Fisheries Committee on April 7th, 2022

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

I appreciate that level of support, but the nature of the question is, are they coordinated? Are they actually working in concert with one brain and a lot of activity?

[Kevin Butterworth]

They are, but this is after the fact. That is the key piece of this. This is cleaning up stuff that is up and down the coast. This is not part of the unified command. I think the best way to look at it is as part of the response efforts.

When they do that first response and the first cleanup, that is still done with a federal lead, with all the other agencies in support.

This is further down the line in the recovery area, which is around pulling together all the stuff that's left. It picks up other pieces that are on their land around the coastline.

Does that help with your question?

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Yes. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Hardie.

We'll now go to Madame Desbiens, for six minutes or less, please.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for their testimony. They are always very relevant and interesting.

Dr. Langlois, I really liked the part where you said that Canada, particularly the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, needs to ensure that there is proper labelling and traceability when transporting dangerous goods.

Can you tell us more about this? Have you explored this in any detail?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

I am an ecotoxicologist, and the issue of labelling and traceability is not my area of expertise. However, I can tell you that we feel somewhat the same way. The labelling of personal consumer products is important in order to be able to respond quickly in the event of a cargo spill. There is some tracking of those containers, but in order to prioritize a spill, there are several levels of response. Private sector companies, as well as provincial and federal agencies, must respond quickly to spills.

It comes back to the same idea that simple and clear labelling of the goods being transported is necessary. It's important to note that all cargo, regardless of the goods they carry, will have an impact on the environment if it's spilled and left in the water for a long period of time. That said, some materials are more toxic than others, so it's important to respond quickly to spills.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

I think a better buoyancy system for containers carrying dangerous goods would be a good option.

I understand that the costs associated with retrofitting with a buoyancy system can run in the millions of dollars, but would this be feasible at an acceptable cost and in the short term?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

As I understand it, materials that are known to be extremely toxic are already transported in sealed containers to protect the carriers. However, containers may also contain certain drugs or pesticides that don't fall into this category. If containers are damaged and there is a spill of such products, there could be an environmental impact.

Consider not only toxic products that are already recognized as toxic, but also consumer goods or recycled goods that are transported from one location to another. If they end up in the environment, there will be an impact. If they aren't as toxic as liquids, which are immediately diluted in the ocean mass, they will still have an effect on the environment in the short, medium or long term.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Could the classification of materials transported by ship according to the degree of danger they represent make it possible to target ships that present a high danger in order to take the necessary measures upstream?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

I think so, but you'd have to ask the other witnesses this question to find out what is currently being done. If there was an incident, there would already be a recovery plan. There needs to be a plan and modelling done to anticipate the impact on the environment.

Research could be done to model the impact of a spill by taking into account, for example, the miscibility of liquids or the degree of hazard posed by other toxic materials. A number of university researchers, particularly at the Institut national de la recherche scientifique, or INRS, can do modelling for a potential spill.

[Caroline Desbiens, Bloc, Beauport—Côte-de-Beaupré—Île d’Orléans—Charlevoix, QC]

Are the departments involved taking your recommendations into consideration?

Is your budget adequate?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

Research budgets are never sufficient.

Of course, you can never be too informed. It's important to have the right systems in place that allow for all contingencies. As I said at the outset, there are many possible permutations of contaminants, and a wide variety of ecosystems can be exposed to a spill risk. You have to do a lot of studies if you're going to be able to respond effectively.

There was mention earlier of an incident involving two containers in British Columbia. It would have been important to have information about the goods being transported in these containers and to know the potential impact of a spill of these products. All materials can be poisons, and it depends on their concentration, so it's important to be able to model all this information.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Madame Desbiens. Your six minutes is up.

We'll now go to Ms. Barron, for six minutes or less, please.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and to our witnesses who are here. I really appreciate the emphasis that's been placed on prevention and protecting our coast. That has come up over and over again.

I have a question for Mr. Butterworth.

