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Vol.9 Number 5		October/November 1999
Environmental News from Georgia Strait in British Columbia, Canada and from the World

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Vol. 9 Number 5 - October/November 1999

Editorial - Requiem for The Disappeared

A Series of Summer Victories
Home Depot Halts Sale of Old Growth Wood Products
Global Public Rejection of Genetically Engineered Foods and Crops
Canada Might Face NAFTA Probe Over Fish

News
False Advertising for Nukes
Boliden Mine Still Leaking into Spanish River
Islands Going Under
Forecast: More Oil Spills
A Victory for Fish
Mice Used in Tests May Be Resistant to Impacts
Canadian Pesticide Residues Climb
A Victory for People
Living Near Traffic Connected to Lung Cancer
Over 4,200 GE Experiments in Canada
Cascade Canyon--The Power of Nature

Features
Potato Paradise Lost
PEI Pesticide Sales Report
Pumping Poison
Life On The Edge - Life is at its most abundant where land and water meet, whether the water is salty or fresh
Pressure Treated Lumber
Preserving Power Poles

Letters
Unbleached? It goes without saying!
Keeping it Clean While on the Road
Plenty To Beef About In Import Tariffs

Toxics, Ink
Sludge Happens

Friends of Cortes Island
Forest Plan Needs Support
Help Wanted for FOCI Home

Magazine Reviews - Taking the Fast Track to the Facts
The Record
Spruce Roots
Auto-Free Times

Opinion
Tax Reduction: The Political and Corporate Bonanza

About Us

It's come to this. The Fraser River is closed to all commercial and recreational salmon fishing until further notice. This year, of an expected 8 million fish, less than 3 million have returned to one of the world's last, best wild salmon rivers.

The shame belongs to all of us, whether or not we fish, whether or not we even eat fish. The exact reasons for this threatened mass extinction are unknown. It is, after all, only one among many, when so many of the native species of earth are finding that they cannot share the planet with human beings. The theories range from over fishing to habitat destruction to global warming; the villains from loggers to government bureaucrats who pandered to corporate appetites. And we all, involved in our orgy of heedless consumption, place the blame where it's most comfortable for each of us.

In truth, perhaps a few brave souls in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans are beginning to ponder the absolute idiocy of their excuse for allowing fishermen to kill up to 80% of the returning salmon year after year. The streams, say DFO, can't handle the fish. The fish, echo the fishermen, are "just wasted" if too many are crowded on the spawning beds. As if nature did not build in over capacity and back up on back up in order to allow all her species to survive, from the old growth fir fertilized by the dead fish to the eagles and bears and human beings. Not for decades, if ever, will all creatures again join at the rivers of British Columbia to celebrate a fat year as they gather the returning salmon.

But the blame belongs to all of us, because in our hearts we know that we cannot disappear two thirds of salmon streams beneath blacktop, we cannot trickle millions of gallons of oil off roads into the nearest ditch which runs into the nearest stream, we cannot spray and spray and spray again in every watershed which runs into every salmon home on the coast, we cannot clearcut entire mountains and watch the streams run brown, we cannot do these things year after year, and expect the salmon to come home.

Rest in peace, all my relations. - Delores Broten, September 1999

Forest activists celebrated another breakthrough in the battle over markets for old growth at the end of August, when Home Depot announced it would stop selling old-growth wood products harvested in environmentally sensitive areas by 2002. The US-based hardware store is the world's largest single retailer of lumber, with 10% of total global sales. Its 856 stores in three countries will phase out products from endangered forests and rainforests, mostly in South America and Asia, but also including areas of British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest, unless the products are certified.

Last year a resolution on the issue was strongly rejected by the company's shareholders, but this year they reversed their stand after forest activists rotated weekly protest actions at Home Depots across the continent.

Genetic engineering of food met major defeats over the summer of 1999. For the first time a major shift occurred in the United States when Gerber's Baby Foods announced that, beginning this summer, they will not buy from suppliers who use genetically-engineered corn or soybean varieties. The company also said it would join Heinz in trying to use only organic ingredients in baby food products. Gerber's is owned by Novartis, one of the world's largest investors in genetic engineering.

In June, EU environmental ministers implemented the equivalent of a three-year moratorium on new approvals of GE foods or crops. A GE food has not been approved in Europe since April 1998. In reaction, major US buyers Archer Daniels Midland and A.E. Staley announced they would no longer purchase unapproved GE corn. Farmers returned their GE seed by the tonne, while both Canadian and US farms reported market losses.

Also in June, the GATT Codex Alimentarius in Rome again refused to certify that Monsanto's controversial recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH or rBST), designed to be injected into cows to boost milk production, is safe for humans. India has banned imports of rBGH, while in New Zealand Eli-Lilly withdrew its application to distribute the drug. The US remains the only major industrialized country to approve rBGH which is now used on 5% of all dairy cows in the USA.

* Campaign for Food Safety News, July 1999

NAFTA's environmental commission has called for an investigation into whether Canada is adequately enforcing federal laws to conduct environmental assessments and to protect fish habitat. The recommendation is in response to the Friends of the Oldman River's 1997 submission under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation.

Martha Kostuch of the Friends of the Oldman River (FOR), welcoming the victory, said, "The government of Canada is failing to comply with and enforce their own laws and the environment is suffering as a result."

It is now up to the Council, whose three members are the Ministers of the Environment from Canada, the USA and Mexico, to determine whether to continue the investigation by preparing a factual record.

* Friends of the Oldman River, August 1999

Thumbs Up to the Better Business Bureau of America which last December ruled that a Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) advertising campaign, which touted nuclear energy as "environmentally clean," was inaccurate. The BBB recommended that the nuclear industry trade group refrain from making such claims. On top of air and water pollution issues, the BBB said that the "environmentally clean" claim is "premature at best," because as yet there is no permanent disposal system for highly radioactive waste created by nuclear plants.

* Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, December 1998

Toxic sludge is still leaking at the rate of 84,000 litres (22,000 gallons) a day from Boliden Mines' Andelusian Los Frailes mine into the river Guadiamar upstream from Donana National Park. The mine's tailings waste pond broke in April 1998 but the mine received permission to reopen despite the fact that environmental groups said the safety of the tailings pond was not satisfactory.

Boliden recently purchased Westmin mines which operates in Strathcona Park on Vancouver Island.

Meanwhile, the company is starting some urban hard-rock mining, offering computer manufacturers a partnership in complete recycling, reusing some parts, extracting the heavy metals from others and burning the waste plastic. Although burning PVC plastic is acknowledged to be a major source of dioxins, Boliden claims to burn the plastic in an "environmentally friendly way" to create energy for the process.

However, the company admits that if manufacturers would identify the types of plastic used, then the plastic as well could be recycled.

* WWF, May 1999, Recycling Product News June 1999

Two South Pacific islands have disappeared beneath the waves, in the island state of Kiribati. Neither island was inhabited, though one was used by fishermen. The South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) says other islands are at risk, in Kiribati, Tuvalu and the atolls of the Marshall Islands.

The small island states of the world contribute only 0.6% of all global warming pollution, but they are suffering disproportionately. In the Indian Ocean, the beaches of a third of the 200 inhabited islands of the Maldives are being swept away. President Gayoom of the Maldives says: "Sea-level rise is not a fashionable scientific hypothesis. It is a fact." More frequent storms will add to the chaos. The rise in levels is happening because water expands as it warms up. Coastal areas of countries like the USA, China and Bangladesh are also threatened.

* BBC News, June 1999

Six "senior employees" of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System have written to the chief executive of BP Amoco, and to three US congressmen, warning of an imminent threat to human life and the Alaskan environment from irresponsible oil operations there, the Guardian of London said in July. BP Amoco owns 50 percent of Alyeska, the company that operates both the pipeline and the Valdez oil terminal near where the huge tanker Exxon Valdez spilled millions of gallons of heavy crude into Prince William Sound. According to the Guardian, the letter included evidence of compliance failures, falsified safety and inspection records, intimidation of workers, and persistent violations of procedures and government regulations.

* The Guardian, July 1999

The Edwards Dam, on the Kennebec River in Maine, is the first US dam to be removed under a policy that weighs power needs against environmental protection. "I just watched a river being reborn. You don't get to see that every day," said Margaret Bowman of American Rivers, after watching the initial breech.

