Ecology Ottawa

News Clippings

Reevely: Water worries prompted ban on offshore wind farms, but Ontario’s done nothing about them

Ottawa Citizen

By David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen, May 27, 2016

Not only has the Ontario government ordered almost no research into wind farms on the Great Lakes since it banned them so it could do more research, it’s done none whatsoever on the worry that prompted the ban: the risk of poisoning Ontario’s drinking water with gunk stirred up from the lake bottoms.

The province has previously been very vague about what research it’s waiting for, and it’s now pretty clear why. There’s no indication that research is coming anytime soon.

Chiarelli: Expanded highways an important part of Ottawa’s transit plan

Ottawa Citizen

By Bob Chiarelli, Ottawa Citizen, May 29, 2016

I was more than a bit surprised with David Reevely’s recent critique about a major investment the Ontario Liberals are making in Ottawa-area highways. It takes more than a bit of creativity to complain about investments to improve the 416, the 417 and the 17 and helping relieve congestion for Ottawa-area commuters.

I expect that few drivers using the 417 during rush hour would agree with his conclusion that additional lanes of traffic — and in total nine unique highway improvement projects in the region — are unnecessary investments in our community. And I expect that few riders on new bus lines and those witnessing the once-in-a-generation construction of new light-rail system would agree that Ontario Liberals have ignored investment in Ottawa’s public transit — it’s about five times as much in transit as in roads.

Ottawa central library has many location options

Ottawa Citizen

By Phil Jenkins, Ottawa Citizen, May 29, 2016

There was a day, somewhere in the late 1950s, when I took my Mum down to the Carnegie (Ottawa) Public Library on the corner of Metcalfe and Laurier and got myself a library card.

That beautiful, Nepean limestone Classical building was full of self-help books —I consider all books, fiction and documentary, to be self-help books — and I began reading my way down the shelves, a nourishing task I’m still engaged in. The library then was all about words on paper, on pages and index cards, and in the foyer was a large globe of the world that awaited me. The windows on that world were the pages of the books I read.

Trudeau, female politicians among your letters for Saturday, May 28

Ottawa Citizen

By Jeff Spooner, Ken Robinson and Michael Kelly, Ottawa Citizen Letters to the Editor, May 28, 2016

Re: NCC enlisted to vet Civic campus sites, May 26.

Just so we are all clear on this, prime federal lands in LeBreton Flats will see a hockey rink, housing and commercial ventures built, and the general reaction is how wonderful this is for the city. The Civic campus of the Ottawa Hospital’s natural expansion is across the street, on a small fraction of the 1,000-plus acres of the Central Experimental Farm, and this proposal has met nothing but opposition.

Bad year for bike collisions? That's a myth, advocate says

Metro News

By Emma Jackson, Ottawa Metro News, May 26, 2016

Cyclist Sarah Tremblay has been hit by a car three times.The first time, she sprained her ankle. The second gave her bumper burn.The third left her with a broken wrist and nerves so rattled she no longer rides on busy roads.

“I’m constantly feeling like I’m being rushed through intersections,” she said. “So I’d rather wait now. I take the long way.”

Urban gardening campaign grows potatoes for a cause

Metro News

By Emma Jackson, Ottawa Metro News, May 26, 2016

Take one sunny balcony, add one garbage bag, a healthy serving of soil, a pinch of bone meal, and some sprouting potatoes. Add water and wait.

That simple recipe could yield you up to 100 pounds of potatoes this summer – a bounty one charity hopes you’ll donate to your local soup kitchen.

Soldiers Helping Soldiers has launched the Grow Potatoes program, which aims to feed Ottawa’s hungry right from the city's balconies and backyards.

Public solar-powered phone chargers coming soon to Bank Street

Metro News

By Haley Ritchie, Ottawa Metro News, May 26, 2016

Always forgetting to charge your phone? Maybe it’s time to spend more time on Bank Street, where the local business improvement area is planning on adding two public phone and laptop chargers.

“We’re pretty charged about it,” said Christine Leadman, executive director of the BIA.

Last fall, Leadman attended a conference in San Francisco focused on downtown communities and came back with the idea of adding solar-powered charging stations on Bank Street.

Battle over bins

CTV Ottawa News

By CTV News Ottawa, May 26, 2016

An Ottawa resident is calling for compromise after she was threatened with hundreds of dollars in fines for putting out recycling bins the city says are too big.

Brigitte Woodburn says she tries to recycle as many things as she can and often ends up with a lot of excess items for the bins each week.

NRC employees told to drink bottled water 2 years before neighbours warned - Ottawa - CBC News

By CBC News Ottawa, May 26, 2016

National Research Council employees at the fire-safety testing facility in Mississippi Mills were told to start drinking bottled water in January 2014, almost two years before neighbours were told about ground water contaminated with toxic chemicals.

According to documents released under the Access to Information Act, workers were told in an email from the facility manager dated Jan. 14, 2014 that "acceptable" levels of PFCs (perfluorinated chemicals) were found in in the drinking water. But "until a decision is made on the health impact to staff at U- 96," employees were, we instructed "NOT TO DRINK WATER AT U- 96."

Editorial: What was the NRC thinking when it comes to tainted water?

Ottawa Citizen

By the Editor, Ottawa Citizen, May 25, 2016

The National Research Council has been giving bottled water to employees at its National Fire Lab in Mississippi Mills since January 2014, after finding firefighting chemicals had leached into the groundwater. The water was “not to be consumed for drinking purposes,” it said.

But the neighbours, whose own water was contaminated, weren’t told to check their well water until last December – almost two years later.It’s an astonishing time lag. How could the NRC, knowing there were chemicals in the water, not tell citizens nearby to check whether they were guzzling H2O containing perfluorinated alkylated substances, the chemicals found in firefighting foam?

Mooney’s Bay and the public mood

Ottawa Citizen

By The Editor, Ottawa Citizen, May 26, 2016

A company applies to the city to turn a former car lot into a restaurant. The public is given a chance to offer feedback. The city decides a new central library is needed. Taxpayers get to weigh in. Changes are needed to taxi regulations; city meetings are held.

Still, public consultation has a bumpy history in Ottawa, depending on the level of government involved and its view of the people paying the bills. Let’s look at some examples.

NRC ‘can’t say’ if fire lab’s flushed chemicals tainted rural water

Ottawa Citizen

By Tom Spears, Ottawa Citizen, May 26, 2016

Canada’s National Fire Lab had an unorthodox way of dealing with some waste chemicals: It flushed overflow into the sewage system, and then into the surrounding environment.

An engineering report commissioned by the National Research Council identified the problem in 2013, and it sheds light today on how the lab in Mississippi Mills contaminated its own groundwater.