I have read Stantec’s 2010 …

I have read Stantec’s 2010 “Assessment of Drinking Water Quality Threats Municipal Groundwater Supplies”, originally commissioned by York Region, available at https://www.ctcswp.ca/app/uploads/2017/05/RPT_201006_Stantec_York_AssWQ…

Groundwater quality vulnerability had been studied and reported in earlier reports from Earthfx in 2007 and 2009.

The tables of drinking water quality threats in the 2010 technical report outlined 18 chemical threat categories and 8 pathogen threat categories.

At the time, it was reported: “Technical Rule 119 provides direction on including the activities that are NOT prescribed in the Clean Water Act of 2006. No such inclusions have been made at present in York Region.” This needs to be investigated further.

This 2010 report included a section on “Non-Managed Land Threats Assessment” that related to the establishment, or operation, or maintenance of a waste disposal site under Part V of the Environmental Protection Act”.

and

“The establishment, operation, or maintenance of a system that collects, stores, transmits, treats, or disposes of SEWAGE within the meaning of the Ontario Water Resources Act”.

These sections of the report are extensively documented and describe how the use of each parcel of land in York Region was assessed and assigned a threat score.

“Managed Land Threats Assessments” were examined separately and assigned a score, based on the application of nutrients (fertilizer), chemicals (pesticides, etc) or road salt. The threat presented by road salt was evaluated in terms of all the “impervious land surfaces used for vehicular traffic, parking and pedestrian paths”, as they apply to paved surfaces. The density of paved surfaces was calculated in square kilometers of affected area.

This extensive 372-paged report summarized, “a total of 998 significant threats were identified on 421 land parcels. An additional 1,721 threats were identified as moderate or low threats to drinking water quality”. Page E8 also mentions additional threats posed to vulnerability areas: “75 threats were identified relating to the transmission of sewage through pipelines, 15 of which were significant, 24 of which were moderate, and 36 of which were low”.

In July 2015, the “Approved Updated Assessment Resource” study reviewed all of Ontario’s water systems. This is a very extensive report, so I will focus on page E6-25, which finds Escherichia coli (E. coli) above 1,000 colony forming units, or CFU/100 ml, based on waster water treatment plants (WWTP) at the DUFFINS CREEK, Highland Creek, Ashbridge’s Bay, Humber and Lakeview locations shows “contaminants released in this area travel east and west within the coastal zone in relatively HIGH CONCENTRATIONS before they are mixed with the water in the main lake.” This portion of the analysis was used as an example of the importance of protecting water quality in the near shore as this is the SOURCE of DRINKING WATER for SEVERAL MILLION RESIDENTS of ONTARIO.” However, this report fails to mentions the MILLIONS of Americans who ALSO use the lake for discharge of their waste water and intake of their drinking water.

Several pages of charts reveal the problem with high E. coli counts at WWTPs in Ontario, but page E6-29 reveals a table, showing ‘Per cent of time E. coli above the threshold of 1,000 CFU/100 ml”, and Duffins Creek at Whitby, Ajax, Horgan and Harris show the following percentages respectively: 47, 58, 22 and 8. In other words, Duffins Creek at Ajax, where this WWTP (located in DURHAM REGION) receives 80% of its SEWAGE INFLOW from YORK REGION, showed a high release of E. coli in its outflow to Lake Ontario 58% of the time. I think this reveals the York-Durham Sewage System is an unsustainable unhealthy option being used to drive unsustainable development in York Region.

Durham Region is being forced to suffer the costs of York Region’s unsustainable development, whilst 15 WWTPs are already located around Lake Simcoe (within the Lake Simcoe watershed, which is linked to the Georgian Bay watershed). No further WWTPs can be situated around the small, relatively shallow Lake Simcoe (41 metres at its deepest point), so ANOTHER WWTP has been proposed for the Holland River, which drains into Lake Simcoe. All this is being driven by unquestioned, untrammelled, and unsustainable over-development. The federal government insists on unrelenting rapid population growth (without reference to economic conditions, nor finite environmental systems that are increasingly stressed to underpin all development), and that mandate is dictated to lower tiers of government: from federal to provincial to regional to municipal levels. There is NO discussion with the public on this matter, though such plans should be presented to the public for their input, via a referendum.

We must recognize there is currently no way for any WWTP to remove chemicals or semi-digested pharmaceuticals from the waters that are repeatedly “recycled” through the same plants, day in, day out, year-round.

A number of the charts shows WWTPs around Lake Ontario have “unacceptable disinfection failure scenarios”, even though a lot of chlorine is constantly used in these WWTPs, and that water is treated and re-treated with this persistent chemical because water usage is so high across Ontario’s towns and cities which are being forced to accept politically-driven levels of rapid over-development.
Section E6.3.3 and Figure E6-17 show Sanitary Trunk Sewer (STS) Breakdown due to Stream Erosion. Both Ajax and Horgan are on this list, and these areas send their outflows to Lake Ontario via Duffins Creek.