The dam was built against opposition in 1837 along a river that had been known for its thriving fishery. It supplied mechanical power to mills and later was fitted to generate a small amount of hydroelectric power.

* Globe and Mail, July 1999

Lab mice vary widely in their responses to estrogenic chemicals, according to a report published in Science in August. Jimmy Spearow, a reproductive geneticist at the University of California Davis, says the mice favoured for many routine tests have been selected for their ability to have large litters, and that the genetic trait probably also makes them resistant to the impacts of toxic chemicals. This finding, which also was replicated with lab rats, may explain some of the strange variations in results during lab testing for impacts of pesticides and other chemicals.

As the Senate ponders the passage of a revised Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA) which environmentalists are adamant will not protect children from the subtle and long term ravages of toxic chemicals, they should also ponder a study obtained by the Globe & Mail in May. The unreleased government testing showed that residues of pesticides in Canadian produce are rapidly rising to meet levels in imported produce.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency found only 1.2% of domestic produce had illegal levels of pesticides, but that is triple the rate at the beginning of the 1990s. Almost one quarter of all fresh produce grown in Canada, and some processed food, contained pesticide residues, up from around 10% before 1994. Half of apples, cherries and peaches tested had residues. Celery showed a mix of up to five different pesticides in the same stock.

The disturbing news comes at a time when Canadian farmers are professing concern over new American legislation which requires that pesti••• cides be reevaluated for their impact in combinations of foods on children and fetuses. The farmers say this is likely to create a "trade barrier" to Canadian produce.

Environmentalists and toxicologists say that the pesticides are suspected, and in some cases, known, to be carcinogens, neurotoxins, and compounds that pass the placenta to disturb the development of a baby.

Canada's new Minister of the Environment, David Anderson, has stated that he is unwilling to change the new CEPA because the law took so long on its way through Parliament.

* Contact the following people to tell them you are concerned about the growing problem of toxic chemicals in our environment and ask them to do something effective about it. Mail may be sent postage-free to: House of Commons, Parliament Buildings, Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A6

• Hon. David Anderson, Minister of Environment; (613)996-2358; fax: (613)952-1458; Anderson.D@parl.gc.ca
• Hon. Allan Rock, Minister of Health; (613)947-5000; fax: (613)947-4276; email: Rock.A@parl.gc.ca

    Selected BC Senators:

• Jack Austin (613)992-1437
• Pat Carney (613)943-1433
• Ed Lawson (613)996-5453

The Atomic Energy Control Board is calling for a federal environmental assessment before the Pickering A nuclear station is allowed to start up again. Pickering citizens had voted 87 per cent in favour of a full provincial environmental assessment at the plant in a plebiscite held in conjunction with the 1997 municipal election but that request was rejected by the province.

The Pickering A station's four reactors were shut down in December 1997, due to safety concerns. The Durham-based Nuclear Awareness Project want to see the reactors closed permanently and are calling for a full review with public hearings.

Meanwhile, the Ontario government has ordered municipalities near the Chalk River laboratories and nuclear plants in Pickering, Darlington, Bruce County and Monroe, Michigan, near the Canadian border to prepare disaster plans to protect and evacuate millions of people in the event of a Chernobyl-like disaster.

Ontario's reactors recently met all their environmental targets for the first half of 1999, as measured against the industry's averages, despite a spill at the Bruce reactor. In May, four workers at Chalk River received a year's radiation dose while working in an old ventilation pipe which was contaminated sometime during the 1950s. In August, a generating unit of the Pickering Nuclear plant was closed to repair "a small leak of radioactive tritium into Lake Ontario and the air around the plant."

* Toronto Star, July and August 1999, CP Wire, Ottawa Citizen, August 1999

A landmark Swedish study has directly linked exposure to traffic exhaust with the chances of developing lung cancer. A study of 3,500 men showed that those who lived in a heavy traffic area for 30 years had a 40% greater chance of developing lung cancer. A ten year residential exposure to traffic led to a 20% increase in the incidence of lung cancer, irrespective of smoking or economic circumstances. Those men who lived in light traffic areas showed no increased risk of lung cancer. The study follows a Danish examination of high lung cancer rates among professional truck and bus drivers.

* Calgary Herald, August 1999

In March the Green Party obtained information on over 4,200 field trials in genetic engineering which have taken place in Canada over the last decade. The Canadian government is advertising this country's leadership in the field, but Joan Russow, leader of the Greens, said that emerging scientific evidence of ecological and health dangers had her worried. Saskatchewan is the leading province for genetic test, while Quebec and PEI had a few dozen in each province.

The Cascade Canyon is one of those unique places that e••• vokes astounding visual and emotional reactions in even the most apathetic people. For all who have never experienced the Cascade Canyon, and perhaps never will, I can only try to create what can not possibly be described with mere words.

There is a place in the canyon, just below the falls, where eons of rushing water have carved out a stone chair. Sitting in this throne of stone is truly an ethereal feeling, as the fall's spray softly brushes your face and forms rainbows in a myriad of colours that dance and play on the waves. In this mystical place, you quickly become lost in oscillating patterns formed by the flowing water as it crashes off rock walls when it plummets over the falls. It is a place of incredible natural beauty, a place like no other. Imagine this experience, the sensations created upon body and soul. Picture the rushing water, the rainbows, the noise and vibrations. Now imagine the same scene with only one cubic metre of water per second in the same context, if you can. In the background, a huge canal, like an enormous sinuous snake stretching into the distance, diverts the river into a gaping hole that sinks out of sight into the earth. Of course, you would be seeing these sights from behind chain link fences, standing on nice little boardwalks.

The Cascade Canyon is located 2 km. south of Christina Lake on the Kettle River in south central BC, one of only 18 Heritage Rivers in BC. Currently the Environmental Assessment Office is completing stage one of the Environmental Assessment of the Cascade Power Park Hydroelectric Project Application by Powerhouse Energy Corporation. The proposal includes the construction of a 25 megawatt power plant that would divert 90 m3/sec of water, when available, from the 800-metre long canyon creating a 1.7 km reservoir upstream of the canyon.

The Cascade Canyon is home to two--possibly three--red listed species and four blue listed species of fish. One species, the speckled dace (Rhinichthys osculus), lives only in one river in Canada, the Kettle River. Initial reports indicate that "85 percent of current speckled dace habitat may be destroyed by the dam's construction" and "may potentially kill 24 percent of downstream (fish) migrants" (BC Environment, 1999). The proponent proposes to mitigate these effects by creating downstream habitat for the speckled dace, but this has never been done and it may not work. The fact is that there have been very few studies conducted as to which species reside within the river and even less is known about their life-patterns and habitat requirements.

Questions have also been raised about the possibility of the project impacting future water licenses in the Kettle River Watershed, and the effect this may have on future industrial and agricultural ventures in the Boundary District. As well, this project will impact the local tourism industry which Christina Lake and the surrounding region relies upon for the majority of its commerce.

This project must not proceed; we must not allow the Cascade Canyon to be destroyed. Please help the residents of Christina Lake, and the world, to protect the Cascade Canyon in perpetuity, for future generations to experience and enjoy.

* More information about this project is available on the EAO's web page at: www.eao.gov.bc.ca/PROJECT/ENERGY/Cascade. Please write letters of concern to: Mr. Derek Griffin, Project Assessment Director, Environmental Assessment Office, 836 Yates Street, 2nd Floor, Victoria, BC V8V 1X4

The carefully constructed image of Prince Edward Island as a pastoral paradise was shattered this summer. Over the course of one month, nine rivers were poisoned by agricultural pesticides. Thousands of fish were found belly-up, and frogs, snakes, worms, slugs and insects were exterminated.

It was bound to happen. In just a decade, the Island has become a potato monoculture, with one out of every six acres of all land devoted to potato production. Agricultural pesticide use has increased by a whopping 571% over the past 14 years.

The warning signs were all there. PEI is riddled with rivers and streams, and potato producers plough right up to stream's edge, squeezing the last dollar out of every scrap of soil. When it rains, the rivers run red with eroded topsoil and dissolved pesticides. It's normal to have at least one river kill per season on PEI. It's likely there are more--they just go unnoticed.

