City of Peterborough Addresses Environmental Remediation Update For Jackson Creek

The City of Peterborough has provided an update to Environmental Remediation Update For Jackson Creek which was contaminated through Bethune Street construction work that occurred on Aug. 24.

File Photo.

The City has assured that they are actively working on short-term cleanup and longer-term remediation. 

The Ministry of the Environment identified a fuel spill in Jackson Creek in the area of Townsend and Aylmer streets. The City had placed environmental protection measures immediately after the spill to prevent it form getting into Little Lake with help from Working with the Ministry of the Environment (MECP) according to a press release. They retained an environmental consultant, Cambium, to investigate the source of the contamination as well as an environmental remediation specialist, GFL, to support immediate cleanup activities.

The City says the investigation, cleanup and implementation of remediation is ongoing .

The City’s environmental consultant has created a Remedial Action Plan including MECP comments, which has been reviewed, accepted and overseen by MECP as the regulating body. The plan introduces a Geophysical Survey which was completed and discovered an unidentified tank containing limited free products.

While the tank was promptly removed, the City believes there are other sources of contamination now surfacing in Jackson Creek, pending the installation of a reactive barrier that is a more promising long-term solution. The Permeable Reactive Barrier (PRB) installation is also scheduled to begin next week.

With the recent weather, conditions in Jackson Creek have deteriorated according to the City. They are communicating with the MECP which directed them to retain a environmental remediation specialist full-time until conditions improve - GFL has deployed all the resources it has available as well as City resources. The City anticipates the contractor will be able to remove the temporary dam in place to support the construction activities and GFL will also support the additional skimming of free product available during the temporary dam removal.

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