[MAverick]

50% mortality is allowable? That's insane. The Fisheries Act is pretty specific. How could they have obtained approvals for this?

I'm really pleased with the stance the band has taken on environmental issues of late, and also the specific issues they're getting behind. Likewise Sarah Harmer re the Niagara Escarpment.

Mav, can you point me to any info on the actual fish community involved here? Is Bath Cr. a coldwater or a warmwater stream, is there any important spawning habitat, etc.?

Hmm, this I am not sure about. I can tell you, the Lafarge plant is really not far from Lake Ontario. I have a place a few klicks east of the city, accross from Kingston.

Waterkeepers would be the pace to go for that type of information.

Here's another article:

Hip band fights tire-burning plan
WAYNE HIEBERT/SPECIAL TO THE STAR
The Lafarge cement plant near Bath, Ont., is at the centre of a protest over plans to burn tires. The Tragically Hip rock band, which has a studio in the eastern Ontario town, is among the protesters.


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Apr 10, 2007 03:29 PM
Canadian Press

A fight to keep a cement plant from burning tires in Bath is getting backing from some of the town's most prominent residents.

Rock band The Tragically Hip has a studio in the town and lead singer Gord Downie says they felt compelled to speak up when the government green-lighted the plans of Lafarge Canada Inc.

Downie says the company's plans to create energy by burning tires has been approved by the government with no environmental assessment and no community input.

He says it's an issue that impacts directly on the community but could play out anywhere across the country.

The Kingston-based band joined a group of local stakeholders in filing a complaint with the Environmental Review Tribunal, and have helped win an appeal of the project.

Downie says the town is happy it will finally have its concerns heard – although it took far too much struggle.

"You don't have to scratch very far or very hard to find an issue like this everywhere, where people are forced to dig into their own pockets to defend themselves against something they never asked for," Downie said in an interview.

"All we're asking for is, `Is it safe?"'

Mark Mattson of the group Lake Ontario Waterkeeper said it's a big victory for the people of Bath to finally get a seat at the table and a chance to influence things happening around their own homes.

"These (appeal) processes are always good for the community and good for the public generally," Mattson said.

"This decision really should send shockwaves throughout the Ministry of the Environment and our political party in ruling in terms of reflecting on that decision."

Robert Wright of the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, which is taking on the case, said the government needs to reconsider its recent policy of allowing some incineration projects to skip lengthy environmental-assessment processes if energy is produced during the process.

"This appeal process was really a last resort because the other environmental-assessment processes had not been engaged," he said.

"(The government should) go slow, look at it very carefully to analyze the pros and the cons and do a proper assessment of it."

There are currently no facilities in Ontario that incinerate tires, but Lafarge has received clearance from the Ministry of the Environment to do so.

The company was chosen as a pilot project to gather data about what impact, if any, incineration would have on the environment.

Wright said the local community is concerned about what kind of emissions will enter the air and water given the facility plans to burn tires and other materials including animal parts.