Charges have never been laid in any river poisonings caused by runoff from PEI potato fields. Why? The industry holds too much political and economic clout. New "right to farm" legislation further protects growers by preventing people from prosecuting them for damages caused by "normal" farm practices. And even though the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans does have authority to prosecute anyone putting deleterious substances into rivers, it doesn't intervene. Two of PEI's four MP's are farmers.

Potatoes have always been grown on PEI, but it was the construction of the Irving's potato processing plant that encouraged rampant uncontrolled growth of the industry. In 1996, the Irving empire opened a second plant on the Island and now almost one billion pounds of potatoes a year are processed. Both Liberal and Conservative governments have encouraged industry expansion through loans, subsidies and other financial incentives. The land has been savaged by the potato industry and neither government nor industry have shown remorse.

On the contrary, government has consistently ignored the will of the people and sponsored "expert" speakers to tell us pesticides are safe. The potato industry, sheltered by a government traditionally dominated by farmers, has thumbed its nose at an increasingly alarmed public. So arrogant and confident of government protection is the potato industry, that after public outcry over the latest river kills, the president of the PEI Federation of Agriculture said the amount of blame farmers were getting for the kills "was getting a little tiresome."

A PEI potato destined for the dinner table is subjected to about 20 applications of pesticide. During the humid days of summer, growers are on a four-to-five-day spray schedule for blight. These blight pesticides are all classed by the US government as probable human carcinogens, and they account for 80%, by weight, of all pesticides sprayed on PEI. If that's not bad enough, about 70% of the pesticides used are also considered endocrine disruptors.

This has serious implications for human health. As Canada's most densely populated province, most rural residents live near potato fields. It's not uncommon for homes and villages to be completely surrounded by sprayed fields, and most schools have potato fields immediately adjacent to the school yard or close by. For years, people have complained about drifting pesticides. In fact, some intensely farmed areas are known by locals as cancer belts.

Growers aren't required to notify nearby residents of spray schedules and people have no legal right to know which pesticides they've been exposed to. When the sprayer shows up, people have only minutes to pull clothes off the line, shut windows, grab kids and pets, and leave for the day. Vapours from evaporating pesticides can hang about for days after spraying, which means that on a four-day spray schedule, there's little relief form the toxic effects all summer.

Besides observations made by nature lovers, we really have no idea how pesticides are affecting wildlife. No PEI studies have been published but people say they see fewer and fewer birds each year. Carbofuran, a commonly used pesticide, is known to kill birds on potato field edges. The Canadian Wildlife Service objects to its use on potatoes, and many organizations, including the American Ornithologists' Union, have called for a ban. Yet its use, and that of other bird-killing pesticides continues, for the birds have no commercial value. Despite calls for controls on further expansion of the potato industry, forests and hedgerows continue to be torn down. Wildlife habitat has been decimated and what's left is fragmented and threatened.

PEI soil is sandy and the bedrock is fractured sandstone, making ground water, our only source of drinking water, extremely susceptible to contamination. Known ground water polluting pesticides are routinely sprayed and a high percentage of residential wells are polluted with nitrates from chemical fertilizers.

Industry, government and even some mainstream environmentalists have tried to marginalize anti-pesticide activists. But after four years of intense campaigning, the tide has turned. The poisoning of nine rivers can't be ignored and the call is out to halt the kills.

Government and mainstream environmental groups favour "buffer zones" along rivers, to act as physical impediments to the flow of eroding topsoil. Government supports 10-metre buffer zones while some mainstream environmentalists have endorsed 30 metre zones. However, those of us who support a deep ecology philosophy have ethical objections to buffer zones.

Promoting buffer zones as a solution to river kills ignores the larger issue--that of industrial agriculture. Our rivers have become drainage ditches for potato fields. Buffer zones would be nothing more than catchment areas for toxic eroded soil, and deadly traps for wildlife. Lured to buffer zones growing up in grasses, shrubs and trees, wildlife will be poisoned directly by pesticide spray drift, and their food sources will be contaminated.

Besides, buffer zones don't stop river kills. A PEI government report says they're effective in reducing sediment entering streams but can't stop the flow of storm water containing pesticides.

The carnage we've seen in Island streams is just an indicator of the more long-term ecological degradation associated with monocultures and the use of chemical pesticides.

We on PEI stand at a crossroads. One path leads us to the downward-spiralling black hole of pesticide regulation. Before we venture on this path, we should look at its success in highly regulated areas like Europe and California. The bureaucracy involved in administering and enforcing the innumerable regulations would make your head spin. The cost to taxpayers for this is mind boggling. Yet in spite of all the regulations, unacceptable harm from pesticides is still documented.

The other path leads to organic agriculture. This is the path some strictly regulated countries, like Denmark and Switzerland are choosing. They've been down the regulatory path and know it's a dead end.

In the short-term, emergency regulations will be necessary for the immediate protection of humans and the environment, and we need to rewild generous portions of PEI, including all riparian zones. And let's get rid of industry words like "buffer zone" and move swiftly and without compromise down the path of organic agriculture.

* Contact: Sharon Labchuk, Earth Action, 81 Prince St, Charlottetown, PEI C1A 4R3; ph: (902)368-7337 / 621-0719; fax: (902)621-0719; slabchuk@isn.net

Group A: (sales of each active ingredient greater than 50,000 kg)

Chlorothalonil
Mancozeb
Metiram

Group B: (sales of each active ingredient between 10,000-50,000 kg)

Diquat
Endosulfan
Glyphosate
MCPA present as amine salts

Group C: (sales of each active ingredient between 1,000-9,999 kg)

2,4-D amine salts
Acephate
Atrazine
Azinphos-methyl
Carbofuran
Carbathiin
Copper Sulphate
Cupric Hydroxide
Cypermethrin
Dimethoate
Dinoseb
Linuron
MCPA as potassium or sodium salt
Metalaxyl
Methamidophos
Metobromuron
Metribuzin
Mineral Oil
Paraquat
Phorate
Pirimicarb
Propamocarb hydrochloride
Thiabendazole
Thiophanate-methyl
Thiram

The war at the gas pump rages un••• abated, with the oil and gas companies and consumers lined up in unequal battle over gasoline price hikes. Meanwhile, the toxic assaults from benzene, Poly Aromatic Hydrocarbons and other natural components of this fuel so central to current industrialized society continue to wreak havoc. Urban smog drifts across the continent of North America. Sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxides, ozone, all cause respiratory illness and premature death, a high price for the marvel of personal mobility. But the naturally toxic results of burning gasoline are compounded by the questionable additives our governments allow, and even mandate, the gas corporations to add to this dirty brew.

The story of legal battles, corporate rule under NAFTA, and fears about toxic gasoline additives got even more extreme in July, this time featuring the American additive of choice, MTBE, methyl tertiary butyl ether.

California announced plans to ban the gas additive MTBE in March and more US jurisdictions are likely to follow. The chemical causes cancer in mammals such as laboratory rats and mice. The EPA has announced plans to reduce the amount of MTBE in American gas. MTBE has been found in reservoirs, ground water and surface water, including storm water run off, across the US, and 10% of California ground water, including over 10,000 wells, is contaminated with traces of the additive.

Although most MTBE quickly evaporates, it is persistent and very mobile in water. A spill of one litre of gas with MTBE additive can contaminate a well 300 metres away.

In July, red-ink plagued Methanex Corp. of Vancouver Canada threatened a $960 million lawsuit against the US government under NAFTA, alleging that California's plan to ban MTBE amounts to an expropriation of its investment in the US market.

Last year, the Canadian government tried to ban another gas additive, MMT, methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl, a manganese compound. MMT, due to resistance by the US EPA, now overruled by the courts, has been used mainly in Canada. Ottawa's motivation for banning MMT was twofold: manganese is a potent nerve poison, and auto manufacturers claimed that MMT interfered with the computerized diagnostic systems and catalytic converters on new cars. The sole producer of this additive, Ethyl Corp. of Richmond, Virginia, sued under NAFTA. Ottawa lifted the ban and paid Ethyl $20 million. [See "The Vampire Child Comes Home: MMT Puts NAFTA on Trial," Watershed Sentinel, August/November 1998]

Ethyl Corp. was also the major producer of lead additives from 1923 until leaded gasoline was banned in the 1980s. Leaded gasoline was banned because levels of lead in children's blood, as well as those who have to work in traffic, were causing illness, lowered intelligence, and neurological dysfunction.

