Environment News in Canada

Radioactive Waste Found in Ontario Groundwater

2007-12-26T07:38:00.000-08:00

Ontario Ministry of Environment officials are downplaying the discovery of high levels of a radioactive substance called tritium found recently in the groundwater of a Pembroke landfill.

"While there was tritium in the ground water at the site, [it was] well below our ministry standards," said Ministry spokesperson Kate Jordan. "We don't feel that they pose a risk to the community or to the environment."

Tritium is widely used in nuclear weapons for boosting a fission bomb or the fission primary of a thermonuclear weapon.

The highest level found in the dump's groundwater was 1,000 Becquerel/Litre - which is 7 times lower than the level considered "safe" under Ontario law.

Not very reassuring when you consider that the the European Union's "safe" level of Tritium concentrations in water is 100 Becquerel/Litre. In California the allowable level of Tritium in groundwater is 15 Bq/Litre.

Natural Gas Prices Down as Canada Heats Up

2007-12-24T15:31:00.000-08:00

Canadians will be spending less heating their homes this winter, thanks to warmer temperatures across the country.

Overnight lows in Toronto are 11 degrees (Fahrenheit) higher than seasonal and Calgary may be 21 degrees Fahrenheit, or about 14 degrees higher (Celsius) than typical, Environment Canada said in an outlook.

Spot gas at AECO fell 2.5 cents, or 0.4 percent, to C$5.975 per gigajoule ($6.379 per million British thermal units) at 11:23 a.m. on Calgary-based Natural Gas Exchange Inc.'s NGX electronic energy market. It was the fourth day prices fell at the southern Alberta gas-trading center.

New study: Polar Bears in Northern Manitoba on Thin Ice

2007-12-23T04:11:00.000-08:00

Researchers at the Canadian Wildlife Service and the U.S. Geological Survey (Alaska) confirm that the sharp decline that is taking place in the northern Manitoba polar bear population is likely a blueprint for the future of the entire Canadian polar bear population.

With ice break-up occurring earlier in the spring the survival rate of younger bears is declining. Over the past 50 years or so, Environment Canada has recorded an average warming in Northern Manitoba of 2 to 3 degrees celsius.With less time to find food on the ice in the spring the researchers are seeing "a large number of nutritionally stressed polar bears."

"Polar bears depend on sea ice for their survival. It is their only predictable substrate for foraging (for seals, their main food item)," the researchers reported.

The research team handled 1,963 bears in the course the its study, which concluded that the west Hudson Bay polar bear population fell from 1,194 bears to 935 in less than 10 years.

Source: Winnipeg Free Press

Global Warming Claims Gretzky's Famous Backyard Childhood Rink

2007-12-22T17:36:00.000-08:00

So would Wayne Gretzky have been the phenom he was in a warmer world?

Don't know, he probably would have just spent a lot more time at the local indoor rink, honing his genius hockey skills there.

Today, there's no ice in Wayne Gretzky's backyard - in fact there isn't even snow. Instead, there's just big, fat, warm raindrops.

Walter Gretzky's, Wayne's dad opines:

"... as a boy, he could skate for miles on the Nith River, which flows by that old farm – 'skate until you hit rapids,' he laughs – but lately the river rarely freezes over. And even when it does, you wouldn't dare risk stepping out on it.

Winters are warmer now,” he says. “There's no ice."

Maybe this is why we're seeing more and more imports from outside of Canada making it big in the NHL?