Northern Ontario Construction News staff writer
The City of Timmins has been fined $45,000 plus a victim fine surcharge of $11,250 for one violation of the Ontario Water Resources Act and five violations under the Environmental Protection Act after untreated sewage flowed into the Mattagami River for eight hours.
The convictions are for using, operating, altering, extending or replacing a sewage works without approval from the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks.
Also, the city failed to meet sampling requirements to ensure that a chlorination system was properly operated and to retain all records, namely alarm records, for a minimum of five years as required by statute.
The northern Ontario city owns and operates the Mattagami Water Pollution Control sewage treatment plant with the plant’s effluent discharged into the Mattagami River.
In July 2023, the ministry conducted an inspection of the plant and identified several non-compliance issues, the ministry said in a court update.
The plant operates under an amended Environmental Compliance Approval that requires it to be operated with a phosphorus removal system, which includes three metering pumps. However, during the inspection, it was noted that the system was not in use and that the metering had been removed.
Subsequent correspondence from the city confirmed that the pumps were removed in June 2018. All three were replaced by Dec. 20, 2023.
During a review of records during the ministry’s inspection, it was determined that a bypass event occurred between May 1 and May 2, 2023. Samples were collected on May 1, 2023, but not on May 2, 2023, as required by the ECA. The city had been previously warned by the ministry for failing to take samples in connection with bypass events.
During the inspection, it was determined that an overflow event occurred between Nov. 10 and Nov. 12, 2022, the update says. Only one sample was collected at the beginning of the event, and samples were not collected every eight hours for the duration as required by the ECA.
During the inspection, it was determined that a loss of chlorination occurred overnight on September 10, 2022, resulting in the final effluent discharging for eight hours without proper disinfection. No samples were taken as required by the ECA.
During the loss of disinfection event, the disinfection system was not alarmed therefore the on-call operator on duty overnight was unaware of the event. Loss of disinfection was only identified when operators started the next day shift.
As part of the inspection, the ministry requested all alarm records for the period from January 1 to March 17, 2022. The city indicated that the system only retained records for 365 days, contrary to the terms of the ECA which requires monitoring records be retained for a minimum of five years.
The ministry’s Environmental Investigations and Enforcement Branch investigated and laid charges which resulted in the court convictions on March 13 and fines with one year to pay.