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Coal mine regulation needs to change
Letter to the Editor
I am a middle of the road voter – with a history in B.C. that is much longer than either of the local candidates for MLA.
Other than the fact that neither the Liberal nor NDP platforms are close to the views of the average voter (I wish both parties could learn to respect different points of view, because finding win-win solutions for those differences would benefit B.C. much more than having some fringe solution imposed upon us), my biggest concern is the pollution of the Elk and Kootenay Rivers by the coal industry.
I am an old Cominco kid who knows that the Cominco Smelter in Trail did not stop polluting the air until the government made them reduce emissions in the 1930s. Then, Cominco discovered they could make money-producing fertilizers from those toxic gases. In fact, the fertilizer business carried Cominco during lean years when metal prices were low. Then in the ‘50s, the government made Cominco stop dumping slag from its furnaces into the Columbia River. Again, Cominco started making money from the rare metals, like indium, that were in the slag. When the government of the day made Cominco, at Kimberley, stop dumping gypsum into Mark Creek, Marysville residents no longer called it Gray Creek. Government regulation can be good for business and for the environment, Mr. Bennett.
When Crestbrook Forest Industries was required, by the government of the day, to stop using beehive burners, they built a co-generation Plant at the pulp mill and burned the waste wood in a cleaner manner, while producing electricity. A win-win for Crestbrook and for the air we breathe in the valley.
Big corporations do not stop polluting by themselves, Mr. Bennett, even when it could be profitable (and create well paying jobs) to do so. Governments have to REGULATE those corporate activities, and ENFORCE their regulations. It is appalling that the coal companies have been allowed to over-produce their ability to protect the Elk and Kootenay Rivers from mine water toxins. We need to change the way our B.C. Government regulates local coalmines. Who knows; those toxic metals could be profitable one day.
It appears Bill Bennett doesn’t have the guts to get the job done. Do you, Norma Blissett?
Frank Hastings,
Cranbrook