I am sure some of the politicians and bureaucrats within the Premier’s Office and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry viewed the CBC comedy show, called Schitt’s Creek, before it was retired. If you remove the ‘c’, the second ‘t’, and the apostrophe from the name, you will have the appropriate name for the way in which Duffins Creek is now being used. And, it’s NO comedy. It represents a huge and obvious growing threat to Lake Ontario, its aquatic ecosystems, and the people who live around the lake.

This report also shows water quality risks from pipeline breaks, for the contaminant, gasoline-benzene, from Bulk Petroleum handling and storage. It also presents tritium releases from the Pickering Power Station. All these activities are associated with a focus on ‘economic growth’ while natural systems relating to the health and survival of all life are being enormously stressed.

Ontario Minister of Natural Resources and Forestry, Jeff Yurek, introduced Bill 306, in which he stated the Minister would make NO decisions about waste water treatment until ANOTHER extensive review has been completed by a panel of experts. This shows the cost and delays of having Ministers, or a Premier, who do not understand the technical requirements of their portfolios. It is TOO LATE to monitor the problems AFTER they occur. Water quality monitoring deserves to be done in real time, and the Minister needs to be a hydrogeologist, hydrologist, or geomorphologist who knows how to track these problems as they occur. There is no point to appointing a panel of experts to review an issue (such as the GTA West Panel), if the Conservative government is going to 'shelve’ that report in order to do the bidding of developers, which seems to be the way government operates.

Furthermore, there must be a temporary moratorium on development which always contributes to the problems that seem to be reviewed at 5-year intervals roughly, without really addressing the growing problems. Then, development is permitted to rush ahead, and now the beleaguered landscape has to deal with the MZOs that have been batch-processed recently through the Ministry of Housing and Municipal Affairs. The provincial government no longer recognizes protective designations for provincially significant lands, nor Areas of Natural and Scientific Interest. This government clearly prefers to ignore science.

Politicians are great at calling for studies and more studies, but they seem incapable of understanding the results, “or applying the lessons” appropriately. The political response to all these exacting technical reports seems to be … silence. The problem festers and grows. Even worse, this government has removed scientific watershed planning from the mandate of Conservation Authorities. Contamination and flooding shall prevail and grow as a result.

Further serious concerns relate to de-oxygenation of rivers and lakes as expressed in the research article, "Widespread Deoxygenation of Temperate Lakes", which can be viewed at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03550-y

While lakes are used as the receiving waters for growing amounts of treated sewage, industrial waste, and land-based contaminants, the warming de-oxygenated waters are have deleterious effects on aquatic species, such as brook trout. The primary GLARING reason for this problem is the decline in dissolved oxygen caused by human activities on land and sea, and at the interface thereof. When the balance of oxygen is affected, humans are affected, too. Time for us to control ourselves, and that means helping others to understand and control their demands.

A further concern is the inability of even the most modern sewage treatment facilities to remove household and industrial chemicals, as well as semi-digested pharmaceuticals, as documented at https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-15989-z.pdf which describes the accumulation of anti-depressants in fish after the researchers decided to limit their study to a particular group of drugs.

There are a number of noteworthy observations in this 2017 study, so I will select a few quotes from this study that tested for certain pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) in water: “Pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) have been found in wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) effluents and their recipient watersheds”.

Then, the researchers discussed some of their findings:
“We detected fifteen different PPCPs in goldfish plasma including six serotonin reuptake inhibitors (amitriptyline, citalopram, fluoxetine/norfluoxetine, sertraline, venlafaxine, and diphenhydramine). Plasma concentrations of serotonin were significantly greater in plasma of fish caged closer to the WWTP effluent outfall site. The fish caged near and downstream of the WWTP effluent were bolder, more exploratory, and more active overall than fish caged at the reference site. Taken together, our results suggest that fish downstream of WWTPs are accumulating PPCPs at levels sufficient to alter neurotransmitter concentrations and to also impair ecologically relevant behaviours.”

These drugs represent a very small number of the thousands of chemicals that enter the wastewater stream everyday .. to be recycled through our drinking water as it is processed and re-processed on a continuing basis. They are not monitored properly, nor are their potential synergies.

DEET, oxazepam, benzodiazepine, antibiotics and antimicrobials (erythromycin-H2O, flumequine, and sulfamethazine), hydrocortisone (a steroidal anti-inflammatory), and gemfibrozil were also detected.

If the fish are swimming in drugs, and our drinking water is cycled repeatedly through the same WWTPs, accumulating more drugs and other chemicals through each cycle, you have to wonder about effects on human behaviour, too. It would be the same story in any heavily populated watershed; for example, the Lake Ontario watershed, or the Lake Simcoe Watershed.