Among the many bizarre twists in this story is the fact that 500,000 tonnes of MTBE, which so readily travels in and contaminates surface water, is manufactured in Edmonton, Alberta, and shipped by railroad along the Bulkley, Skeena and Kitimat Rivers for transfer to California-bound tankers at Kitimat in northern British Columbia. Despite the new evidence of how quickly MTBE can contaminate water, neither the federal nor provincial governments can or will overturn the permits issued under old Environmental Assessment processes. In fact, a new plant in Alberta, owned by US Bioclean Fuels, plans to produce a further 800,000 tonnes a year of MTBE and ETBE from barley and butane.

MTBE was assessed as a Priority Substance under the (old) Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA), and deemed to be "non-toxic." However, the scientific review included no data on human health issues obtained after October 1991, and no environmental impact data obtained after April 1992. There were no studies on human populations exposed to the chemical, and animal experiments on chronic toxicity and carcinogenicity had not yet been completed.

The definition of 'Toxic-Under-CEPA' includes a criteria of how much MTBE there is likely to be in the Canadian environment, for which the reviewers simply calculated a generous spill allowance of 1% plus-a-bit of the 500,000 tonnes produced in Edmonton in 1992, spread over the entire country. Clearly, the situation has changed: there are further worrisome animal experiments; there is a growing level of manufacture and use (and probably spills) in Canada. It is time to reevaluate MTBE, which is now considered a possible human carcinogen in the US.

But the strangest aspect of this entire convoluted story of toxic contamination of a continent is that not all of these additives are necessary for most automobiles, according to the Canadian Automobile Association, among many others.

So what's going on? What is this stuff, and what's wrong with gasoline that it needs all these additives - octane boosters, oxygenizers, detergents - with every gas station billboard trying to convince you that your car will implode if you don't choose just the right brand and the most expensive gasoline? The basic corporate profit motive hidden and protected in some badly-negotiated trade deals is one part of a confusing and devious road map.

What is Gasoline?

Gasoline is refined from crude oil, which, Ashland Petroleum explains on their web page, "is a mixture of thousands of different compounds of hydrogen and carbon, or hydrocarbons." The crude oil is refined by separating it into different fractions based on the vapourization at different temperatures. These fractions are then purified and transformed into high end products, from gasoline and kerosene to diesel oil, with asphalt being one of the "dregs" at the bottom of the distillation tower. Low end fractions are improved, and contaminants including sulphur, are removed, using pressure, catalysts, and heat.

The cleaner the gas the more intensive this complicated refining process needs to be. This is why the gasoline companies are threatening dire price consequences if the Canadian government moves to require lower sulphur content in our gasoline in order to improve air quality. The important thing to note here though, is that gasoline is mostly just a string of hydrogen and carbon atoms. It burns releasing a lot of energy, which is harnessed by the internal combustion engine. The heat of the gasoline burning causes the gases to expand, pushing the pistons in the motor up and down. The gas needs to burn at the same rate as the pistons move, for maximum efficiency. If the combustion is too slow, unburned fuel is exhausted as pollution.

If the gas burns too fast, the pistons can't keep up, and the engine will be damaged. That mysterious 'Knocking' is the sound of a too rapid expansion of gases in the motor. If combustion is too fast or too slow energy is wasted.

Enter the Mysterious Octane Rating

Gasolines are graded on their ability to burn smoothly and without knocking, on an arbitrary 'octane rating' based on how different hydrocarbons burn in a special test engine.

Octane is a hydrocarbon with eight carbon atoms and is assigned an octane rating of 100. Gasolines are blended with additives to reach the appropriate burning rate. Most automobile engines require an octane rating of 87 or higher.

In fact, Statistics Canada says that in 1995 only 10% of the cars on the road required premium gasolines, although those expensive high end gases claimed 16% of all gasoline sales.

Incidentally, the auto techies say that switching octane levels is not particularly good for modern cars, since the computer which regulates gas flow needs to readjust. They also say higher octane gas is not going to "turn your Ford into a Ferrari."

Even the gasoline companies suggest you read your owner's manual and use what the car manufacturer recommends. (Car companies explicitly don't recommend gasoline with MMT as an additive!)

Additives Also Add Oxygen for Cleaner Burning

In order to get the octane level of 87, additives to gasoline are required, which brings us back to the sad stories of lead, of MMT, of MTBE, and of NAFTA.

But there's more. In 1990, to improve air quality in American cities, the US government amended the Clean Air Act to require the addition of oxygen to gas so it would burn cleaner, emitting carbon dioxide instead of carbon monoxide. Gas which burns cleaner can also be made by improving the refining process but this is not mandated by the law.

American gas companies immediately chose to add up to 15% MTBE, which contains oxygen, thus triggering an explosive growth in the amount of the compound manufactured and released.

In some parts of the United States, a wave of worker and consumer health complaints, from headaches and eye irritations to coughs, nausea, and dizziness, although unproven, immediately followed.

Dr. Peter Joseph, on the Asthma Task Force of the Philadelphia Dept. of Health, believes that the doubling and tripling of asthma rates in US cities is related to the time in each area of introduction of MTBE, although he stresses that the health complications may be due to breakdown products such as formaldehyde, tertiary butyl nitrate, or others, as the volatile compound decomposes in the air.

Alaska, where the cold temperatures mean that MTBE does not break down quickly when it disperses into the air, almost immediately switched to ethanol; Alaska was followed by Maine, and then California.

What's Wrong with Ethanol?

Ironically, the simplest and cleanest alternative as a fuel additive is probably the most innocuous: ethanol--alcohol produced from corn, grain, or even wood chips, possibly pulp mill sludge. Methanol, wood alcohol, would be even cheaper as a gasoline substitute, but it is toxic, and so corrosive that it would require stainless steel gas tanks and pipes in automobiles.

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada points out that ethanol as fuel has three main advantages:

• It's cleaner burning than gasoline,
• It can be produced from renewable sources, and,
• It would provide an extra economic base for rural communities.

The same advantages apply to ethanol as an octane booster instead of the troublesome products we have mainly used to date.

What's the problem? Some technical difficulties with vapour pressure which had led to smog generation have been solved by better refining. But the oil refineries would rather use products they make, than dilute their share of the gasoline market by adding ethanol from other sources.

Ethanol is not particularly cheap to make, although probably competitive as the technologies develop. Commercial Alcohols in Tilverton Ontario produces 6 million tonnes of fuel grade ethanol and 19 million tonnes of commercial alcohol a year. The fuel blend goes into farm gas from Imperial Oil and Petro-Canada, thanks to the persistence of Ontario farmers. Sunoco and UCO Petroleum distribute an ethanol blend from their refineries. Mohawk distributes ethanol-boosted "green gas" in western Canada.

An environmental concern about ethanol, of course, is using food grains and valuable farm land for non-food purposes. Interestingly, AgCanada points out that the protein and fibre left after production of ethanol from grain can be fed to cattle, provided the plant is in an area with a market for these co-products.

The solution to the gas wars about gas additives is probably multi-headed, from new technologies for transportation, and new non-petroleum engines, to a careful selection of the kinds of chemicals used for improving gasoline.

As Peter Montague points out, in "Bad Decisions Again and Again," (Rachel's Environment and Health Weekly # 541, April 1997) it is time that we changed the way corporations make these decisions which affect our lives and future generations:

"Shouldn't we require an assessment of all available alternatives and selection of the least damaging? And should that burden of proof be placed squarely on the Ethyl Corporation--and others like it--and not on the public? Where can all this poisoning be taking us?"

* With thanks to Josette Weir, Smithers BC and all others who sent information

* If you are interested in working on the MTBE contamination issue, contact: Eugene Conway, MTBE Activist, Box 16, Conception Harbour, NF AOA 1ZO; ph: (709)229-6206; fax: (709)229-4806; email: econway@nfld.com

Two ecosystem types are among Earth's most important and most abused: estuaries and wetlands.

