FLUSHABLE WIPES CAUSING A STINK FOR CITIES

• The long-running “flushable wipes” controversy has turned into an ongoing war of words in Canada, with manufacturers insisting their moist towelettes are more sewer-friendly than ever as municipalities urge citizens to put them in the garbage, not down the toilet.

More than a dozen lawsuits have been launched in the United States against manufacturers, claiming damages to individual or municipal sewer systems, but in Canada the fight is so far a public relations battle.

Metro Vancouver, for instance, is spending $200,000 on an “Adult Toilet Training” program this summer, using humorous videos and ads in pink port-a-potties to bring the message to its 2.5 million system users that it’s not OK to flush “flushable” wipes — or anything else other than “pee, poo and toilet paper.”

In Fredericton, the city warns: “If you did not eat it first, you should find another way to dispose of it,” on its website.

The industry, however, is unrepentant. Lynn Matheus, senior research and engineering manager for Kimberly-Clark, the company that manufactures popular Cottonelle wipes, insists that flushable wipes are just that.

“We continue to stand firmly behind our claims that our wipes are flushable and they are safe for sewer and septic systems,” she said.

Darrell Mussatto, Metro Vancouver utilities chairman, is just as convinced that the wipes are a problem, pointing out that utility workers were able to use remote cameras to count flushable wipes travelling through the sewer system during a pilot project last year to test its toilet training campaign.

“It cost us $100,000 in 2015 to declog the pumps in the sewer system to remove flushable wipes,” he said. “We’ve identified them. The pumps get so full with them they just stop running and we have to go in and declog them.”

A waste water expert with the Municipal Enforcement Sewer Use Group, comprised of 29 Ontario communities, says he stands by his rough estimate of $250 million per year in clog cleanup costs for Canadian utilities because of flushable wipes.

Barry Orr said municipalities are on the hook for more than $1 billion in additional capital costs to build more robust pumps, grinders and coarse screening systems to deal with flushable wipes, but bristled at the suggestion Canada’s sewer systems are part of the problem.

“The system was never, ever designed to handle garbage. It was designed to handle human waste and toilet paper. That’s it,” Orr said.

Municipalities hoping for federal help have turned to the Competition Bureau, which is responsible for Canada’s consumer packaging act governing false or misleading labelling. Spokesman Phil Norris said in an email he can’t say whether the bureau is looking into flushable wipes because its investigations must be kept confidential.