SARNIA Sarnia Mayor Mike Bradley has asked the province to shut down a waste transfer site on Scott Road that has been the source of odor complaints in recent months.
Bradley sent a letter this week to the district manager of Ontario’s Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks about the site where Brantford-based Wessuc stores waste, including treated sewage biosolids also known as sludge, in former sewage lagoons the company purchased from the city in 2020.
Wessuc stores the material in the lagoons until it can be spread on farm fields as fertilizer.
“Since starting operations in the spring, the site has continually been a source of disgusting and nauseating odors for the citizens of Sarnia,” Bradley says in his letter.
Both the city and the ministry have received complaints about odors from the site and in late June Adrian Simpson, a Wessuc representative, told a city council meeting about steps the company was taking.
“We’re getting real close to what I think would be a solution, where we can present the neighbors with an odor-free backyard,” he said.
At the same meeting, Bradley warned the company a request to close the site could be the next step if complaints continued.
“It was a clear message then,” he said.
Bradley said he received complaints about odors from residents across the city, particularly as a heat wave settled in during the middle of the week.
“It’s overwhelming for people,” he said.
“City council does not have the legal authority to shut down the operations but the ministry does,” Bradley’s letter says.
“I am imploring you to act quickly to shut down Wessuc until they resolve all the issues, so the people of Sarnia are no longer inflicted with this nauseating odor on a regular basis, particularly in the hot weather,” the letter says.
Ministry spokesperson Gary Wheeler said in an e-mail the ministry is taking the odor issue “very seriously.”
He said the site stopped receiving material in mid-June and the number of odor complaints has declined.
“The company is also developing an action plan to address odors and will increase air monitoring to assess community impacts as they work to resolve their operational challenges,” Wheeler said.
“The ministry continues to respond to the occasional odor complaint and will ensure the company takes the necessary action to address the concerns,” he said.
Simpson told city council in June that, as well as no longer accepting material at the site, the company improved a water “cap” to keep the material from hitting the air and creating stench, applied odor suppressants, and was working with odor specialists.
But Bradley said this week, “nothing seemed to have worked,” leading him to send the request to the ministry that it shut the site down until the odor problems are solved.
He said other municipalities have faced issues with odor complaints about sewage sludge being stored before it’s applied on farmland.
“I think the province needs to look at some control” of the practice, he said.