Occurring at the interface of land and water--whether salty or fresh--it was at this margin where life first crawled rather than swam. It is the margin that often manifests society's paradoxical relationship with nature.

Estuaries

Estuaries are transition zones where fresh water mixes with salt water; they occur where rivers meet the sea. Like all transition ecosystems, estuaries are places of tremendous biological diversity. Nutrients in rivers flow downstream to mix with and feed near-shore marine organisms, and together these enrich the local environment. In fact, estuaries are among the richest, most productive, and most diverse ecosystems on Earth. They are also among the most endangered and very often bear the brunt of human waste and contamination. Just as nutrients flow downstream, so do river-borne pollutants.

From humanity's beginnings, estuaries have been major centres of settlement, becoming economic, transportation, and cultural focal points for coastal communities. Because of this, however, estuaries are frequently dredged, diked, drained, built-up, or otherwise altered, and their natural functions impaired.

Estuaries perform a number of important ecological functions and come in a number of habitat types: shallow open waters, freshwater and salt marshes, sandy beaches, mud and sand flats, rocky shores, oyster reefs, river deltas, tidal pools, sea grass and kelp beds, and wooded swamps. The wetlands adja••• cent to many estuaries filter out sediments, nutrients, and pollutants, and provide cleaner water for the benefit of both people and marine life.

Because of their richness, estuaries provide permanent and seasonal habitat for many types of plants, animals, and fish. They provide critical staging and nesting habitat for millions of migratory birds and water fowl, and their often sheltered, tidal waters provide safe places for juvenile and spawning fish and shellfish; in this way, they are regarded as nursery grounds.

Estuaries of big sediment-laden rivers, like the Fraser, are major places of deposition where large areas of agricultural lands build up. The Fraser's delta extends from roughly Chilliwack downstream to the ocean. Over 70% of its estuary, the largest on Canada's Pacific coast, has been diked, drained, and developed. Still, it provides winter refuge for more than 130 species of birds and supports millions of salmon and over 1.5 million migratory birds during peak times including the federal Alaksen National Wildlife Area and Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary and the provincial Sturgeon Bank WMA and Boundary Bay WMA. The bad news for Boundary Bay is the recent announcement that BC now wants to sell Crown green belt and agricultural lands around Boundary Bay. These green belt lands were purchased by the province in 1974 for their conservation value and many have been farmed specifically to enhance the WMAs in the region. This quasi-protection was enabled by the Green Belt Protection Fund Act of 1972 but, under Socred legislation of 1977, the lands are currently available for private sale. The BC Assets and Land Corporation, acting under the Ministry of Finance and rapidly becoming the bad boys of Crown corporations, is now eyeing them with a different shade of green, the almighty greenback.

Maplewood Flats on Burrard Inlet in North Vancouver, offers a good sample of a salt marsh, mud flats, and adjacent freshwater marsh in the heart of the urban landscape of Vancouver. In part a project of the Wild Bird Trust of BC, the area does double duty as a wildlife sanctuary and as a nature classroom. A variety of individuals and organizations have worked together to establish protection of the area.
For more info, phone 604-924-2581 or website: www.pesc.org/web_files/wbt/index.html.

Vancouver Island Estuaries

The Nanaimo River estuary is Vancouver Island's largest. It, too, has seen considerable development, but 200 ha have been set aside for wildlife. The Cowichan estuary, one of the least developed on the east coast of the Island, has 300 ha of intertidal habitat and back shore farmlands in a wildlife management program. The Englishman River estuary has a combination of management regimes over nearly 900 ha, the result of a hard-won battle with developers.

Many preservation efforts have been spear headed by the Pacific Estuary Conservation Program, which works in conjunction with the Nature Trust of BC, Ducks Unlimited Canada, BC's Habitat Conservation Trust Fund, Canadian Wildlife Service, farmer's organizations, and a host of local and regional citizen and conservation groups.

(Check out PECP websites: www.ec.gc.ca/press/pecp_b_e.htm; http://www.ramsar.org/key_awards99_interview_pecp.htm)

Goldstream Provincial Park near Victoria features the estuary of the Goldstream River. In past years, it was always open to the public and subject to the impacts of considerable use. About four years ago, park naturalists closed access to the lower river and estuary to "give wildlife a place to be where people aren't."

The first season brought new winged and four-legged users: black bears, great blue herons, swans, and bald eagles, with a pair of eagles taking up residence. Over 200 eagles used the estuary the following year. Since this estuary experiences a large chum salmon run every fall, it is an opportune place to observe predators at work. The public can view them thanks to a video camera and TV screen in the visitor centre.

An estuary walk had been scheduled on the day I visited. The group was small to keep impact to a minimum. While the ground we were walking on seemed sturdy, it was quite spongy and in winter is completely under water at high tide. It was a wonderful opportunity to go literally toe-to-toe with some of the organisms living in the sandy soil at the top of the salt marsh, and in the muddy parts further down, where we saw dozens of small shore crabs and a variety of mud worms. We learned how centuries of runoff from the river deposited the layers of silts and how different hydrological regimes over time have created numerous channels, some drying up and some containing more fresh than salt water, and how to tell the difference by the types of plants growing in the different micro-environments.

We were also treated to the first flight of two fledgling eagles. We could hear the cries of their concerned parents, who dropped bits of food, enticing their young to fly increasingly longer distances.

There are 407 estuaries along the BC coast, but this is less than 3% of BC's 7,000-km-long indented, island-dotted coastline. Nonetheless, they are used by about 80 percent of all coastal wildlife, including over five million water birds that journey along the Pacific Flyway each year.

Wetlands

Wetlands, whether adjacent to estuaries or inland, provide crucial habitat for a large number of plant and animal species. They cover about 6% of the earth's land and freshwater surface and are critical to the stability of the global environment. Canada has about a quarter of the planet's wetlands. Also called bogs, fens, marshes, and swamps, wetlands sustain more life than any other type of ecosystem. Like Rodney Dangerfield, however, they get no respect. Most of us know all too well the alarming rate at which wetlands have been misused, destroyed, and polluted in past decades. Only recently has society come to appreciate their importance not only as habitat and centres of biodiversity, but for their role in the purification and maintenance of fresh water and as reservoirs and buffers in times of flood. Bogs also provide long-term storage of carbon (more even than forests) and methane; two greenhouse gases that, when released to the atmosphere, contribute to global warming. When bogs are disturbed, these gases are released.

Wetlands have always been special places for me. As a kid growing up in Michigan, a quintessentially swampy state, I remember numerous places where I learned to appreciate their tremendous diversity. One of my favourites-- Chandler's Marsh-- was a short walk from my home. Ponds and creeks and deer and bluegills come to mind, along with garter snakes, snapping turtles, frogs, dragonflies, and the drone of cicadas. It was there I used to lie on the ground with my magnifying lens and be transported to the Lilliputian world of tiny plants and insects; I would marvel at the many different forms and colours. There was even an area of "quicksand," about which tales of bodies occasionally rising to the surface would terrify the daylights out of us kids.

In my mind's eye, I can still see every hue in the rainbow come autumn at the marsh, and the song of a red-winged blackbird evokes all those memories. Thanks to a misguided notion of "progress," the area is just another runway for the local airport today.

The litany of loss of wetlands is astounding. By 1981, 79% of the wetlands present in the Vancouver area at the time of European settlement, and 76% of those in Victoria, had been lost. Many of us have witnessed the agonizing deterioration of Somenos Marsh, adjacent to the Island Highway on the north end of Duncan. [See "Labour of Love for Somenos Marsh," WSS Vol 9:1, Feb/Mar 99]. Turner's Bog, one drained and developed wetland of the greater Victoria area, is now the site of a Canadian Tire store. For some interesting info on Victoria area wetlands, check this website: www.birding.bc.ca/victoria

One of the most well-known bogs in BC is Burns Bog. It is a very rare domed, or raised bog, likely the finest example in northwest North America. Occupying about 3,000 ha. (down from 4,000 ha) on the south shore of the Fraser River, it may be one of the largest urban wilderness areas in the world. Black bears, deer, coyote, and over 150 species of birds, including the threatened greater sandhill crane, call the bog home.

