News 1. Motor Vehicle Act “The province has put out an open call for input on a new Traffic Safety Act to replace the much-amended and much-maligned Motor Vehicle Act (MVA),” writes Examiner transportation columnist Erica Butler: The call-out is remarkably open ended, simply asking people to read over the current MVA and “tell us what […]
Nova Scotia’s looming oil-drilling disaster
Canadian regulators have failed to reduce the likelihood of a Deepwater Horizon-like blowout at BP's deep-sea well on the Scotian Slope, and the company plans to respond to a blowout with an oil dispersant that could compound the catastrophe.
When BP named its exploratory well in the Mississippi Canyon the Macondo Prospect after the doomed fictional town of Macondo from Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, that alone should have raised alarm bells. The story of seven generations of the Buendía family are set in the Colombian town, which is beset by […]
Liberals refuse to allow opposition parties to question bureaucrats responsible for the privacy breach
Morning File, Thursday, April 26, 2018
1. Dirty Dealing, Part 4 Reports Linda Pannozzo: Nova Scotia Lands, a provincial crown corporation charged with cleaning up Boat Harbour, played a role in silencing two Dalhousie University researchers whose work studied air pollution coming from the Northern Pulp mill, the Halifax Examiner has learned. The two researchers, Emma Hoffman and Tony Walker, were the […]
Dirty Dealing
Part 4: Message Control and the Northern Pulp Mill’s Cancer-Causing Air Emissions
Nova Scotia Lands, a provincial crown corporation charged with cleaning up Boat Harbour, played a role in silencing two Dalhousie University researchers whose work studied air pollution coming from the Northern Pulp mill, the Halifax Examiner has learned. In Part 3 of the Dirty Dealing series, I reported on the researchers’ 2017 ambient air study, which revealed […]
Examineradio 149: Linda Pannozzo on the Northern Pulp mill
This week, journalist Linda Pannozzo discusses her latest investigation into the Northern Pulp mill. Plus, we discuss the convention centre, racism reports at schools and Abdoul Abdi. (Direct download) (RSS feed) (Subscribe via iTunes)
John Lohr plays footsies with the reprehensibles: Morning File, Friday, March 9, 2018
News 1. Dirty Dealing, Part 3 “In a study published in 2017, Dalhousie University researchers reported that air levels of three volatile organic compounds (VOCs) near the Abercrombie pulp mill in Pictou County exceeded cancer risk thresholds and ‘are of primary health concern in terms of population risk,’” reports Linda Pannozzo, who goes on to […]
Dirty Dealing
Part 3: Elevated Levels of Cancer-Causing Air Emissions Coming from Abercrombie Pulp Mill, Peer-Reviewed Study Reveals
In a study published in 2017, Dalhousie University researchers reported that air levels of three volatile organic compounds (VOCs) near the Abercrombie pulp mill in Pictou County exceeded cancer risk thresholds and “are of primary health concern in terms of population risk.” Over an eight-year period (2006-2013), 1,3-butadiene, benzene, and carbon tetrachloride were found to […]
Nova Scotia is destroying its forests by chasing the biomass delusion: Morning File, Friday, February 23, 2018
News 1. Biomass “Guysborough County harvester Danny George is accusing the Department of Natural Resources of allowing old-growth hardwood to be cut and burned in Nova Scotia Power’s biomass boiler at Point Tupper,” reports Aaron Beswick for the Chronicle Herald. Beswick gets into the details of that charge, and it’s worth reading the whole article. […]
Examineradio 146: Erica Butler on Transit
This week, we talk with Examiner transportation columnist Erica Butler about all things transit. Also: Linda Pannozzo’s latest investigative piece about plans to pipe effluent from the Northern Pulp Mill into the Northumberland Strait, and Jennifer Henderson on the rights of people with mental disabilities. (Direct download) (RSS feed) (Subscribe via iTunes)
Dirty Dealing
Part 2: Wading Through the Quagmire of Northern Pulp’s Fast-tracked Environmental Assessment
Documents obtained through a Freedom of Information request reveal that concern about the possibility that Northern Pulp’s proposed effluent treatment facility could result in eutrophication, or the creation of a dead zone in the Northumberland Strait, was raised early on by a senior official with Nova Scotia’s Environmental Assessment (EA) Branch. Emails between Northern Pulp’s […]