Dear Editor:
Re: Concerns grow over proposed coal facility, Letters to the editor, The Record, March 13.
What is wrong with coal along the Fraser River? I already live adjacent to the railway tracks and the truck traffic in New Westminster spewing diesel fumes into the air. All buildings along this corridor have been advised to clean their air systems more regularly because of this dust. When you add coal delivery and loading on the Fraser River, transporting it from Washington and up to Texada Island the situation can only worsen. Can someone please explain what is wrong with this picture?
In 1954, federal and provincial governments, the academics and the asbestos corporations gave their blessings to extracting asbestos from the ground to be used primarily as an insulator. That was the year of my wife's birth in Quebec. Before she was 50, she died of mesothelioma, caused by exposure to asbestos.
Here in 2013, we have fracking in the north, a proposed pipeline, increased traffic in New Westminster, a proposed pipeline and now, quite suddenly (as if snuck under our noses) this - a coal terminal along the Fraser River because the Americans have tougher environmental laws than we do in Canada - a total surprise to me!
Port Metro Vancouver, a federally regulated body, has decided that a flyer is all that is required to approve an expansion of coal exporting on behalf of the U.S. Where is the process of consultation with the public, federal and provincial leadership on environmental issues, environmental reviews, and impact studies of what the coal does at the other end (i.e. China)?
What about the costs to our health-care system?
How much suffering and loss of life will this black plague inflict? Will someone please enlighten me?
Mike Hoyer, New Westminster
