Sign me up for the class action. Time to end all the BS.

Go for it! Long overdue!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrostatic_precipitator

The pulpmills already have electrostatic precipitators to catch fine particulates. If they don't do the job 100% more stages can be added.

There are various types of scrubbers, such as wet scrubbers and dry scrubbers for industrial gases that contain fine particles from combustion.

This is a bad time for the pulpmills to embark on new technology which may cost many tens of millions per mill.

Since it is an environmental and health issue both the federal and provincial governments have funds available for new investments in the latest technology.

To get a handle on toxic oil refinery emissions may be more difficult and expensive.

Hey, speaking of toxic emissions, why not vote NDP and shut down the whole province?

The NDP can sell everyone a horse so we can drag logs down to the "People's Railway" and ship the raw logs off to China. Processing wood in BC will become illegal, and just out of the question because processing would be too expensive to compete anyway.

And any people still left in PG will be sneeking out at night for some wood to burn so their bottled water doesn't freeze.

I believe that it is time that the big industry in our city is held accountable for their illegal polluting activity in out city. They should take some of the cash out of the cash reserves that they have built up over the years that they are burning right now trying to operate and use it to clean this up. Our health and our lives are not worth this the big corporations greed.
Check the statistics....you will find a higher percentage of lung decease in Prince George than you thought there was.
This city "STINKS" worse than Tokyo Japan for crying out load.

With people like YDPC around we would still be emptying our human waste into the streets.

This is the 21st Century. He has dreams of living in the 16th.

Yes, but talking tough and being tough are two different things....
you want to be tough I'll back you all the way...
otherwise just go away and shhhhhhhh....have little patience for blowhards....

The difference 10+ years of inactivity by the Ministry and the City makes in the way people look at air quality is almost unbelievable.

Good going for PACHA. Hope they have some money to fight the fight that obviously needs to be fought.

One has to wonder whether that is why the most recent episode left the advisory on for much longer than normal.

With people like gus around our kids have no future.

Actually Tokyo does stink. It smells like sewage all the time. And there is less cancer in Japan simply because they can't afford to eat like pigs.

"This is a bad time for the pulpmills to embark on new technology which may cost many tens of millions per mill"

Given the current state of the economy I would agree with you BUT (and this is a very large but) when will it EVER be a good time for the mills to upgrade their technology? I'd suggest that if we wait for them to do something on their own accord, it will NEVER happen. Regulators, government and the general public need to force these changes to occur because heavy industry won't do it on their own. History proves this.

"With people like gus around our kids have no future"

Pure hogwash and nothing more. If you honestly believe that a future for our kids is contingent on allowing heavy industry to keep poisoning the air with impunity, you have been sleepwalking through life in North America (and the developed world for that matter) for the last couple of decades.

Good on PACHA for pursuing this. Let's see what the MoE has to say on the matter in a pubic forum. Heck, let's really blow it up and get Global News and The National on the case as well. Nothing like a "the government has known this was a problem for years and did nothing about it" story to get some action.

Yeah for YamaDooPolCat, Boo for all you bleeding hearts. We are all destined to die one day, I don't mind it, as long as it is not in a third world conditions.

I can see why they're talking tough. This crappy air has affected their voice boxes.

"This is a bad time for the pulpmills to embark on new technology which may cost many tens of millions per mill"

This is a bad time indeed compared to not too long ago when there was no global meltdown yet and the new housing construction starts in the States were ten times what they are now.

Canfor's losses last year were several hundred millions.

The unemployment lines are growing daily south of the border (and here) and most newspapers are on the brink of bankruptcy. Consumer spending is way down and so is the need for pulp, paper and lumber products. Facts of life.

Well, it's a good time at least to get cracking on the tougher standards and on research into what the best available equipment would be.

Give them a deadline to achieve zero fine particulates by a certain date like 2012 or so.

"With people like gus around our kids have no future"

Our kids, and many of us living today have no future due to rampant consumerism.

Hopefully you are not naive enough to think that an interest in having an unpolluted environment is to blame for that ciris rather than simple greed.

Back to the basics of living. THAT is what is causing the loss of jobs. So is an increase in mechanization. I defy you to show that requiring better quality manufacturing processes has yet lost one job. It might have lost jobs as one company goes under. But if the demand stays the same, then another company will open up with a new plant and better quality control. Those jobs lost due to more effective manufacturing techniques are gained in the auditing and quality control side of the process.

Things are not as simple as you make them out to be. You have to look at the whole system, not just one part of the sytem.

We need more YamaDooPolCats around with authority to tell it like it is instead of pussy footing around debates worrying if someones feelings might get hurt.

Yama has authority?

He can't even get NDP policy right, let alone speak with any authority.

When the blind lead the blind indeed.....!

People’s Action Committee for Healthy Air???

If anyone can give a better example of a thinly-veiled communist faction, I'd like to see it.

Gamblor, is that like the Chamber of Commerce and Free Enterprise???

IMO Huskey Oil has the most harmful emissions in town by a significant magnitude. I think a lot could be done if they just piped their emissions a kilometer to the north around that North bank on the Fraser that would block it significantly from the hills from blowing back into the bowl area. This done overnight would nearly eliminate the harmful air quality of PG.

Out the Northwood way is where we should be directing most of our industrial pollution, because that is the safest place for it population wise.

Another source is the gases from the biofuels for the pulp mills. I think they have already done some work to reduce turn over time of their inventory to prevent rotting. I think that stuff should be stored on paved parking lot type pads for a more efficient clean up in turning over the fuels in say a 90-day turn over period... rather than having huge wastage sinking into the ground to generate smelly gases as it rots year after year. The garbage dump has to take these kinds of precautions, so why not the pulp mills... I don't really see the difference in the process of biofuels rotting? Wood chips would be alright because they turn over fast and don't rot nearly as easy, but the hog fuels, sawdust ect... I think would be an interesting study.

PACHA communist?????
Gamblor come in out of the smog
You aren't seeing clearly
Furthermore your off the cuff remark is damaging to democracy.
Be careful where you point the finger there could be four coming back at you.