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More on Canada’s polluting ways
image by SkyTruth (Flickr CC)
Not to Canada bash, but the North American Country – known the world over as much kinder, gentler and more just in comparison to its neighbor, the big bad US of A – has been grabbing a few headlines lately for its deteriorating (or at least more conspicuously poor) environmental record.
And let’s be real. Environmental pollution is also a social justice issue. Coal kills people as well as animals and plants. Never mind greenhouse gases. Likewise the tar sands in Alberta. Likewise poisonous emissions from chemical plants on Canada’s Great Lakes.
So, without further ado, on to the bashing, or ahem, information dissemination.
The community of Ammjiwnang, located in the centre of Canada’s largest concentration of chemical industries around the Great Lakes, says that it has also seen rising asthma and cancer rates most likely linked to air pollution, which the World Health Organisation says is higher in the area than anywhere else in the country.
–Al Jazeera English
Check out the following video report on how a community of Canadian aboriginals is suing the Petrochemical company Suncor due to health problems attributed to chemical pollution.
In other Canada-as-pollution-villain news, recent satellite photo research by Environment Canada, Canada’s environmental agency, reveals that the pollution from the Alberta tar sands project is frightful.
From Click Green:
For both gasses, the levels are comparable to what satellites see over a large power plant – or for nitrogen dioxide, comparable to what they see over some medium-sized cities. It stands out above what’s around it, out in the wilderness, but one thing we wanted to try to do was put it in context.
Chris McLinden, research scientist, Environment Canada
So it would seem that Canada’s environmental agency is at odds with its country’s government. They’re also cracking down on coal pollution, according to this piece in the Calgary Herald. Consider me a bit skeptical.
Tags: Canada, environment, Pollution, tar sands
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