A big stink is brewing in Vancouver’s east side.
And the cause is rendering plant West Coast Reduction, says University of the Fraser Valley’s Lenore Newman, a professor and researcher in food security and the environment.
“It’s this dead-fish kind of smell,” she said.
“You spend $1 million on a house, you don’t want it to smell like fish.
Newman’s argument is that this summer has been exceptionally bad for a problem that is normally limited to a few blocks.
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“A lot of people are suddenly learning there’s a rendering plant in the neighbourhood,” she said.
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Newman was correct about a problem at the plant – a breakdown at West Coast Reduction on Thursday forced a buildup of unprocessed animal waste and an extra day of rendering Sunday, said West Coast Rendering president Barry Glotman.
But residents shouldn’t hold their breath for action against the company. Without any agreeable way to measure the smell, there’s no way to prove West Coast Rendering broke any law.
Neither has Harvest Power, formerly called Fraser Richmond Soil and Fibre, which Ray Robb, Metro Vancouver’s manager of regulation and enforcement, said triggered the majority of this summer’s odour complaints.
The summer heat and one-time breakdown are to blame for the recent stench, but there’s more at play – gentrification and increased awareness, thanks to a proposed bylaw that will effectively improve air emissions.
Metro Vancouver’s complaint line has been ringing off the hook, with more than 50 calls this past weekend, well above the weekly average of 30.
“If you think about it, 15 years ago . . . that community wasn’t a pleasant place. Whereas now those homes are selling for a million dollars,” said Robb.
“You have people with expectations that are higher than the old days where … people were struggling to survive and odours were the least of their concerns.”
The proposed bylaw drafted by Metro Vancouver is set for community consultation in the fall.
Its model would charge for permits by high-risk odour producers. It doesn’t measure the amount of odour because a March 2010 decision by a provincial Environmental Appeal Board ruled that the European standard of measurement, odour units, wasn’t acceptable.
Without a measurable unit, there’s no way to measure odours. All Metro Vancouver can do is impose more means to clean the air through technology requirements.
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