Environment Committee on June 5th, 2014

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

So perhaps some of these forestry communities whose economies have been hurt, some of their harvesting activities could continue to produce energy.

[Doug Starr]

Our business model is to understand the waste issues in a particular jurisdiction, and then adapt our solution for the waste. Is it a specific waste stream? Are there barriers to waste issues?

Yes, the technology has the capability of processing anything that's carbon-based that we can turn into energy.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Ms. Leung, you talked about a role for the federal government in R and D for your industry. Can you elaborate on the kind of research and development that you would like to see governments sponsor?

[Emmie K.H. Leung]

In response to the related question you asked Peter a minute ago regarding whether we should recycle at any cost, I have two answers. The first one is that by using technology, the cost to recycle would be less than the net cost of disposal. That's my stand. Just using Halton Region as an example, their blue box cost is $78. If you take your garbage to the disposal site, it is more than $78.

The next one is the technology. Everybody talks about how it just costs too much money to sort the parts, because there's a plastic problem. But if you use the technology we employ today, the optical sorting, you can sort every type of plastic, from one to seven. It's worth lots of money. So this answers the first question about the tangible part.

The second one is the intangible part. Now we are disposing of our waste not by capturing the real cost, just like polluting the air and polluting the water. If you take that into consideration, I think lots of things can be justified. As Peter says, we need data, we need research and development on how to do things better and more efficiently and more effectively.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

We're going to have to stop there.

Thank you, Mr. Sopuck.

Thank you, Ms. Leung.

We'll move to Mr. McKay, please, for seven minutes.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to each one of you.

I'm just trying to get my head around the notion of cutting down a tree and taking it to a waste disposal facility in order to generate energy. It doesn't seem to be a very sensible idea.

I want to direct a couple of questions to Mr. Hargreave first. You and I are looking at television screens here. If we were buying these at Best Buy, Future Shop, or whatever, we would paying some sort of end-of-life fee.

You made some interesting comments about this being a monopoly or an oligopoly. Can you expand on that notion? I had no idea that when I buy a television there is, in effect, an indirect form of taxation. I send off the money. I have no idea where it goes. And I have no idea how that helps with the disposal of the waste from buying a television.

[Peter Hargreave]

It's probably a little bit of a stretch, but I'll provide the example of seat belts.

Seat belts are a requirement in vehicles. We require companies to have seat belts in vehicles. Vehicle companies innovate. They figure out the best way to put those seat belts in the car, and they figure out the cheapest way to do it. That's how they approach it.

With recycling, companies form a large agency, a monopsony, and that agency, then, figures out the price. It sets the price for recycling in a jurisdiction. That price gets passed directly on to you, as a consumer, through the retailer. You have no choice as to how much you're paying. There are no competitive tensions within the system to innovate or to find ways to do things more efficiently or more effectively. You are stuck with the price.

What I'm saying is that doesn't make sense based on the economic and market system we have. It's an issue that has come up in other jurisdictions in Europe. Europe has taken notice of that and has started to take actions. Germany is one example. When they took action to break up those monopsonies, the result was a 50% decrease in cost and better environmental standards.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

I find that quite interesting. So I don't have any real control over the price. The fee is whatever the fee is.

But going to, apparently, the purpose of the fee, how do I know that the fee is actually used for the purpose I just paid for?

[Peter Hargreave]

There is some government oversight, but essentially, those bodies work completely unhindered by any government control.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

So they could be spending it on slick advertising or they could be doing something else with it. How do I actually know?

[Peter Hargreave]

They still have to have audited statements that come out.

But sure, there surely are lots of ways for them to hide money and move it around. I think that has always been the concern.

The concern, bluntly, from the waste management industry, is that we've gone from a system in which we have hundreds of purchasers to a system in which we have one purchaser that controls the fate of the industry. So they make a decision that could potentially put businesses out of business. That has been the real concern. That's why we've certainly been pushing the Competition Bureau and other provincial governments for a long time.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Is this a provincial government problem? Is it generally a consumer problem as opposed to a competition problem?

[Peter Hargreave]

In Ontario it's a problem, to some degree, with how the legislation was written back in 2002. But it should very well be a federal issue.

As I said in my remarks, when you're looking at one organization charging $115 million annually on electronics purchases across the country, surely that's a pocketbook issue that the Competition Bureau should be looking into.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

And 115 million bucks sounds like a lot of money to me.

The second issue had to do with your comment that there had to be consistent standards for conforming processes and that there was a vacuum in political leadership. Again, I didn't quite understand. I take it there are some bad actors in every industry, and there's no regulatory framework to get them to comply. Can you give me a specific example of that so I can understand it?

[Peter Hargreave]

Again, I think I talked about scrap yards a little bit earlier. Scrap yards are probably a good example. Ontario is in the process right now of providing an environmental standard for how vehicles need to be dismantled and recycled. There is no standard right now, so there are players out there that aren't draining the materials or the fluids from those vehicles or are throwing mercury switches out, and you end up with brownfield lands that saddle the federal or provincial government with cost. So that's one example.

Certainly you can look at other types of facilities and ask if materials are being properly recycled or if the majority of that material is just flowing into countries where it's not being properly managed. Electronics is a great example with the Basel Convention, but there are other materials, and there is big concern around where those materials are going.

So you need to have some common environmental standard and then oversight happening within these areas.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

My final question is for Ms. Leung.

Your business model depends upon an adequate supply of material. I hear Mr. Hargreave saying we're at 25% diversion rate and we could be at 60%. Both of you agree that if you look at it differently it is actually a huge amount of value that we're just flushing down the toilet. So the question I have for you is this. Can you access sufficient amounts of material on a regular basis at a cost level that can keep you going 100% on a daily basis?

[Emmie K.H. Leung]

Today, yes. As I mentioned a minute ago, in the last 24 months we have invested $58 million in our business, and in the next 24 months we will probably do the same. There's a tremendous amount of waste, but the education process and getting everyone in business to want to do the right thing is a very slow process. So if we can have what you call legislation, material bans, then that will make a really big difference. We can move as fast as you want us to.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you very much, Mr. McKay.

Mr. Choquette, you have five minutes, please.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank the witnesses for their contributions today.

I'd like to ask you about some very relevant issues, such as the extended producer responsibility as regards the polluter pay principle.

But first I am going to propose a motion. I believe most of the committee members have received a copy of it. If possible, we could hold the discussion and vote during the last 15 minutes of the meeting, in public, of course. The motion reads as follows:

That the Committee meet before the summer recess to consider the public's and the scientific community's growing concerns about the immediate threat posed by seismic prospecting and exploration work currently being done in the marine environment of species listed in the Species at Risk Act and other vulnerable species in the Gros-Cacouna region of the St. Lawrence River; that representatives of the Department of the Environment be invited to this meeting to answer questions on this matter and to establish what activities would have been subject to a federal environmental assessment under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act if this act had not been repealed; and that the Committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

We have a motion before us.

Go ahead, Mr. Woodworth.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Point of order, Mr. Chair, if it is a point of order.

I propose that, as is our usual practice when we are dealing with the determination of committee business, we suspend the public meeting and go in camera.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Mr. Woodworth, I just need a motion, not a point of order.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I will make that motion, please. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

So we have a motion to move into camera.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

I'd prefer a recorded vote, please.