Taking out the trash
Halifax companies available to temporarily transport waste for disposal under certain conditions
Offloading international garbage can go ahead at port of Sydney.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency reached an agreement in June with two Halifax area hazardous waste removal companies to dispose of a vessel’s international garbage offloaded at the port of Sydney.
It was requested by the Port of Sydney Development Corp. in its bid to increase the number of vessels using Sydney as a home port.
It’s a temporary six-month solution as the port struggles with the issue of how to handle garbage accumulated onboard ships — uneaten food and plastics, glass and other material generated and discarded by crew and passengers — that travel to international destinations and need to offload the waste upon arrival in Sydney.
Up until this point, vessels would have to keep all international waste on board until reaching the port of Halifax or another port that had the proper disposal services. The problem with the waste, according to the CFIA, has been the potential to introduce foreign insects, parasites or bacteria, into the environment in Canada.
The change largely affects companies such as adventure cruise operator, One Ocean Expeditions, which intends to use the port of Sydney as a home port for the beginning and end of its cruise tours of the Arctic and Antarctic, likely starting in 2020.
Edge Marine and Disposal Services Inc. of Dartmouth and Stericycle, which has its Canadian headquarters in Brampton, Ont., with offices also located in Dartmouth, have agreed to transport international waste from Sydney to federally approved disposal sites in the Halifax area when requested by cruise lines.
The port of Sydney’s manager of cruise marketing and development, Christina Lamey, said the deal was reached after several months of talks with the CFIA and Canada Border Services Agency — the two federal government bodies jointly responsible for the proper disposal of international waste at Canadian ports.
It’ll be up to cruise lines
or other commercial traffic whether they call upon the services of either of the two approved disposal companies.
“We have that in place but that’s a temporary measure because our long-term goal is that we’re able to process that type of waste here,” Lamey said.
“And it’s not just cruise (ships) that would be able to use it as well because it’s relevant to the airport. Any time a charter flight or direct flight from another country comes in to our airport, whatever waste they
have onboard is considered international waste.”
She said the port is committed to working with “different levels of government” and the private sector in having that garbage disposed of in Cape Breton.
It’s unclear how long it would take the federal government to make the necessary changes to allow the offloading of international waste a permanent service at the port of Sydney.
Sydney-Victoria MP Mark Eyking said the next step is to monitor the volume of international waste being offloaded in Sydney.
“I haven’t been asked to make it permanent yet but I’m guessing they’re going to ask me to do that,” he said in an interview Thursday.
“I’m assuming that we’ll have to put a case forward, and (when) they put a case forward, we can go to the bureaucratic level and say, ‘OK, here’s the potential we have and here’s the cost recovery we have here.’ That will always make a difference. Makes it more doable, I’d say.”
He mused the construction of a second cruise ship berth could create enough traffic to warrant a full-time CBSA or CFIA official stationed at the port of Sydney.
There are other issues that concern One Ocean Expeditions, which will recommission a vessel, the RCGS Resolute, on Oct. 16 in Sydney, ahead of its inaugural voyage from Ushuaia, Argentina to Antarctica in midNovember.
The company’s CEO and managing director Andrew Prossin said last month that services including customs, inspections, improved security protocols, and fuel and water directly to the pier are required to make home porting in Sydney a reality.
“Sydney needs to have the same services as the Port of Halifax,” he said.
“And we’re not talking about spending tens of millions of dollars here. We’re just talking about getting the same permits and various departments of government have to co-operate if we really want to build a viable port.”
So, even though the issue of international waste has a temporary solution, there remains stringent regulations in handling and eliminating the garbage.
It involves driver and handler training, storage and maintenance plans, visibly identifiable leak-proof containers approved by a CBSA inspector, advance routing map approval by the CFIA, a spill contingency plan and a waste manifest as proof delivery to the disposal site went ahead as scheduled.
Dr. Shane Hood, the CFIA port veterinarian for Nova Scotia, based in Kentville, said “additional conditions” were implemented in order to move the international waste the 400-kilometre distance from Sydney to Halifax.
He declined to specify what those added conditions were, saying it was an agreement between the waste disposal companies and the CFIA. However, in general terms, he indicated it could have included ensuring the vessel’s crew empties all organic material from containers, as well as clean all glass jars, cans and plastics prior to disposal.
“It reduces the risk and reduces the load and thus the volume is much smaller and the risk is much easier to manage,” Hood said.
“And the containers used must meet, or could meet, or (may be) told to meet greater conditions of a simple fish tote (bulk insulated container) with straps on it.”
When it comes to the port of Sydney’s longer-term plans to dispose of the waste in Cape Breton, the approval process for a landfill capable of accepting international waste can take between “two months to two years” depending on “how hard” the organization wants to work to gain the necessary permits outlined in the international waste directive, Hood added.