I know that the B.C. government has done quite a bit of work and has been focused on protecting our coasts. I'm wondering if you can speak a bit to the funding that has been initiated and the gaps you've been seeing along the way. How can we work better alongside you as federal partners? We're hearing a lot about the importance of an integrated response plan, and of course working alongside the provincial government is a key piece of that. I'm wondering if you can speak a bit to what you've been doing and how the government can work better with you to have an integrated response plan.

[Kevin Butterworth]

I'm happy to do so. We're very keen on developing a coordinated all-hazard response plan that addresses oil and other hazardous substances. One of the things the Zim Kingston has shown us is that there is a big need for an all-hazard response plan to address more than just marine oil spills. If you have a look at certified response organizations, such as the Western Canada Marine Response Corporation, they're only required to demonstrate preparedness for and respond to world pollution incidents, so there is definitely a gap in that area.

Another piece you may be interested in, which also fits with some of your earlier questions, is geographic response plans. They're something we're very keen on here in B.C. We do them on the land base, and we're looking to work to move that into regulation at some point in the future. Basically, you end up putting together a plan on how you respond that is very specific to an area. It's about working with the local indigenous groups and local authorities to develop these geographic response plans. In this instance in the marine environment, it could quite easily be led by the federal government, while working with the different groups that have their different levels of jurisdiction, to develop plans specific to each region, which would allow folks to respond in a very efficient manner.

Another piece you might be interested in is the possibility of long-term funding for indigenous groups and local authorities to increase their spill planning and response capacity, with staff, planning, training, equipment, etc. It all comes down to being well prepared and able to prevent things if possible, and to having a fast response. A key piece of this is also making sure that information is open and transparent. Just as a reminder, the funding attached to the oceans protection plan does end in 2023. We'd be very keen if the federal government were to develop a long-term funding strategy to ensure the protection of the coastline and waterways beyond that. An example of one of the questions that will need to be addressed at that point is how will emergency tow tags be funded in the future?

There's also a guarantee of compensation for loss of use and some clarity from the federal government on its enhanced cost-recovery provisions and environmental cost-recovery framework. How will we be able to guarantee access to communities and to the province, with full, fair and timely access to the funds? Will we be able to work closely with the federal government in the development of their policy to make sure that we can get their policy aligned with B.C.'s provincial regime? How can we work more closely on those things?

I'll stop there.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Butterworth for sharing that very helpful information.

Madame Langlois, thank you for all of your thoughts and, of course, for sharing your knowledge of the importance of getting plastics out of our waters and the impacts these containers have in polluting our waters. One of my NDP colleagues, Gord Johns, put forward a motion 151 in the past to address ocean plastics.

Could you expand a little bit on your work in understanding the impacts of these containers being left in our oceans and the plastics and debris from these containers being left to float in our waters and wash up on our shores?

[Dr. Valérie Langlois]

It's a bit like you just said as an introduction, that any broken container containing plastic will obviously come to the surface and float, most likely, and contribute to the already increasing plastic pollution. One issue with plastic is that it's a very nice thing because it's so persistent, but that's also the problem with it. It's something that doesn't degrade. When it floats, the UV light will destroy the molecules a bit and it will start degrading—or we think it's degrading; we don't see it, but it's just changing forms. It's becoming microplastic.

So it's still there. You just don't see it with the naked eye. The smaller it gets, the more it's contributing to other types of damage. Plastic is one of the threats to the planet at the moment. It was such a brilliant invention, but now we're stuck with it. We are finding it in our lungs. It stays there. It's sticking everywhere. It doesn't go away.

For everyone who uses a plastic mug, which I don't, just think about the plastic that gets released after that—

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Madame Langlois. I apologize for cutting you off.

I so appreciate the information. You're spreading education and awareness of the impacts of these plastics on us. Clearly, we need to have some strong prevention in place to keep these plastics from floating and ending up in our systems in so many different ways.

I'll move on to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Barron. You're well over the six-minute allotment.

We'll now go to Mr. Zimmer for five minutes or less, please.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you to our witnesses.

