Community & Labour Action

Riverkeepers pour cold water on Aquablue plan: Ottawa Sun

By BETH JOHNSTON, Sun Media

Last Updated: 16th July 2009, 8:16pm

Smiths Falls residents are being sold down the river by a bottled water company planning to move into the old Hershey’s plant, a citizens’ action group says.

Aquablue International announced June 18 it will move into the Hershey’s Factory and, within two years, employ 190 people from the community devastated by the loss of 500 jobs when the chocolate stopped flowing last December.

At the announcement, local politicians hailed the company as a saviour for the community struggling since the 46-year-old chocolate factory moved to Mexico.

But the Ottawa Riverkeeper, a citizens’ group which protects the Ottawa River and its tributaries, says the company’s plan to export Ottawa tapwater for profit is “outrageous.”

“Canadian municipalities are already facing water shortages and the predictions for future domestic water resources are gloomy. Our watersheds are supposed to be protected by federal and provincial prohibitions against transferring water out of a water basin,” Meredith Brown said.

Aquablue is taking advantage of a loophole in Canadian law that lets them export municipal tap water as long as it is packaged in containers of 20 litres or less. The company plans to take approximately 340 million litres of water a year from the municipal water system, which comes from the Rideau River, she explains.

“Taking massive amounts of water out of the Rideau River and shipping it overseas is a water diversion project in my dictionary. Diversions have ecological, cultural, social, and economic impacts that cannot be avoided or remedied,” she said.

Although she empathizes with out-of-work Smiths Falls residents, she urges them to see the bigger environmental picture.

“When you look at the life cycle analysis of bottled water, it’s extremely wasteful,” she said. “In these days, when we need more than ever to be sustainable, this is just not a good industry to be supporting.”

At last month’s announcement, Aquablue staff showed graphs detailing how they will use millions of gallons of water a year less than Hershey’s did.

But the water Hershey’s used was going back into the wastewater stream, Brown said.

“This is just exporting the raw good. This way we’re never getting it back, it’s right out of the watershed.”

A woman who answered the phone at Aquablue headquarters yesterday said the only person able to make a comment is the president and he won’t be back in the country until July 28.

Smiths Falls Mayor Dennis Staples couldn’t be reached for comment yesterday.