Ontario’s Excess Soil…

Ontario’s Excess Soil Regulation (O. Reg. 406/19) was developed to recognize excess soil as a resource, to provide clear rules to support beneficial reuse of excess soil, and to help address issues of illegal dumping. Ontario also notes that the regulation supports greater local reuse of excess soil, and reduces the amount of soil sent to landfill, greenhouse gas emissions from transportation, and overall soil management costs.

One scenario not considered by the regulation does not achieve these positive benefits; in fact, implementation of the regulation in certain instances may do the exact opposite – increase greenhouse gas emissions from transportation and significantly increase overall soil management costs. This scenario applies to the occurrence of provincial land in and around First Nation Reserves, in remote areas of the province that are accessible only by winter road, barge, or aircraft.

Hydro One Remote Communities Inc. (HORCI) as well as other federal and provincial ministries and utility providers have established properties in Indigenous communities in Ontario’s remote north. In some communities, these installations are located within the boundaries of federal Reserves; however, in some cases, the installations are located on Crown (provincial) land. Where located on Crown land, the installations are surrounded and/or abut to First Nation Reserve (federal) land. Many of these communities are accessible only by winter road, by air, or by barge. There are no provincially licensed waste disposal sites in these communities. There are also no soil bank sites and it is unlikely that soil bank sites would or could be established as the area is located on Reserve which would be federally-regulated.

HORCI operates diesel generating stations (DGSs) in communities not connected to the electricity network. Often construction work and yard expansions are required involving removal of soils. Additionally, environmental monitoring and remediation is carried out at these facilities, as required. When facilities are no longer required, they are decommissioned, and remediated. As remote northern communities are eventually connected to the electricity transmission system, the DGS facilities further remediated, as applicable. Connection of most remote communities to the electricity grid will occur in the years and decades after the January 1, 2025 restriction on landfilling of excess soil comes into effect.

The current exemptions in Schedule 2 of O. Reg. 406/19 do not exempt HORCI activities that involve provincial land from the requirements of the regulation, generally because the primary purpose of the work is remediation and/or the quantity of soil requiring removal is more than 100 m3. This is problematic in that the only options for management of excess soil or contaminated soil in the north are hauling to the community landfill, in-situ bioremediation, or treatment at the community’s biocell (usually located at the community’s waste disposal site), where one exists (or, alternatively, construction of a new biocell). Schedule 2 of the regulation does not currently address the scenario in the remote north.

Application of the legislation in the north does not change the options available for soil treatment or disposal, but imposes a heavy burden on utility service providers and ministries with installations on provincial land with respect to the documentation and tracking requirements. Furthermore, because the land surrounding these provincial installations is federal Reserve land, the communities are not bound by provincial legislation. In addition, vehicles hauling contaminated soil and/or contaminated groundwater are those available in the communities; they may not meet the requirements outlined in the legislation and they are not provincially licensed. Waste disposal sites are not provincially-licensed in the north, and the potential for the establishment of provincially-licensed soil bank sites on Reserve is unlikely. Implementation of the regulation in the remote north would greatly increase the financial and logistical burden on projects in remote locations.

In junction with this proposed delay in implementation of certain requirements of the regulation, HORCI is requesting that Schedule 2 of O. Reg. 406/19 be modified to include an exemption for ministries and utilities with establishments on provincial land in the remote north from the requirements of the legislation.