In a lead up to World Environment Week, the World Wildlife Fund, Earth Hour team, is calling all Canadians to Pin their Car Keys on the Fridge and find another way to get around.  Suggestions could be carpooling, walking, cycling or taking the transit bus.

They are suggesting that during the week of May 31st to June 5th, that you begin to get a little more exercise and/or work with your colleagues and get to work or play while leaving a smaller impact on the planet. 

And if you feel good about doing that this week, maybe you can consider doing it for the rest of the summer and perhaps think of getting rid of your automobile completely.  It is estimated that an average auto costs the owner and user about $6000-$8,000 dollars a year.  Just think of the fancy bike you could purchase and the number of bus passes you could use in the winter.  You could still perhaps have enough for a special vacation in this province.

This would seem to be a trick question but for a number of lakes in Canada, it will mean a loss of protection.

Under changes to the regulations (Schedule 2) of the Fisheries Act, a lake can be changed into a tailings impoundment area.  At that point it no longer is considered a natural body of water which, if toxic materials were dumped in it, would be protected by that same Fisheries Act.

There are now a dozen lakes and rivers in Canada that have already begun the process of  being "reclassified" as toxic dump sites for mining companies.  Sandy Pond in Newfoundland will now be a place where Vale Inco, a Brazilian company, can dump 400,000 tonnes of toxic waste a year over the next 15 years.

Vancouver-based Taseko Mines wants to develop an open pit mine 125 kilometres west of Williams Lake, British Columbia.  They will drain the Textan Biny (Fish Lake) and stockpile rock waste and use Fish Creek and Little Fish Lake to dump their toxic tailings.  These tailings pond would clearly poison local water supplies and wipe out fish populations as Taseko River is connected to Little Fish Lake.

As the mining industry makes staggering profits into the billions of dollars, it could certainly afford to use technologies to manage mine waste in a sustainable way. The Canadian Federal Government appears to be complicit in this by allowing the mining industry to degrade our pristine water resources for short-term gain.

Canada’s public freshwater ecosystems are now at risk of being toxic waste dumps rather than being diverse habitat.  When fresh water is valuable as drinking water sources, it seems inappropriate to eliminate them now when climate change is looming.

Released just days after a federal budget that effectively slashed funding for university-based climate science by failing to renew the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, the report documents a disturbing pattern of federal actions that undermine the scientific research that must underpin responsible federal climate change policy.