An "Ecological Symphony"

Thousands of water fowl use the bog as seasonal feeding grounds, and rare plant species abound. Carnivorous sundew, rein orchids, cloudberry, and the red-listed narrow-leaved goosefoot and false pimpernel, to name a few, are found here, relict species from when the glaciers were retreating from nearby shores. One biologist called it an "ecological symphony," yet it would seem that not the right ears can hear it.

Burns Bog is home to the largest garbage dump west of Toronto. Nearly a quarter of BC's solid waste is dumped here daily. This landfill is rumoured to be in contravention of the province's landfill criteria. In the meantime, the City of Vancouver makes $22 million in profit annually. Among numerous other threats is cranberry and blueberry farming along the edges of the bog, which leaches fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides into the delicate ecosystem. (For more info, see Burns Bog Conservation Society website: www.burnsbog.paconline.net)

Imminently threatened is Hull's Field wetland, adjacent to Langford Lake, west of Victoria. The first assault came when the E & N Railway separated the wetlands from the lake when they created a permanent base for the RR tracks.

Today it's the usual story: drain it and build houses on it, short-term gain for the developer and an increased tax base for the local municipality.

Never mind the fact that the lake and its wetlands ecosystem cannot withstand the ecological effects this will have; Langford Lake is a slow flusher and is already near its limit for dealing with excessive nutrients.

Never mind the fact that Langford's Official Community Plan, adopted three years ago, declared the area "environmentally sensitive."

Never mind the fact that the area is currently in the Agricultural Land Reserve and would have to be withdrawn from the ALR for development. That ought to test the mettle of BC's new Minister of Environment, Joan Sawicki, who, when she was parliamentary secretary to the previous minister, quit that job as a protest to withdrawing land near Kamloops from the ALR for a resort. (For more info on Hull's Field, contact G.E. Mortimore, (250)474-5157.)

One way to save wetlands has been to give them sanctuary status. Some provincial wetlands, such as those at Vaseux Lake in the Okanagan, are somewhat protected within provincial parks. North America's oldest water fowl refuge is at Last Mountain Lake in Saskatchewan, established in 1887 by Parliament and which today continues as a Migratory Bird Sanctuary, part of a network of 98 sanctuaries in Canada. (See the Saskatchewan Wetland Conservation Corp. website at www.wetland.sk.ca/index.htm --comes with bird sounds!)

Canada has a federal policy on wetland conservation. Check out these websites for more info:

www.wetlands.ca/wetcentre/wetcanada/wetcanada.html;
www.cws-scf.ec.gc.ca/hww-fap/nwambs/nwambs.html;
www.nais.ccrs.nrcan.gc.ca/schoolnet/issues/wetlands/ ewetland.html

The US EPA Office of Water also has an excellent site at: www.epa.gov/OWOW/wetlands/facts.html

My advice to readers is to get out to your local wetland and enjoy it, maybe even find out how to protect it for future generations so they have as many wonderful memories as I have of Chandler's Marsh. Let's hope your favourite wetland doesn't become just a memory.

Chromated copper arsenate (CCA) treated wood, com monly known as pressurized or Wolmanized wood, is used extensively in outdoor construction: for playgrounds and picnic tables, for planters and garden furniture, for fences, decks, porches, and walkways, and for docks and wharves. This greenish-coloured wood is popular because it resists rot and can last up to 30 years. And perhaps because of its prolific use, its safety is rarely questioned.

Three years ago, when we needed a new front porch, my husband and I chose CCA-treated wood because of its claims to longevity and safety. As a person with a history of chemical sensitivities, I wish I had checked more carefully. Before the porch was completed, I began to experience burning in the palms of my hands when I touched the railing and in the soles of my feet when I walked on the porch. By the time it was completed, a mere touch of my hand on the wood caused my arm to go numb; I began to suffer nausea and weakness.

Alarmed, I contacted an environmental building consultant who told me I was likely picking up arsenic dust from the surface of the wood. Tests showed I was suffering from arsenic and chromium poisoning. We decided to remove the porch and replace it with one built of untreated spruce.

This experience led me to read widely about the subject. I discovered that there are a number of safety concerns. First, there is a lack of research in North America on the effects of CCA-treated wood on human health. This is in part due to a lack of clarity in regulatory responsibility, in part due to postponements in government reviews of the process. Second, there is considerable debate over the amount of chromium, copper, and arsenic that leach out of CCA-treated wood. Third, there is no safe means of disposal of CCA-treated wood once it exceeds its useful life.

CCA is registered as a pesticide with Health Canada's Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA). The chro mium is toxic to certain fungi and helps fix the preservative to the wood fibre; copper is toxic to a wider range of fungi, arsenic to wood-destroying insects. But chromium and arsenic are also toxic to humans. Above trace concentrations, chromium is carcinogenic (causes cancer) and mutagenic (alters genetic material). Arsenic is carcinogenic, mutagenic and teratogenic (produces birth defects). Copper in concentrations from 0.02 milligrams/litre to over 10 mg/l is acutely lethal to certain species of fish, algae and invertebrates.

The CCA wood industry, represented in Canada by the Canadian Institute for Treated Wood (CITW), claims that the process of pressure-treating "fixes" or seals in the pesticides, thereby eliminating risk to humans. Raw lumber is sealed inside a pressure cylinder, where a vacuum sucks out air and water from the wood. The cylinder is then filled with a mix of water and pesticides and the pressure increased, forcing the mixture into the wood.

The CITW denies there is any health risk to humans if the wood is handled and used properly. CITW and Health Canada handling precautions recommend the use of plasticized gloves, plus, if sawing and machining the wood, goggles and a dust mask. After working with the wood, wash exposed skin thoroughly before eating, drinking or smoking, and wash your work clothes separately from other clothing, before wearing again. Although the precautions warn that CCA-treated wood should not be used where it may come in contact with drinking water, animal feed, or food, there is no warning against its use for picnic tables.

Government regulations

In Canada, production of CCA-treated wood is licensed provincially. The labelling and use of wood-preserving chemicals is regulated at the federal level by the Pest Control Products Act, which is administered by the PMRA.

All heavy-duty wood preservatives have been under re-evaluation since 1992. In 1995, this re-evaluation became a co-operative effort of the PMRA, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the California EPA under the NAFTA Technical Working Group on Pesticides. The re-evaluation should be completed by fall 1999.

The length of this process is not unusual. In 1996, the PMRA had performed more than basic testing on only 3.5% of all chemical pesticides in Canada. The United States Congress ordered the EPA in 1972 to retest and reregister 600 active chemical ingredients, yet by 1985 the EPA had retested and reregistered only 16 of them. The American example is important because Canada follows the EPA in many cases. The co-operative review under NAFTA further erodes the possibilities for Canadian independence in pesticide regulation. Jennifer Reynolds, in If Food Counted, described the EPA as a "bureaucratic organization that has a horrible track record for succumbing to corporate pressure." The American treated-wood industry has already exerted enough pressure to obtain a hazardous waste exemption for CCA-treated wood

There are several shortcomings in the testing procedures the government employs for CCA and other pesticides.

First, industry supplies the scientific studies and trials. This shifts the burden and cost of proof to the producer, but it also builds in a bias.

Second, tests for pesticides are performed on animals, not humans. But animals and humans do not always manifest the same reactions.

Third, human tolerance levels for pesticides are set for adult males, not women and children; children are especially vulnerable to pesticides due to their small size and less-mature detoxifying systems.

Finally, tests look at only short-term, single pesticide exposure, not long-term, cumulative or multiple exposure. People are already exposed to naturally occurring arsenic in food and in drinking water in some areas of the country.

Because of the number of pesticides and other toxic chemicals to which humans are exposed, the effects of CCA exposure are difficult to analyse. David McCray, a lawyer in Indiana who has won three claims involving injuries from CCA-treated wood, states, "The effects of CCA exposure can be insidious and can range from hair loss, to itching skin, bleeding, and nerve damage."

Workers in CCA wood-treatment plants and carpenters who work frequently with CCA-treated wood have even higher levels of exposure than the general public, another issue ignored by Canadian and American governments.

