North Cowichan is appealing a decision by the province that allows Coast Environmental to increase its processing capacity at its Chemainus facility.
The municipality and some of the neighbours of the facility, located in the Chemainus Industrial Park, have had odour issues for years with the waste and compost treatment facility.
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Coast Environmental, which has seven locations on the Island, deals mostly with waste water, soil treatment, recycling and composting.
In 2012, the Municipality of North Cowichan amended its bylaws to not allow commercial composting as a permitted use at that site.
Rob Conway, North Cowichan’s director of planning, said Coast Environmental’s facility was grandfathered in and allowed to maintain operations at the time, but an increase in its processing capacity is not permitted under the municipality’s updated zoning.
But the company was recently given the green light from the Ministry of the Environment, which is responsible for the facility’s licensing, to increase the amount of composting materials it can process at any one time from 13,200 tonnes to 18,500 tonnes.
“The appeal window is up to 30 days after the province issued the permit for Coast Environmental to increase processing, which was on Feb. 26,” Conway said.
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North Cowichan Mayor Al Siebring said there has been a significant decrease in odours from the facility since it first opened.
“But don’t tell that to people across the road from the facility because when it’s bad, it’s bad,” he said.
“We’re just trying to make sure it doesn’t get any worse. It’s not within our authority to grant licences for this facility, but we can appeal the government’s decision. Commercial composting is currently a prohibited use on that land under our bylaws, but Coast Environmental is operating legally there and we can’t retroactively kick them out of there after we changed our zoning.”
Siebring said that while the facility is located in North Cowichan, jurisdiction for its operations is shared among a number of authorities.
“It’s complicated, with the province responsible for issuing the licence to operate, the CVRD is in charge of regulations and North Cowichan is responsible for land-use issues,” he said.
“It can keep you awake at night.”
Calls for comment from Coast Environmental were not returned.
robert.barron@cowichanvalleycitizen.com
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