Waste Management Our Focus Sewage Treatment Garbage & Landfills 3 R’s

Municipal Water Supply, Use & Sewage Treatment 1. Brantford’s water source is the Grand River. 2. Water Treatment Plant = Waterworks Park. 3. Water use = residential, commercial, industry. 4. Waste water (what goes down the drain) drains into the municipal sewer system and goes to the sewage treatment plant. Rainwater drains into the storm sewer system and goes directly back into the river. 5. Sewage Treatment = Mohawk Sewage Treatment Plant.

After the Walkerton Inquiry Recommendations 2002 Yukon C- N.W.T. C+ B.C. C+ Alberta B Sask. B- Manitoba C+ Ontario A- Quebec B+ Nfld. C- N.B. D P.E.I. C- Nova Scotia B Data taken from WATER PROOF2- CANADA’S DRINKING - WATER REPORT CARD 2006 Sierra Legal Defence Fund Grading Canada’s Drinking Water Treatment Systems

Sewage Treatment Brantford Facility

Sewage Treatment Process

Sewage Treatment Process Summary 1. Primary Treatment – Screening and primary settling to remove garbage, large solids and sediment. 2. Secondary Treatment – Uses biological processes in which bacteria and other microorganisms break down most of the dissolved organic waste (aeration tank digestion, sludge tank digestion = stomach). 3. Tertiary Treatment – chemical treatment to remove phosphates, nitrates, harmful bacteria and other contaminents, before cleaned water goes back into river. 4. Concentrated Sludge – pumped to lagoon for storage, then trucked to landfill or farmers (fertilizer).

Brantford treats 100 Wayne Gretzky swimming pools of waste water per day!

Garbage – To the Landfill

Landfill Mound

Brantford’s Waste Collection Garbage – 5 bags maximum per week. Yard Waste – free collection spring, summer, fall. (Free compost material for your garden, Compost bins for sale $20 every spring) Bulk Pick-up – free if you phone (furniture etc). Recycling – “2 sort method” Blue Box 1: plastics (#1, #2 or #5), waxed cartons, glass, metal and aluminum. Blue Box 2: newspaper, including junkmail, paper, envelopes, books and magazines, and boxboard. Household Hazardous Wastes, Electronics & Tires – items/chemicals that pose a health hazard if not disposed of safely. Brantford has 8 designated Saturdays throughout the year for drop-off at the landfill site.

The 3 R’s - Can You Think of Ways? Reduce Reuse

Toronto Tap vs Bottled Water Below is a side-by-side comparison of the federal regulation of bottled water under the Food and Drug Act and Ontario’s regulation of Greater Toronto’s water under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Contaminent StandardsBacteriological Testing Frequency (monthly, including distribution system) Publicly Available Testing Results Bottled Water 1 (mineral & spring water) 3 (other water) Not specifiedNo Toronto Tap Water (100 samples plus one additional distribution sample for every 10,000 people served by the system, additional tests on 25 percent of those samples) Yes Source: Canada’s Drinking Water Report Card 2006, Sierra Legal Defence Fund

Facts about the Pacific Garbage Patch 1. The size of foul field of Trash is 2 times the size of Texas. 2. It is said 1/5th of junk trapped in the “garbage patch” comes from ship dumping and the rest of the trash comes from human land trash. 3. Environmental researchers believe 90% of the trash in the ocean dump is from plastic, which is not bio-degradable. 4. Some environmentalists say there is 3.5 million tons of waste swirling in the Pacific vortex near the beautiful Hawaiian Islands. 5. Thousands of birds and sea-life creatures are dying from eating plastic particles in this huge debris field, because they can not digest the plastic and it dehydrates them or stops their digestive system from functioning. 6. Some of the tiny plastic bits pass into the living systems of marine life and travel up the food chain until it lands on your dinner plate or in your fish sandwich! And, yikes…. Gulp…. you have eaten residual plastic! Perhaps a piece of your plastic grocery bag, water bottle, used condom or plastic chips bag ends up in your stomach.

Youtube Videos on Plastics and Drinking Water