BKEJWANONG TERRITORY —…

BKEJWANONG TERRITORY — WALPOLE ISLAND FIRST NATION

Individual Community Member — ERO 026-0436
Environmental Compliance Approval (Industrial Sewage)
175 Bloomfield Road — Greenfield Global Inc. — Chatham-Kent
Comment Period Closes: June 4, 2026 at 11:59 p.m.

Fill in your information where indicated. Submit to the ERO before June 4, 2026 at 11:59 p.m.
A concerned Rights Holder from Bkejwanong Unceded Anishinaabeg Territory

Minister of the Environment, Conservation and Parks
Government of Ontario

Re: Formal Opposition — ERO 026-0436 — Environmental Compliance Approval (Industrial
Sewage)
Greenfield Global Inc., 175 Bloomfield Road, Municipality of Chatham-Kent

I am a member of Walpole Island First Nation — Bkejwanong Territory — and a
rights-holder on unceded Anishinaabe land within the Three Fires Confederacy. I write not as an
Ontario resident but as a member of a sovereign nation whose lands, waters, and governance
authority have never been surrendered, ceded, or extinguished.

I formally oppose ERO 026-0436 — the proposed Environmental Compliance Approval (Industrial
Sewage) for Greenfield Global Inc. at 175 Bloomfield Road, Municipality of Chatham-Kent. I
submit this comment in solidarity with the Sovereign Grandmothers of the Hereditary Line of
Bkejwanong Territory, whose formal objection has been filed concurrently.

Bill 5 — Contested Legislation Cannot Ground a Valid Approval
This approval is being processed under a regulatory framework shaped by Bill 5: Protect Ontario
by Unleashing our Economy Act, 2025. Bill 5 received Royal Assent on June 5, 2025 — but it is
currently being actively contested by First Nations across Ontario and Canada on constitutional
grounds. Multiple First Nations are challenging Bill 5 because it removes environmental
assessment requirements that would otherwise trigger mandatory consultation under section 35
of the Constitution Act, 1982.
Approvals issued under contested legislation that is being challenged for violating Aboriginal and
Treaty Rights are legally vulnerable. If those constitutional challenges succeed, approvals built
on Bill 5's reduced framework may be unwound. The Ministry is being asked to issue an approval
on a foundation that First Nations are actively challenging in court. That risk belongs on this
record.

Lines of Authority — The Obligation Cannot Be Delegated Away
Municipalities have no independent constitutional status. They are creatures of provincial statute,
existing only through authority delegated under section 92(8) of the Constitution Act, 1867. They
carry no independent treaty obligations. When the Municipality of Chatham-Kent voted 11 to 4
against consulting Walpole Island First Nation on April 27, 2026, it was exercising delegated
provincial power — and a co-proponent of this facility voted to remove the consultation
requirement that stood between itself and its own approval.
The Province cannot use municipal delegation to escape a federal constitutional obligation. The
duty to consult flows from section 35 and the honour of the Crown. It runs from the federal Crown
to Bkejwanong Territory directly. No municipal vote, no provincial approval process, and no
omnibus economic legislation — including Bill 5 — can transfer, diminish, or extinguish it. The
obligation has not been met.

Oneida Nation of the Thames — A Cautionary Example on the Same River
Oneida Nation of the Thames has lived adjacent to the Green Lane Landfill — an anaerobic waste
processing facility using the same Renewable Natural Gas technology proposed at 175
Bloomfield Road — for nearly two decades. On a windy day, community members have described
the odour as unbearable — impossible to be outside, impossible to keep windows open.
Community members are now reporting rising cancer rates. No independent health risk
assessment has been completed. The Indigenous Value Based Environmental Health Risk

Assessment the community sought to conduct was formally deferred in November 2023 and
remains deferred.
This is the same river. The same technology. The same consultation failure. The same sequence:
approval without consent, cumulative exposure, community health impacts, no remedy. The
Ministry cannot claim this outcome was unforeseeable. It is documented, on the public record, on
the Thames River system. Proceeding with this approval repeats a harm that has already been
named.

Water Rights — The Thames River Flows to Bkejwanong
The proposed sewage approval authorizes stormwater runoff from the anaerobic digester facility
to discharge through a drainage ditch along Bloomfield Road into the Thames River. The Thames
River flows directly toward Bkejwanong Territory. Our community holds Aboriginal water rights,
Treaty rights, and responsibilities under chi-naakenigewin — the natural law of the Anishinaabeg
— to protect those waters. Authorizing industrial discharge into our river system without our
consent is not an administrative matter. It is a water rights violation.
The stormwater enters the Thames River system — the same river that flows past Oneida Nation
of the Thames, the same river the Green Lane Landfill sits beside. The Kettle Point Aquifer, which
underlies this watershed and supplies Bkejwanong Territory's drinking water, is a federally
designated vulnerable water system. No hydrogeological study has been placed on the public
record. The Thames River connects to Lake St. Clair — a boundary water governed by the
Boundary Waters Treaty and the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement. Canada's international
obligations under those agreements have not been assessed.

UNDRIP — Canada's Obligations Apply
Canada affirmed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as binding
law through Bill C-15 in 2021. Article 19 requires consultation through our own representative
institutions before administrative measures affecting us are adopted. Article 32(2) requires
consent before projects affecting our lands and territories are approved. The 11-4 vote documents
the opposite — an affirmative refusal to consult. No UNDRIP consistency analysis has been
placed on the public record for this approval. That analysis must precede any decision.

What I Am Asking For
I am asking the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks to:

• Refuse to issue the Environmental Compliance Approval (Industrial Sewage) for
Greenfield Global Inc. at 175 Bloomfield Road until free, prior, and informed consent has
been obtained through legitimate hereditary governance of Bkejwanong Territory;
• Recognize that this approval is being processed under Bill 5 — legislation currently
being contested by First Nations on constitutional grounds — and that approvals issued
on this basis are legally vulnerable to being unwound;
• Recognize that the Municipality of Chatham-Kent's 11-4 vote against consultation, cast
by a co-proponent of this facility, constitutes documented affirmative refusal to consult
that cannot be cured by proceeding through the provincial approval process;
• Require a comprehensive cumulative effects assessment for the Southwest Ontario
Energy Hub — integrating all approved and proposed facilities in the watershed —
before any approval is granted;
• Place on the public record a UNDRIP consistency analysis demonstrating alignment with
Canada's obligations under Bill C-15;
• Consider the documented experience of Oneida Nation of the Thames as evidence of
foreseeable harm from this technology on this river system;
• Suspend all three companion applications — ERO 026-0434 (air), ERO 026-0436
(sewage), and ERO 026-0437 (waste) — as a single integrated facility until these issues
are resolved.

Sincerely,

A concerned Rights Holder and Water Protector from Bkejwanong Unceded Anishinaabeg First Nation and for the Water

Supporting documents I am attaching: (Schedule 1 — Legal Precedent Reference / other)