Environment Committee on June 4th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Mr. Lussier.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Ms. Kenny, you talked about your notice of intent and partly explained the scope of the settlement concerning dishwashing products. Provisions on laundry soap are already included in the CEPA; so you aren't just going to deal with dishwashing products.

[Margaret Kenny]

As described in the notice of intent, the areas that we are examining for regulation include laundry detergents. They are already in CEPA, but at a percentage of 2.2% by weight phosphorous. This proposal would lower this to 0.5% for laundry detergent. There is also the dishwashing detergent, with the proposed standard of 0.5%.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

In your presentation, you talked about phosphorus concentrations in waste water that is discharged into the lakes. Did you also consider discharges into waterways?

[Margaret Kenny]

I'm afraid I have not completely understood the question. I did not, in my presentation, identify the concentration in lakes themselves or in waterways.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

It's the concentration of the product.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

You mentioned in your presentation that you wanted to have new regulations passed on waste water discharges into the lakes, but you didn't talk about discharges into rivers. Was that intentional?

[Margaret Kenny]

Perhaps I misspoke. We were talking about the regulation of municipal waste-water effluent that would set a standard for treatment. It would reduce the amount of phosphorus, among other substances, that would be entering any waterway.

[John Carey]

If I correctly understood,

for surface waters, which is your question, we have Canadian water quality guidelines, some of which are formulated for the protection of aquatic life. They are not national regulations, however; they're national guidelines, which are implemented by the provinces rather than--

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

—particularly targeting—

[John Carey]

Secondly, we have been working with Agriculture Canada in recent years to try to formulate environmental quality standards with respect to beneficial management practices in agriculture, such as the setbacks and buffer zones, etc., and their performance with respect to the actual concentrations in the receiving water, which would help guide the formulation of those practices.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Blasioli, did you also study certain documents concerning Switzerland, which has had bans on phosphates since 1986, and which has belonged to the WTO since 1995? Were limits imposed on them concerning their products and activities in the WTO? You seem to want to transfer the problem to NAFTA, but has this matter previously been considered in the WTO agreements?

[Daniel Blasioli]

Those facts were not part of our examination.

I'm not saying this is the case in this particular instance, but I would caution you that “ban” may be a euphemism for a very low limit, like 0.5%, as opposed to a true absolute zero ban.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Carey, you said that you were a chemistry expert. Has phosphorus been assessed in dredging waste?

[John Carey]

Has phosphorus been assessed in dredging waste? I'm sure that our dredging disposal guidelines consider phosphorus. I don't know the number off the top of my head, but it certainly has been a contaminant. It's been known for quite a while.

We do have guidelines for the open disposal of dredging waste.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

All right.

A few minutes ago, in his presentation before the member who introduced the bill, Mr. Harvey made an outburst in which he talked about the slightly broader scope of your draft regulations. He even included the shoreline issue. Does the government also intend to legislate on the protection of shorelines, including those of lakes?

[Margaret Kenny]

The regulation we are talking about here would fall under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. Part of this act deals with nutrients very specific to cleaning products, and that is the area we are considering regulating at this point.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

I see the distinction. We thought it had received priority information. I think we're going to get more concrete information from our officials.

In your opinion, is the regulation of domestic waste water a provincial or federal jurisdiction?

[Margaret Kenny]

I might respond first to this question.

This is an initiative that the federal government, with the provinces and the territories, is undertaking under the auspices of the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment. So the objective is to jointly develop common standards, one of which would be published under the Fisheries Act, a federal piece of legislation; but then every province and territory would have the opportunity to put their own measures in place.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Does the federal government intend to set conditions for the infrastructure program that funds waste water treatment works? Does it intend to set rules and conditions for the municipalities that build those waste water treatment infrastructures?

[Margaret Kenny]

My understanding of the strategy that accompanies these standards is that it will be phased in over a period of time, so that a municipality, for example, would need to be making investments to meet these standards ultimately. I know there are interactions or conversations between the infrastructure programs, but I do not have the details to answer the specific question that you asked.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

The presenter of Bill C-469 often mentioned septic facilities. The word “defective” is very often associated with them. Will the government's research make it possible to establish, for example, the distances that must be respected between a lake and septic facilities? Does the department intend to intervene in those construction rules?

[John Carey]

Thank you for your question.

We have done some research on the migration of both nutrients and microbes and viruses in soils from septic systems, which we do communicate to the provinces and municipalities, who are in fact responsible for the bylaws that control these. So, yes, we do have some information on it, which can inform the setting of setbacks and other processes.

However, I think one of the problems that sometimes can be ignored is that many of these cottages are built on terrain that is simply not suitable for septic systems. It's not a question necessarily of setbacks, if you're building cottages on the Canadian Shield, where you simply don't have enough soil for a septic system to work at all.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

All right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Mills]

Thank you, Mr. Lussier.

I will let the last two members have their full times, so we'll go slightly over time, because we started half an hour late. But if you do finish in less than ten minutes, that will be okay too.

Mr. Cullen.