Leaching

The treated wood industry argues that CCA is fixed in the wood and therefore is not readily available for absorption by skin contact and respiratory inhalation. Despite industry's claims, however, there is widespread evidence for leaching of the pesticides; production of safe CCA-treated wood involves complex chemical reactions that can be compromised in commercial production, resulting in less than complete chemical "fixing" and subsequent leaching.

The Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation, in their publication Building Materials for the Environmentally Hypersensitive, advises that "some of the chemicals may not be fixed and can leach out. A white surface residue indicates that CCA precipitated out of the solution. The environmentally hypersensitive should not use this material." A study performed in 1991 for Health and Welfare Canada found that the soil under playground equipment made from treated wood had arsenic concentrations up to 24 times higher than areas just 10 metres away. Using a cloth, they wiped ten of the structures and got measurable amounts of arsenic each time. Chromium and copper showed up, too.

In the US, Judith and Peddrick Weis conducted a number of studies on the effects of leaching from CCA-treated wood in marine environments. They found that in areas adjacent to the wood, there was a significant reduction in species richness, total number of organisms, and diversity. J. Warner and K. Solomon, of the University of Guelph, published a study in l990 in Environmental Toxi cology and Chemistry that examined the effect of pH on leaching from CCA-treated wood. Copper, chromium and arsenic leaching from new and weathered wood were found at all pH levels, with higher metal concentrations in acidic conditions. At pH 5.5, for instance, 92% of the copper, 12% of the chromium and 32% of the arsenic leached out. This raises concern for the amount of leaching caused by acid rainfall along eastern areas of Canada and the US. It also means that the rate of leaching is accelerated in acid environments such as bogs, silage, and compost.

David E. Stilwell, an analytic chemist at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station of New Haven, Conn., measured copper, chromium and arsenic concentrations in soils collected under seven decks built with CCA-treated wood. The decks ranged in age from four months to 15 years. In all cases, the samples collected beneath the decks had significantly higher levels of the chemicals than did soil collected five metres from the decks. Stilwell is now working on a playground exposure study; thus far it indicates the use of CCA-treated wood should be avoided wherever possible in playgrounds, especially on surfaces children touch.

Robin Barrett is an environmental building consultant who runs Healthy Homes Consulting in Sackville, NS. Sometimes he sees CCA-treated wood that is not properly dried or has a white powder residue on it. This concerns him, because it means the chemicals are not bound to the wood. When considering CCA-treated wood for outdoor projects, Robin says, "We do not know the real risks, so why not play it safe. It's easier to prevent a problem than to fix it. If I have a choice, I'll go for the safer material." If CCA-treated wood is already in place, and a client is concerned about potential safety risks, then Mr. Barrett works with his client to decide the best solution, which may include removing the wood or sealing it.

People can indirectly absorb leached arsenic if they eat vegetables grown in soil contained by CCA-treated wood. A British study of contaminated soil, at a site where treated wood was made, found that carrots grown in soil containing 200 parts per million (ppm) of arsenic produced crops containing nearly twice the current recommended limit for arsenic in food. Arsenic can be toxic to plants at levels as low as 1 ppm soluble arsenic.

Disposal

CCA-treated wood does rot eventually and must be disposed of. Every year producers in the United States manufacture more than 5 billion board-feet of CCA-treated wood, and the amount is increasing. CCA-treated wood from the early 1970's is now finding its way into landfills. Researchers at the Forest Products Laboratory in Wisconsin estimate that 2.5 billion board ft. per year of treated wood products are currently entering the solid-waste stream. That level will rise to 8 billion board ft. per year by the year 2020. This will place a huge burden on declining landfill space.

Unlined landfills may not adequately protect area groundwater from contaminants in CCA-treated wood. Landfills in Minnesota have already stopped taking CCA-treated wood scraps because of concerns about chemical leaching and water contamination. CCA-treated wood should be classified as a hazardous waste, but it is not. The EPA's Toxic Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP) sets threshold levels for toxicity of 39 different chemicals, including chromium and arsenic. If measured leaching from a waste product exceeds the TCLP limits, it is considered "hazardous waste" and regulated accordingly. CCA-treated wood does not have to pass the TCLP rule, because it has a special exemption, likely the result of strong lobbying pressure. Results of one test obtained by Environmental Building News show that CCA-treated wood actually fails the test for arsenic and only barely passes it for chromium.

The ash from treated wood that has been burned does not have an exemption and fails the TCLP rule. Incineration of CCA-treated wood is unacceptable from either a human-health or an environmental standpoint, even in state-of-the-art municipal incinerators: chromium and copper become concentrated in the ash, while arsenic becomes a vapour that either escapes into the air or is trapped in pollution control equipment. There have been at least two reported incidents of people who used treated wood for fuel and developed neurological problems, numbness in the arms and legs, loss of hair, skin rashes, and gastrointestinal upsets.

Because of concern over the disposal issue, Environmen tal Building News and the American Institute of Architects both recommended in 1997 that CCA-treated wood be phased out. Some European countries, including Germany, banned CCA-treated wood in the 1970s. The three major American producers of CCA have developed copper-based alternatives to CCA, eliminating the most toxic components of arsenic and chromium, but these alternative products are not available in Canada. Neither are there any financial or government incentives to make the production switch from CCA: the copper-based alternatives are more expensive to produce, and Canadian and American governments continue to extend the end date for their review of CCA. If there is to be a phase-out of CCA, it may have to be consumer-driven.

What can be safely used instead of CCA-treated wood? If wood must be used where rot or insect infestation is likely, naturally rot-resistant species such as cedar can be an option. Tamarack (larch) is an under-priced softwood that is plentiful in Nova Scotia and is harder and more durable than spruce; hemlock is also a viable substitute but tends to splinter.

Untreated softwood can be finished with an environmentally friendly sealant to increase longevity. Borate preservatives are much less toxic than CCA, but they will leach out of wood in wet conditions. They are effective for treatment against termites when wood will not be exposed to weather. Finally, recycled plastic lumber and concrete are alternatives for some applications. Hamilton, Ontario, has spent $1 million since 1988 removing CCA-treated wood from civic playgrounds and replacing it with untreated wood and plastisol (nine-gauge steel covered with plastic).

Contrary to what the treated wood industry would have us believe, CCA-treated wood is not an environmentally safe, non-toxic building material. It leaches poisonous chemicals both during use and after disposal. The industry claims to be helping the environment by saving trees, but surely the toxicity of treated wood outweighs this benefit. The treated wood industry and the wood products sector should be actively pursuing and promoting safer alternatives, and we should be encouraging them to do so.

* Andrea Johnson lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Excerpted with permission from: Between the Issues, Ecology Action Centre, 1568 Argyle St., Halifax NS, B3J 2B3; (902)429-2202

References

Bamwoya, James Jasper "Soil and sediment contamination at four wood preservation facilities in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia in 1989." Environment Canada, Atlantic Region, 1992
Bower, John. "Treated Wood and Your Health." Greenkeeping, Sept./Oct., 1991, p. 28.
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, "Pressure-Treated Lumber." Building Material for the Environmentally Hypersensitive.
The Canadian Institute of Treated Wood. Pressure Treated Wood in Residential Construction. Ottawa.
Ferrara, Mike. "Spring Soil Spectacular." Organic Gardening, April, 39(4): 27, 1992.
Health and Welfare Canada (Health Protection Branch) "Pressure-Treated (Preserved) Wood and Wood Preservatives." October 30, 1991.
Health Canada, "Co-operative Re-evaluation/Re-registration of Heavy Duty Wood Preservatives, Update," Pest Management Regulatory Agency, April 20, 1998.
Hopey, Don "Wood treatment linked to dangers." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Jan. 25.1998
Long, Cheryl. "Arsenic again shown to leach from pressure treated wood." Organic Gardening, Apr.1997, 44(4): 18, 20.
Long, Cheryl and McGrath, Mike (1994) "Treated Wood." Organic Gardening, Jan., 41(1): 71-74.
Reynolds, Jennifer (1996) "If Food Counted." Halifax: Nova Scotia Public Interest Research Group, pp.17, 20 & 53-54.
Stilwell, D. E., (1997) "Contamination of Soil with Copper, Chromium and Arsenic Under Decks Built from Pressure Treated Wood." Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, 58: 22-28.
Warner, J.E. and Solomon, K.R. (1990) "Acidity as a Factor in Leaching of Copper, Chromium and Arsenic from CCA-Treated Dimension Lumber." Environmental Toxicology & Chemistry (9): 1331-1337.
Weis, Judith S. and Weis, Peddrick (1991) "Effects of contaminants from chromated copper arsenate-treated lumber on benthos." Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology, 26: 103-109.
Wilson, Alex (1997) "Disposal: The Achilles' Heel of CCA-Treated Wood." Environmental Building News, 6(3): 1, 10-13.

