In her letter of March 13, Bonny Skene of Domtar corrects a Daily News “error,” stating that “emissions of fine particulate (PM 2.5) will decrease by 70 per cent “ by 2016.
This is true for the high stack, and for overall regional emissions, but is blatantly untrue for our city. According to Domtar’s own figures, in its “CALPUFF Dispersion Assessment Report,” there is a sin of omission at work here, or is it a simple case of “smoke and mirrors”?
What Domtar is not telling Kamloops residents is that although regional PM 2.5 emissions will decrease by about 65 per cent (from 1129 tonnes per year now, to 359 tpy in 2016), and high-stack emissions will decrease by about 75 per cent (from 1,099 tpy now, to 279 tpy in 2016) city-level emissions of PM 2.5 will actually increase about 250 per cent (from 31 tpy now, to 80 tpy in 2016).
This is why the Interior Health Authority did not approve Domtar’s plans when asked for its input during the permit application stage.
And read on: PM 2.5 is only one constituent of Domtar’s ‘smoke.’
Emissions of PM 10 from Domtar’s city-level stacks will increase from 41 tpy at present to 139 tpy in 2016. This is a 340 per cent increase!
Putting all particulate emissions under 10 microns in size (which the B.C. government states are the province’s worst threats to health at present) together, city-level emissions will rise from today’s 72 tonnes per year to 2016’s 219 tpy. That’s a lot of smoke.
The least Domtar could do is to be totally honest with Kamloops residents and admit that our downtown air quality is going to worsen by about 300 per cent.
BRONWEN SCOTT
Kamloops
