The Brome-Missisquoi waste disposal site in Cowansville would have done without this publicity.
An article from Radio-Canada in fact revealed, at the beginning of the month, that several technical landfill sites – the official name – presented very high levels of perfluorinated substances (PFAS or PFAS, in English) at the outlet of their wastewater treatment plant .
Of these landfills tested by the Ministry of the Environment between 2019 and 2021, Cowansville had the highest PFAS levels with 4,725 nanograms per liter (ng/l), the article said.
The water treatment plant at the Brome-Missisquoi landfill site (Catherine Trudeau/La Voix de l’Est)
There is not yet a Canadian environmental standard capping these perfluorinated substances in drinking water or in discharged wastewater.
To give you an idea, 30 ng/l corresponds to the standard that Health Canada has been working on for over a year for drinking water.
“We have never had any follow-up from the Ministry of the Environment regarding PFAS since they took their samples.”
— David Rumsby, CEO of Zone-Éco (including the landfill site) in Cowansville
13 sampling points
In Cowansville, the landfill site’s board of directors — eight elected officials from Brome-Missisquoi sit on it — approved the establishment of a preliminary action plan on May 14.
First step of this plan: 13 different sectors will be sampled for the presence of PFAS, first on the site, then upstream and downstream of it.
These samples will begin to be collected this week. They will then be tested in the laboratory, according to David Rumsby, general manager of the Brome-Missisquoi landfill site in Cowansville.
The main perfluorinated substances will be scrutinized during these analyses.
Once the first results are known, “we will see which sectors of the site we can better target, or which materials would be involved,” he adds.
“The environment at heart”
“In our team and on the board of directors, everyone has the environment at heart,” assures Mr. Rumsby.
As proof, Mr. Rumsby recalls that the water treatment plant at the Cowansville site has benefited from investments “of several millions” since 2013.
“The water treatment plant is compliant and meets regulatory limits,” insists Mr. Rumsby. We are making so much effort to reduce our environmental impacts that it is annoying to know that we have PFAS leaving our site.”
David Rumsby, CEO of Zone-Éco (Catherine Trudeau/La Voix de l’Est)
Waiting for the government
The CEO of the Brome-Missisquoi site, in Cowansville, underlines the exploratory nature of this sampling and analysis work. “It’s new, we have to learn about our problem,” he said.
A letter was also sent to the landfill site vigilance committee ― made up of a dozen stakeholders: neighbors, the Lake Davignon watershed protection committee, among others. This is to inform them of the action plan. Each landfill site is associated with a vigilance committee, according to Mr. Rumsby.
An internal assessment will be made once the samples have been analyzed and the vigilance committee informed. “We will also speak to several stakeholders, including consultants,” says Mr. Rumsby.
The Zone-Éco composting site is one of the places where the 13 samples are taken. (Catherine Trudeau/La Voix de l’Est)
The preliminary action plan cannot, however, be translated into a “real action plan” until the “government directives” are known, says Mr. Rumsby.
On the side of the office of the Minister of the Environment of Quebec, we do not yet seem ready to issue precise directives on the matter. “The issues related to PFAS are very concerning and we, as well as several other countries, are currently looking into the potential effects,” we were told by email. We are also working on amending the Regulation respecting the landfilling and incineration of residual materials, which will allow the mandatory monitoring of certain substances, including PFAS. […]»
According to university professor of environmental chemistry Sébastien Sauvé, the Quebec government should ensure that wastewater from all technical landfills is measured for its PFAS content.
And until an environmental risk analysis is carried out, according to him, we should issue a temporary standard, establishing a maximum threshold for wastewater capping at “three or four times” the maximum allowed for water. drinkable. “This threshold should not be 10 times higher than that for drinking water,” warns Mr. Sauvé.
RISK FOR THE HEALTH
Chronic exposure to perfluorinated substances, for example by long-term drinking of water contaminated by them, could be associated with various health problems, according to Dr. Mélissa Généreux, medical consultant at the Public Health Department of the ‘Estrie.
- Increased risk of kidney, liver and pancreatic cancers
- “Imbalance” of lipids in the blood (like cholesterol)
- Poorer immune response to vaccines
- For the fetus: low birth weight; impairment of bone development
