  Walkerpub Member Username: Walkerpub Post Number: 152 Registered: 12-2003 |
U.S. House votes unanimously to ban Canadian trash imports April 24, 2007 By KATHLEEN GRAY FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER Despite warnings from the Bush administration that banning Canadian trash into the United States would hurt American businesses, the U.S. House of Representatives unanimously approved the ban today. “We love our Canadian neighbors. We love their trade,” said U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, the Brighton Republican who sponsored the legislation along with U.S. Rep. John Dingell, D-Dearborn. “But you don’t throw your trash in your neighbor’s yard.” BUT HERE'S THE KICKER FOLKS: But in a letter from Justin McCarthy, assistant U.S. Trade Representative and Jeffrey Bergner, assistant Secretary of State, the Bush administration warned that the legislation could prompt reciprocal action from Canada. The country accepts hazardous waste from 230 companies in 32 states. “The administration is concerned that the enactment … would have the unintended result of increasing the disposal of hazardous waste in the United States and lead to an unnecessary trade dispute,” the letter stated. http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs .dll/article?AID=/20070424/NEW S06/70424052 | ||
Gsgeorge Member Username: Gsgeorge Post Number: 132 Registered: 08-2006 |
Get your trash outta my state. If we stop taking in their trash then that means there'll be more room for the "hazardous waste from 230 companies in 32 states." We produce it, we better dispose of it (properly). Canada should do the same. | ||
Walkerpub Member Username: Walkerpub Post Number: 153 Registered: 12-2003 |
Does that mean you'll stop sending us fumes from your belching smokestacks anytime soon? River Rouge Detroit Incinerator Not to mention the Ohio Valley coal burners et al... | ||
Blueidone Member Username: Blueidone Post Number: 48 Registered: 03-2007 |
I was employed briefly by a company that owned a landfill. The income potential for those who have capital to properly run a landfill is TREMENDOUS. I agree that Canada should keep its trash to itself, but I don't hold out a lot of hope that it's going to happen. There is too much money at stake for Michigan businesses. | ||
Jjaba Member Username: Jjaba Post Number: 5267 Registered: 11-2003 |
The trash they send us is in payment for defending their asses, eh. The Canadians have one battleship in each ocean and 4 old F-15s parked on the Shores of Hudson Bay near Polar Bear Park. But what great neighbors on our 5,000 KM border. jjaba. | ||
Charlottepaul Member Username: Charlottepaul Post Number: 844 Registered: 10-2006 |
I had heard before that there are no open landfills in Ontario. I find that kind of hard to believe; anyone know for sure? | ||
Blueidone Member Username: Blueidone Post Number: 51 Registered: 03-2007 |
I don't know for sure. But it seems to make sense because they pay a LOT of money to bring their trash here. They truck it as far as the Cadillac area through Port Huron. I think a lot of their land is considered "permafrost" and landfills cannot be placed there. | ||
Walkerpub Member Username: Walkerpub Post Number: 154 Registered: 12-2003 |
There was a plan to put Toronto trash in a giant open pit in Kirkland Lake during the Mike Harris regime. It makes some interesting reading Garbage plan scuttled, mayor still hopeful. Northern Ontario Business, January 2002 Bill Enouy, Kirkland Lake mayor, is not holding out much hope that a composting plant proposal designed to handle Toronto's burgeoning garbage problems would be accepted by mega-city politicians any time soon. But, like the provincial Tories, he is not totally ruling it out yet. "We've been doing this for 11 years. Every time we think it's dead, it comes back," says Enouy. The project, has the potential to create 90 jobs in his town with the construction of a state-of-the-art facility at the Adams mine, but has been blacklisted by Toronto politicians and stigmatized by protesters that scuttled an earlier Rail Cycle North proposal to dump millions of tonnes of garbage into the abandoned open pit mine. After signing a deal in December with a Michigan landfill company, Toronto intends to truck its garbage down the Highway 401 corridor to Republic Services Inc.'s site in Wayne County, Mich. What kind of reception they will receive at the Canada-U.S. border is anyone's guess, considering the opposition of a number of southwestern Ontario mayors, Michigan legislators and candidates for governor running on a platform of no outside garbage. In a November press conference, Gord McGuinty, who heads Rail Cycle North, and United Transportation spokesperson Glenn King accused the Harris government of "dropping the ball" in stealing away a $600-million contract from Northern Ontario. "Especially when Northern Ontario is so economically depressed and the offshoots of this project are so considerable," says Enouy. Despite assurances from Premier Mike Harris, both McGuinty and King demanded the premier stay true to his word in ordering an environmental assessment of the Toronto-to-Michigan plan. Enouy says without a big contract from Toronto, the Enviroganic composting project cannot proceed, since the Adams Mine owners - McGuinty's Notre Development Group and their partners - cannot be expected to pour about $90 million to $100 million in needed infrastructure improvements into the site. The composting plant is one of the keystone projects proposed by the town and private development interests to transform the slumping mining and forestry community of 9,000 into a waste-reduction centre of excellence. The town had offered an attractive incentive package with a plan that could cost Toronto between $70 million and $100 million less over the next 20 years than it would pay to truck waste across the border. Kirkland Lake was prepared to invest $20 million in capital money to build the composting plant, along with offering free transport and processing for the first 25,000 tonnes of waste a year over a 20-year period, with the second 25,000 tonnes brought in at the same price as landfilling it. Despite Toronto rapidly growing out of its landfill capacity at the Keele Valley dump in Vaughan, Enouy says his presentation of their enviroganic waste diversion last summer to the city's works committee largely fell on deaf ears. "Adams Mine is a dirty word to them," Enouy says. Although he has few allies at Toronto city hall, Enouy harbours some optimism that the proposal will remain alive as Greater Toronto's only viable back-up plan, especially if border tie-ups and pressure from Queen's Park and the State of Michigan force them to scuttle the deal. "There will be a day when there is no other proposal on the table but ours," says Enouy. "I don't see how you can site a landfill in Ontario when you let 50 radicals dictate policy for you. The only licensed landfill in Ontario suitable for that tonnage of garbage is the Adams mine." | ||
Upinottawa Member Username: Upinottawa Post Number: 818 Registered: 09-2005 |
Calling international trade lawyers: does this law contravene NAFTA? | ||
Erikto Member Username: Erikto Post Number: 547 Registered: 11-2003 |
A hundred million dollars from the Ontario government to bring 90 stinking jobs to the area around the Adams mine? Not to mention the additional tens of millions promised by the town, and presumably underwritten by some higher level of government. Anyhow, the argument is moot. The City of Toronto purchased a land-fill site near London. In the mean time, one of the so-called 'state of the art', clean(er?) burning incinerators is going up somewhere near Ottawa; if it turns out to be as clean and effective as promised, that could point many municipalities in a 'greener' direction. |