BC Hydro has found three alternative wood preservatives which can add 50 years to the life of a power pole. After an integrity check, the poles can be wrapped in an external plastic bandage with a membrane containing copper napthenate which is drawn into the pole. Alternatively, drill holes can be filled with a liquid fungicide, metam sodium, which gasses into the wood after the drill hole is sealed. For the last four years, however, Hydro has been pleased with the results of using a solid rod of environmentally-friendly boron, sealed into the poles and safe for areas with wetlands and/or other sensitivities. Ray Read, a BC Hydro biologist, says the six inch boron rods, although more expensive than other treatments, perform admirably, with the boron travelling well over a metre up and down inside the pole. BC Hydro does use the green CCA-treated new poles, but Read says they pay extra to make sure the preservative is "fixed" before the poles are installed.

* Delores Broten

Dear readers ...
We welcome your letters, but we will edit for clarity, brevity, taste, and legality. Write: The Watershed Sentinel, Box 39, Whaletown, BC V0P 1Z0, Canada; ph/fax:(250)935-6992; email: wss@rfu.org

It's been said that when you want to keep someone unaware of the facts, you don't deprive them of information, you provide them with too much of it--and bury them in so much data that it all becomes inaccessible.

As a fast-track to the facts, the Watershed Senti nel offers reviews of periodicals that are filled with inspiring stories about the people, events, and ideas you want to know about.

This is one of the best community newspapers in BC, if not all of Canada. The Record is subtitled News & Views from Canada's West Coast, and is published by Jerry and Lynne West in Gold River on northern Vancouver Island.

The Record features the usual community fare of local happenings, regional politics, weddings, real estate, and pizza palace ads, but it is incredibly inclusive in the range of community sectors and members it serves, and manages to look good while doing it. The photos are plentiful and clear, and really do enhance their respective stories. Even the most locally oriented article is written in a style and language that is a pleasure to read. I get a strong sense that the editor is a courageous person who is willing to put his money where his mouth is.

In a recent issue, the editor comments on the responsibility of newspapers to open-up community debate on controversial issues. Commenting on an opinion piece in the previous issue that drew both flak and commendations, he says: "In a democracy, one of the most valuable things we possess is the freedom to speak our opinions and have our ideas heard for consideration in determining the course of our society, no matter how pleasant or unpleasant those ideas may be. Debate is a healthy process for democratic progress, and enabling debate is an important function of a newspaper." Good stuff!

After reading an issue, I feel I've learned more not only about the communities of Kyuquot, Port McNeill, Tahsis, Gold River, Port Alice, and Zeballos, but also about how these are microcosms of the larger world. Incidentally, they have one of the best websites I've ever seen.

* Check it out at www.island.net/~record. You can email The Record at record@island.net, or call them at (250)283-2324.

In its masthead, this journal says it "exists to provide perspectives and promote discussion on issues that affect Haida Gwaii." Many of these perspectives and discussions are much more encompassing than the comparatively tiny corner of the world from which this journal comes. Published in both paper and electronic format (www.spruceroots.org), SpruceRoots is free, and is quintessentially Queen Charlottes. And it isn't afraid to ask such (maybe) rhetorical questions as: "What if MacMillan Bloedel disappeared from Haida Gwaii?" (Now there's food for thought!)

Nor does it shy away from a definition of Act of God in an article about a diesel spill into a salmon stream: "An Act of God is sometimes what we call a mishap when it is inconvenient to look too hard at how we may have been responsible." Or, when talking about habitat repair: "We have turned environmentalism into a cost, which is wrong."

* Contact the Gowgaia Institute at (250)559-8756 or by email at gaia@spruceroots.org.

This news magazine, published in Arcata, California, hits the nail on the head when it comes to criticising the mainstream media: "Our [society's] undeclared war against nature is the underlying reason for socio-economic sputtering and the upcoming collapse. The voices in control--the mainstream media--don't draw the connections." Auto-Free Times focuses on the damage to nature caused by our "pave-it-so-we-can-drive-on-it" society. The publishers say it's not about targeting motorists, it's about the destruction that roads themselves create. Stating that any debate on whether or not global warming exists is irresponsible and a red herring, an editorial talks about the larger issues of the unrealisable American Dream of "progress" and the role of the automobile as the "greenhouse-gas-generator" of choice.

The issue I reviewed contained a letter from Rick Coronado entitled "Canadians Against the NAFTA." Rick is a Canadian Auto Workers Union member; he explained why the Citizen Environment Alliance of Windsor, Ontario, was joining the Alliance for a Paving Moratorium.

* Contact the publishers at: autofree@tidepool.com; Website: www.BikeRoute.com/AutoFree; Snail-mail: Box 4347, Arcata, CA 95518, USA; Phone: (707)826-7775.

Federal and provincial politicians throughout Canada are trying to out-do each other in their promises of tax reductions. Although none have yet promised that corporations will be able to tax the governments, many observers of the FTA and NAFTA deals, signed by Canadian governments in recent years, would expect that to be a bargaining chip in the coming rounds of the World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations.

Of course, such promises would be useless to the corporations. They've had those tax privileges for years in tax incentives and outright grants in the guise of employment creation programs. And then, after the initial flurry of construction and start-up of an enterprise, comes automation and downsizing, the jobs go out the door with the laid-off workers and the enterprise continues, freed from the burden of a heavy payroll. The corporation hoists the Jolly Roger and prowls the shipping lanes of the job creation industry, the government, wearing its medals, sails into the next election campaign and the workers, bearing their scars like caught and released salmon, wait for the next electoral hook to be dangled.

The corporations have, in effect, been given the right to tax the citizenry. Government carries the corporate bags and baits the hooks. The general citizenry carries the scars, and deserves them. Indifference, coupled with party loyalty, is an expensive, taxable luxury.

Corporations, as such, do not vote. The votes of the politicians, in general elections, are too few to have any significance. Only the citizenry determines the outcome of an election. So citizens have a right to expect the democracy that's been promised. But that expectation carries with it an obligation, a responsibility to be diligent, to be informed. And diligence does not mean turning on a TV set to watch a gang of millionaires struggle to put a piece of hard plastic in a net at the end of an ice rink.

Citizens have a duty to be involved. That involvement should include challenging the assumptions, statements and actions of the politicians they elect.

Surely, by now, most of us should be aware of the work-saving technology that pervades the daily lives of all of us, the social value of that technology, and its impact on the work-force. It is unnecessary to strive for a forty hour work week. When politicians come dangling their hooks, promising jobs, at election time we must demand a thirty or twenty hour work week.

And if our vaunted social system is to continue, we would do well to realize that responsible citizens pay taxes. Responsible governments impose and collect taxes. Corporations are a ledger entry and, as such, are neither responsible nor irresponsible.

It's up to governments to impose responsibility on their directors.

It is a compliment when readers send us letters and articles for publication. We are sorry we cannot publish all the material we receive. Deciding what to put in/what to leave out is a tough call. In order to present a broad range of topics, many good items are shelved and then become dated. You can help by ensuring that your articles are researched, documented and topical. Don't be discouraged. Your next article may trigger a polar shift.

About us
Reach for Unbleached! started in 1991 as a grass roots organization in British Columbia, Canada in response to fishing closures due to dioxin contamination from chlorine-bleaching kraft pulp mills. We are now a national foundation, and a Canadian registered charity with a focus on consumer education and pulp mill monitoring.

Patrons of the Watershed Sentinel donate $100 or more to the Friends of Cortes Island Watershed Sentinel Development Fund, so we can make a better magazine. Donations are tax deductible.