Alberta financing environmental degradation - Chief Badger

Swan Hills chiefs protest plans to import toxic waste for treatment.

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Toxic substances are moving up the food chain in the Swan Hills area in northwestern Alberta, and the provincial government is funding the company which is putting them there.

The Swan Hills are part of the traditional lands of the First Nations who signed Treaty 8 in 1899. Within a 48-kilometre radius of the Alberta Special Waste Treatment Centre at Swan Hills, there are 26 treaty Indians who now are registered trappers and many other non-status Aboriginal trappers, said Jim Badger, chief of the Sucker Creek band. Sucker Creek is one of nine bands in the Swan Hills area represented by the Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council.

Many Elders still gather herbs and plants- some that can only be found in the Swan Hills - for medicinal and spiritual purposes, Badger said.

But they do so at their own risk. According to studies released by Chem-Securities, which operates the hazardous waste treatment facility for co-owners Bovar Inc. and the Alberta government, poly chlorinated biphenyls, which are highly toxic chemical compounds, and other contaminants have been found in soil, sediments, fish, plants and small animals.

In July of this year, the provincial government and Bovar Inc. applied to the Natural Resources Conservation Board for approval to import waste from outside the province for treatment at the facility. Badger made a presentation to the NRCB at public hearings on behalf of the Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council and the Indian Association of Alberta.

The NRCB is expected to make a decision this fall.

So far, the Alberta government has put up almost $250 million in operating subsidies, payment to Bovar, which owns 60 per cent of the plant, and in a loan guarantee for $100 million.

The loan guarantee was approved eight days after Alberta Premier Ralph Klein was re-elected, despite Klein's campaign promises of no more money being lent to businesses.

In the last year, Klein and his ministers have said at least seven times the only loan guarantee granted since they assumed office was $50 million to Canadian Airlines International The Opposition Liberals released government documents Aug. 29 which disclosed the loan guarantee to Bovar made since Klein's re-election.

Last year alone, Alberta taxpayers paid between $25 and $30 million to keep the Swan Hills plant going through the Alberta Special Waste Management Corp.

"If we didn't subsidize it, we wouldn't have to cut back social services, education or part of the health care system," said Karin Buss, an Edmonton lawyer working with the Lesser Slave Lake Indian Regional Council.

Badger calls the government's agreement with Bovar a "sweetheart deal" because Bovar bears no financial risk. Bovar Inc. is guaranteed a rate of return on its investment, regardless of financing costs or the performance of the Alberta Special Waste Management Corp.

If its volume projections are high and operating revenues do not meet expectations, the province is obliged to make up the different. Bovar is not required to put any money into ASWMC and can finance 100 per cent of its share of the capital costs.

Bovar has been paid $34 million as a return on its investment in the facility since 1988, acknowledged Monty Davis, the company's chief financial officer, even though subsidies it has required from the government are expected to total $108 million by the end of the year.

Supporters of the plant argue that importing waste from other provinces will make the plant viable, since all Alberta PCBs have been incinerated.

But both Buss and Badger said there are cheaper alternatives. Alberta is just too far away from the Ontario industrial belt, Badger said. It's less expensive to send waste to the United States, and some places now are using portable incinerators.

"It is a dinosaur. Technology is moving way too fast for Swan Hills," Badger said.

But beyond the obvious squandering of taxpayer's mney by the Alberta government, Badger is concerned about the environmental impact of the plant's operations. The levels of PCBs being released are 10 times the level allowed by the Ontario government, Badger said.

No tests have been done to see what other kinds of contaminants or how many PCBs exist in animals hunted in the Swan Hills. Starting with mice, which are eaten by hawks or other birds, which are eaten by wolves, and so on, PCBS move up the food chain. Because PCBs "bio-magnify", or appear in higher and higher levels as they move up the food chain, the risk to humans who eat animals which may have fed on other contaminated animals could be considerable, Badger said.

"There could be new toxins being developed that we don't even know about. Albertans with their tax money are financing environmental degradation," he added.