Background
Industrial waste generation in the Toronto area has increased significantly in the past decade. Waste discharged to water, land and air represents a loss of valuable raw materials and is a threat to human, wildlife and aquatic health and the environment.
In order to protect the quality of biosolids, federal and provincial governments have brought in regulations that limit the quality and quantity of substances of concern discharged into the environment via the municipal sewer systems. As a result, municipalities have introduced bylaws that control the quality and quantity of substances discharged into their sanitary and storm water sewer systems by waste generators or ‘‘point sources’’ within their jurisdictions.
Harmonization
In 1998, the former Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto (Metro) and its six area municipalities amalgamated to form the City of Toronto. With the amalgamation, there was a need to harmonize the seven individual sewers bylaws of the former municipalities into a uniform bylaw for the new City of Toronto. In January 1997, Metro’s Environment and Public Space Committee requested the Commissioner of works to make amendments to the Metro Sewers Bylaw by incorporating the requirements of Pollution Prevention (P2) and restricting trace organic discharges.
A draft of the new Toronto Sewers Bylaw was completed and released for public consultation in May 1999. In July 2000, Toronto City Council enacted a new Sewers Bylaw following the amalgamation of seven former municipalities. The new By-law (By-law 457-2000), found in Chapter 681 of the Municipal Code, provided a two-year phase-in period for facilities to meet the proposed new limits. The By-law was drafted after consultation with Environment Canada, the Ontario Ministry of the Environment (MOE), Canadian Centre for Pollution Prevention (C2P2), and the World Wildlife Fund. It underwent a public consultation process to obtain input from industry, industry associations, environmental groups and other stakeholders.
The same year, Toronto City Council approved a proposal to end incineration of sewage sludge at the City’s largest sewage treatment plant, the Ashbridges Bay Treatment Plant. It was to be replaced by a biosolids (i.e., sewage sludge) beneficial re-use program. For the current status of the biosolids program, refer to the Biosolids and Residuals Master Plan (BRMP), Executive Summary, Municipal Code Chapter 681 (By-law 457-2000).
Key objectives
The key objectives of Toronto’s Sewers Bylaw are to:
- help facilities identify ways of reducing and/or eliminating pollutants, at the source
- continuously improve the quality of biosolids
- protect water quality. The new bylaw established more stringent limits on most of the 11 heavy metals found in the Ontario Guidelines for Utilisation of Biosolids and Other Wastes on Agricultural Land and included 27 toxic organics.