My questions will be directed to Chris Hall.

Chris, I was just looking at your resumé. It's quite extensive. You have experience with the Coast Guard and port authorities and different things like that.

Maybe I'll start with a bit of a preamble. As somebody from British Columbia who's close to the angling community there, we're very concerned about any contaminants getting into the water that would affect fish and wildlife. But that said, we had an industry witness on Tuesday who said that the incidence of container loss is actually very low, below 0.001% of all containers shipped. That said, if one container goes overboard and it contains some contaminants that get out, that's a big deal.

I want to ask you specifically, Chris, with your experience in the shipping industry, what you think needs to be done on the preventative side. I was just talking with my colleague Mel Arnold about the potential in the future of something that is in a hazardous state. Perhaps a container has floats. We've all used those life jackets that inflate when you hit the water. Perhaps there's technology that hasn't been developed yet for some of these more hazardous containers. There's also a container recovery project in Australia where they have some really neat gear and are recovering containers that go overboard.

Is there a lack of the infrastructure that we need? Maybe you could give some recommendations, Chris, if you wouldn't mind.

[Christopher Hall]

Thanks for the question. It is a great one.

I firmly believe that the technical problem of losing containers overboard will be overcome. Make no mistake: Industry doesn't want the loss of containers any more than a private citizen or any one of us on this call does. It's not acceptable. The status quo is not acceptable.

Whether the root cause is ship design, ship size, container design or securing methods, whatever the root cause or the combination, that problem will be solved. Similar problems have existed throughout time, and a solution can be found. Yes, it will take some time. Yes, it will take some coordination amongst the international agencies that are involved, and it will take some money, but it will get solved. It has to be solved, because, again, the loss of containers is not acceptable.

The economic impact of that lost cargo is—not to minimize the environmental side of it—just as great. The insurance claims and the impact to the shippers and cargo owners is equally as catastrophic from an economic standpoint, as it is on the environmental front.

A solution does need to be found. Tracking of containers, flotation devices, and all of those types of things, I'm sure, will be considered by the relevant technical bodies in how they come up with the ultimate solution.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Further to that question, Chris, I was speaking to a colleague about how, back in the day, we all grew up with cars without airbags. We all wondered how they'd actually fit those airbags in and make them work. Would it change cars forever, perhaps in a negative way? But they found a way, and now every vehicle has them. It's saved me from injury in one incident. But it's still necessary to have tow trucks along the highway. We have this proactive thing we can do.

What is the industry doing? You said, “we'll find a way”, but what is the industry currently doing that you know of to deal with it, so that , first of all, containers don't fall off the ship? Then the other aspect of it—and you'll have to put on your Coast Guard hat given your experience with them—is whether at each major port in Canada we need a ship specifically that can recover containers. It could go out and address these concerns, like a fire truck, and go out to deal with them quickly so we don't have containers in the ocean for long periods of time.

Could you speak to both of those, if you know?

[Christopher Hall]

I'll take the second part first, if I may.

From a cleanup standpoint, I'm sure more can be done. Having dedicated vessels to recover containers could work. We need to remember that unless there is a flotation device or the contents of the container are such that it remains buoyant, the chances of finding it in the early days are very remote. Considering the vastness of the oceans and the limited amount of time it may stay on the surface would make finding it difficult, but it could be found after the fact. That is something that could be looked at. I don't have any more to say than that.

On the proactive side, I would like to go back to the comments in my opening statement. Early intervention is what is so key in any marine emergency, whether we're talking about containers being lost overboard, a fire on board, or a ship in peril of capsizing due to taking on water for whatever reason. All of these things can be managed better by taking a more proactive response and not waiting for the ship to declare an emergency and to be abandoned or waiting until there's oil on the water. If we had a single entity that could take charge at the earliest hour, make recommendations and have that overriding jurisdiction, the right decisions could be made to prevent the release of the pollutant and save a life.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC]

Thanks, Chris.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Zimmer.

We'll go to Mr. Morrissey for five minutes or less.

Go ahead, please.