Tuesday, November 18, 2003

Canadian Garbage Overview

About thirteen months ago, Michigan State Trooper Linda Jordan was dispatched to a suspicious circumstance at a US Customs facility in Detroit and found a garbage truck continuously leaking blood, leaving puddles wherever it stopped. Further investigation revealed the truck contained bags full of human blood transfusion bags, human blood products, and intravenous (IV) tubing. The truck had just entered the United States from Windsor, Ontario.

The bleeding truck was one of over 200 trucks carrying over 10,000 tons of imported Canadian garbage into Michigan that day. Although it was turned back at the border that day, it is assumed that it returned with the more than 200 trucks that were allowed to enter the country the next day. There is no evidence that any corrective action was ever taken to prevent future bleeding trucks.

In September 2003, US Customs inspectors discovered 2,000 pounds of marijuana on a Canadian trash truck trying to cross the Blue Water Bridge from Sarnia, Ontario, to Port Huron, Michigan. Illegal drugs have been found in Canadian trash on other occasions, but usually not when entering the US. Remarkably and against all odds, the drugs are sometimes seen when the truck unloads at the Michigan landfill.

It should be noted that 200 trash trucks daily hauling over 10,000 tons - an estimated 3.6 million tons annually - is an amount so gargantuan that expectations of an effective inspection program are unrealistic. It simply cannot be done. It should also be noted that the trash going to Michigan from Ontario amounts to more than 10 percent of all trash generated in Canada. Since Canada is larger than the US and has only about 10 percent of the population, and Ontario is more than six times the size of Michigan, why don't the Canadians have their own landfills? Good question.

The answer is simple. It's easier to dump trash in Michigan than to fight the political battles necessary to have a new Canadian landfill. Toronto attempted to utilize an abandoned mine (see Adams Mine) for solid waste but the city met with fierce opposition from Canadian environmentalists. Claiming landfills produce greenhouse gases and leach toxins into groundwater, the greenies pledged they would do anything and everything to kill the idea. Toronto caved and started sending caravans of trash to Michigan.

[As an aside, the Canadian greenies are selective environmentalists. They're concerned about the rainforests in Brazil and greenhouse gases from landfills in Ontario, but they aren't concerned about greenhouse gases from landfills in the United States. Maybe they should be called the Canadian NIMBY (Not In My BackYard) environmentalists.]

Another troublesome aspect of the Canadian garbage issue is the gaping loophole it represents in relation to the security of the United States. To have 200 plus truckloads of largely unknown material passing across the border daily has to be considered unacceptably risky to the Department of Homeland Security.

The drugs, the bleeding truck, and other examples of unwanted cargo in trash trucks, including radioactive materials, has many people outraged. Environmentalists (US), lawmakers, and the general population of Michigan would like the importation of garbage to stop, but they have been powerless since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) governs the importation of commodities (see here for SCOTUS decision on definition of commodity) and any restraint of trade is prohibited. Also, a 1992 decision of the US Supreme Court ruled that states blocking importation of trash would violate interstate commerce provisions of the Constitution. For anything to happen with regard to importing trash, the federal government needs to get involved and, so far, the administration and Congress have not acted. But, there is hope. Legislation has been introduced in Congress to ban the Canadian garbage. Senator Debbie Stabenow, Senator Carl Levin, and Congressman John Dingell are spearheading the legislative efforts. Hopefully, some kind of relief from the Canadian garbage problem will be legislated in the coming months.

The Canadian garbage controversy is multifaceted and involves many groups and individuals. This overview is intended to give a disinterested observer a general idea of the scope and complexity of the issue.

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