A 2020 study at "Overcoming the concrete conquest of aquatic ecosystems" describes the harm of cement structures on natural waterways. The damming and channeling of coastal habitats has “simplified habitat and reduced aquatic biodiversity”, so the researchers recommend finding alternatives to concrete in such areas: see https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2020.108589

A 2018 paper, "Disinfection Impacts to Drinking Water Safety— A Review" describes problems with cumulative disinfection methods at: https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2110603
“It is known that disinfection is affected by many parameters such as water temperature, water pH, type of existing bacteria, type of disinfection, disinfectant dose, contact time and inorganic and organic material existing in water. Although disinfection is the method for the removal (or inactivation) of pathogens, disinfection itself can result in the formation of inorganic and organic disinfection by‐products (DBPs). DBPs are usually trihalomethanes (THMs) and haloacetic acids (HAAs).”

The researchers also note there are various factors than can impact and reduce water quality after it leaves the WWTP and flows through kilometres of distribution pipes to homes and businesses. They recommend real-time online monitoring of water systems in addition to “traditional sampling and laboratory‐based analytical techniques which are very crucial for water quality monitoring” since the costs of a contamination incident can be very high (as Ontario knows from the Walkerton Water Tragedy).

At last, this brings me to York Region’s latest update to its Water and Waste Water Master Plan. Supposedly, York Region is seeking the public’s input, though it should be following the problematic conditions already presented in past reports. Instead, York Region Council forges ahead, begging for more development, more paving of the landscape -- and most of the sewage problems are to be 'solved' at the expense of Durham Region's waterfront and connection to Lake Ontario.

On page 11 of York Region’s 2021 update brochure report for its second Open House, a question is posed:

“Did you know York Region is the only regional municipality in the Greater Hamilton-Toronto Area that does not have direct access to Lake Ontario (our main supply of water)?”

York Region sends most of its wastewater to the shores of Lake Ontario (via the Duffins Creek outflow), comprising 80% of the foul concoction being "treated" at that plant in DURHAM REGION. King City's water comes from Lake Ontario, as does the water for other areas. How much more "direct" does York Region want its access to Lake Ontario water supply to be?

York Region shows a complete misunderstanding of the scientific reasoning behind watershed planning when it explained on p. 13 why it cannot limit growth:

“Limit growth means limiting regional growth to what our existing water and wastewater systems can service. This would put the Region in conflict with the Places to Grow Act, 2005 and A Place to Grow – Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe.”

This is an example of political pipe-dreaming at its worst! York Region appears to want to exceed the biophysical constraints of sound watershed planning by importing/exporting water across watersheds. Despite the fact York Region has reached the limit of 15 WWTPs situated around the relatively shallow and small Lake Simcoe; therefore unable to place another WWTP there, York Region and the LSRCA are proposing a 16th WWTP be located on the Holland River, draining into Lake Simcoe. Healthy watershed planning relies upon protecting waterways, local species, and ecological services provided by natural areas, by LIMITING human development and activities to preserve essential ecosystem functioning. That means limiting human demands, and that can also means recognizing the need to limit growth, too. Growth forever is not possible, not desirable, though it can be dangerous and destructive when improperly managed ... as it is ultimately proving to be in this case.

There is a cautionary tale in The Regional Municipality of York Water and Wastewater Master Plan, November 2016. There appears to be ONLY ONE GOAL for this Master Plan: population growth no matter what. For instance, consider the attitude toward the York Durham Sewage System, mentioned on p. 41 within this document, which likely helps to explain continuing problems at the Duffins Creek treatment plant where smelly black sludge washes up on the shoreline. Obviously, the plant is receiving more sewage than it can handle (as noted in the following excerpt), but population growth remains the primary goal:

“About 80 per cent of the current flow to the Duffin Creek plant comes from York Region. The plant was recently expanded to treat 630 million litres a day, but its capacity rating under the existing Environmental Compliance Approval is temporarily limited to 520 million litres a day subject to the Schedule C Class Environmental Assessment to Address Outfall Capacity Limitations at the Duffin Creek Water Pollution Control Plant being completed. The population served by the YDSS Primary System is forecasted to grow by 57 per cent from 2016 to 2041. The plant’s hydraulic capacity can meet this need subject to addressing the outfall constraint. Review is also recommended to identify potential treatment process limitations as result of higher loadings before population growth reaches the design limit.”

The York Durham Sewage System appears to working beyond the limits of its capacity now; yet, politicians want more of the same over-development.

In reality, expansion of human society is limited by external biophysical constraints so improvements in efficiency have to be framed within existing natural limits. ‘Sustainable development’ cannot be achieved by new and innovative technologies alone, or the addition of even more technologies, as politicians believe. Sustainability requires adaptations through a process of continuous adjustments to institutional and government behaviour, based upon interpreting environmental feedback signals correctly, instead of ignoring them.

Richard Feynman was a famous physicist (who shared the Nobel Prize for Physics in Quantum Electrodynamics), and he believed that politicians had to understand the limits to resources, as those limits relate to silly political dreams of economic growth forever. He said:

“For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled “

and

“Theoretically, planning may be good. But nobody has ever figured out the cause of government stupidity — and until they do (and find the cure), all ideal plans will fall into quicksand.”