This report by Golder Associates (March 2009) gives practical steps to increase the municipal waste diversion rate — i.e. not to landfill or incineration — to 70% and beyond in Durham Region. The capital cost is a small fraction of what would be spent on the proposed incinerator.

Note: this is a large PDF file (7.5 mbytes). The file size listed below is inaccurate.

The Municipality of Clarington and Durham Region have signed the Host Community Agreement (HCA), the contract that states what Clarington gets for hosting the Durham incinerator for the 25 (or more) years it is planned to operate.

The story of the HCA merits attention because council voted against finding out what the municipality's solicitor had to say about it, after administrator Frank Wu said he over-rode the lawyer's concerns. Follow the story in two news reports by Jennifer Stone in Clarington This Week. See the links below.

The Ministry Review (PDF) published Friday February 26, 2010 is NOT a final decision by the Ministry of the Environment. In the words of the Notice of Completion posted in newspapers around Durham Region, "The Review of the EA does not make a decision about the EA. That decision is made by the Minister of the Environment after the comment period is over and in consideration of all submissions".

The publication of the notice of completion marks the start of a five-week comment period on the Ministry Review, and the Environmental Assessment study in total. Please submit your comments before the deadline of April 2, 2010.

The full Notice of Completion is reprinted here for your convenience.

The Regions of York and Durham have submitted an amended EA study Friday November 27. The documents are posted on the Durham-York Waste EA site but are not easy to find.

For your convenience, we link to the amended study:
 - Notice of submission (PDF)
 - Full set of documents

The Durham-York incinerator (thermal treatment) project team has submitted the environmental assessment (EA) study to the Ontario Ministry of the Environment (MOE) Friday July 31. The final documents will be available on the project web site www.durhamyorkwaste.ca by Friday August 7. We have attached the formal notice of submission to this alert as a PDF file. The notice sets out the commenting period and locations where documents can be viewed.

Clarington's peer review of the Site Specific Human Health and Ecological Risk Assessment was not included in the report release Friday July 3 for discussion at Clarington General Purpose and Administration committee Monday July 6. In other words, councillors approved it sight unseen.

The file attached to this posting is Attachment #14 to the Clarington Peer Review Report PSD-071-09. Hard copies are available from the Municipality of Clarington Planning department.

Clarington's peer review report released Friday July 3 for discussion at Clarington General Purpose and Administration committee Monday July 6 9:30am.

The report is 100 pages and cannot be conveniently emailed. See the file attachment below. Hard copies are available from the Municipality of Clarington Clerks dept.

Durham Region released a massive amount of staff reports and consultant environmental assessment studies Friday May 12th. There are literally thousands of pages to read before the committee meeting Tuesday June 16th.

The staff reports are on the Durham Region web site but they are hard to find: Left side menu "Minutes and Agendas" >> "View Agendas", then choose "Committee of the Whole", June 16th.