Every day, hundreds of trucks loaded with trash from Ontario
stream across the U.S. border. The possibility of Congress passing a
bill that would allow states to close their borders to out-of-state trash
has some Canadian officials worried. It would mean Ontario would
have to find a new place to put the 3.5 million tons of garbage it sends
to the state of Michigan each year. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Dan Karpenchuk has more:
Transcript
Every day hundreds of trucks loaded with trash from Ontario stream across the U.S. border. The
possibility of Congress passing a bill that would allow states to close its border to out of state
trash has some Canadian officials worried. It would mean Ontario would have find a new place
to put the three-and-a-half million tones of garbage it sends to the state of Michigan each year.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk has more:
Garbage is a politically charged issue in Ontario. And so far most politicians, appear to have
ignored it. If the border closes, Toronto can store garbage for only two days.
The Toronto region has started the process of finding an alternative landfill, or another
technology to deal with the problem… but getting a new plan in place could take years.
Anne Mitchell is with the Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy. She says the
provincial government and residents must make the issue a priority.
“And it’s going to take a lot of increasing awareness so that people in fact are managing their own
garbage better. Because I know right now we’re not.”
The province could allow, or even force, other large Ontario landfills to take Toronto’s garbage,
But that would almost certainly lead to fierce local opposition.
For the GLRC, I’m Dan Karpenchuk.