Big corporate polluters have long been required to report to Ottawa the
dangerous chemicals they routinely dump into the environment under federal
laws applying to such facilities as steel mills, tar sands plants, and pulp
mills.
Now the City of Toronto is considering a micro refinement to this macro
scheme with a community right-to-know law that could require smaller
businesses, perhaps even mom-and-pop enterprises such as local dry cleaners
and filling stations, to tell their neighbours what hazardous substances
they use and release into the environment.
In a move that would be the first of its kind in Canada, the city is close
to developing a bylaw that would require smaller businesses to disclose
their emissions of 25 dangerous air pollutants, including benzene, a
carcinogen found in gasoline, and perchloroethylene, a harmful solvent used
by most dry cleaners.
The Board of Health will debate the disclosure bylaw proposal at its regular
meeting today.
Such disclosure laws already exist in several U.S. communities, including
New York City. A public health official said Toronto is mulling over the
idea because it hopes the outing of small- and medium-scale polluters will
encourage them to clean up their acts.
The benefit of disclosure is that it 'will certainly encourage them to pay
more attention to what they're using and emitting and that this will
hopefully stimulate greater interest in pollution prevention,' said Monica
Campbell, manager of the public health department's environmental protection
office.
The city believes it needs a new disclosure bylaw in part because federal
right-to-know requirements click in only when there are big releases of
pollutants - 10 tonnes in most cases. Consequently, only 3 per cent of
Toronto's 11,000 businesses need to publicly reveal their discharges.
The city estimates that more than 80 per cent of the most dangerous
substances dumped into Toronto's air escape federal disclosure requirements.
Levels for many of these harmful chemicals in the city's air already exceed
public health guidelines, frequently by large margins.
According to a technical paper compiled by Dr. David McKeown, Toronto's
medical officer of health, many of the substances the city is proposing
disclosure about are already found at elevated levels in the city's air.
Chromium, for instance, is found at a level more than 1,000 times higher
than recommended by the California Environmental Protection Agency.
For greenhouse gases, the federal law is even more lax. No factory exceeds
the 100,000 tonnes of yearly carbon dioxide emissions, or about the amount
released annually from 20,000 cars, that is the minimum public reporting
threshold set by Environment Canada.
Ms. Campbell said pollution-disclosure rules designed with big factories or
oil refineries in mind often don't meet the needs of city dwellers, who may
live only metres away from businesses releasing harmful substances.
The city's board of health is expected to recommend a bylaw forcing
disclosure of the use and release of dangerous substances later today.
Ms. Campbell said the city still must decide what thresholds would require a
business to report its pollutants, and she doesn't yet know if the reach of
any new bylaw would extend to local gas bars or the corner dry cleaner.
'We want to balance getting as much information as possible with being
reasonable about the reporting burden, obviously, on very small premises,'
she said.
Local environmentalists have been lobbying for the disclosure bylaw. Katrina
Miller, a spokeswoman for the Toronto Environmental Alliance, says the bylaw
would provide local residents interested in a clearer neighborhood with
information on which companies they need to press for pollution cleanups.
Solvent solutions
Dangerous pollutants frequently found in Toronto air that are under
consideration for the new right-to-know bylaw include:
Benzene: The solvent is found in gasoline and concentrations are frequently
elevated around gasoline stations. Benzene exposure has been linked to
leukemia, lymphoma, lung cancer and bladder cancer.
Perchloroethylene: The solvent is used to dry clean clothes and degrease
metals. It is a suspected carcinogen and high exposures have been linked to
liver and kidney damage in animal tests.
Formaldehyde: The chemical is used in glues, plywood, particle boards and
embalming fluids, among other applications. It is a suspected carcinogen
linked to nasal cancer and leukemia.
Particulate matter under 2.5 micrometres: These are extremely small soot
particles, often formed by burning diesel fuel, that can become imbedded
deep in lung tissue. Small particles have been linked to heart disease and
asthma.
Chromium: It is used in metal-making and in paints and dyes. Some forms have
been linked to increased risks of lung cancer.
Vinyl chloride: The chemical, used as a building block for many plastic
compounds, is linked to an increased risk of cancers of the liver, brain,
lung and blood.
Dichloromethane: This solvent, frequently used as a paint remover, has been
linked to cancer and liver damage.
MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT
Globe and Mail
Toronto
ENVIRONMENT REPORTER
July 9, 2007
