Wastewater treatment plants a point source for microplastic pollution
Although Manitoba’s commercial fishing industry has been using floats and nets made from plastic for decades, a Gimli environmental group thinks the industry could pivot away from plastic in order to help protect Lake Winnipeg.
After learning of Gimli’s Cornerstone Enterprises’ work program that converts plastic pop bottles into floats for commercial fishing nets, the Gimli Environmental Advisory Committee (GEAC) thinks it would be better to have that plastic turned in to a recycling depot rather than put to use in Lake Winnipeg.
“Our members are concerned about the use of plastic bottles in the lake where they’ll deteriorate and some might break down into smaller pieces. I know you can buy approved cork floaters for fishing nets,” said GEAC chair Gail Mastin. “We have enough plastic in the lake already without adding more to it. There have been studies done now that show fish are eating plastic.”
Before plastic rose to prominence in the 1950s, wood or cork – cork is the outermost layer of tree bark – were used to make commercial fishing floats for both freshwater and sea fisheries. Fishing nets were traditionally made from organic materials such as cotton or wool. Natural materials were subject to rot. To provides floats for the Pacific salmon fishery in the 1950s, for instance, a British Columbia cork mill cut red cedar trees into bolts and dipped them in tar.
The commercial fishing industry the world over primarily uses plastic floats and plastic or nylon nets. Angling gear is also primarily made from plastic.
Mastin said she’s also on the steering committee¬¬¬ of the Coalition to Save Lake Winnipeg, a grassroots environmental group based in the Gimli area that advocates for the health of the lake, and it was “disappointed” to learn that pop bottles are being used as floats for fishers’ nets.
GEAC’s mandate is to advise Gimli council on environmental matters, but also educate the public on environmental issues.
“We want to educate people and suggest better environmental practices and, hopefully, have better safeguards put in place to keep our lake healthy. Just because fishers have been using plastic soda bottles for a long time doesn’t make it right, especially today knowing the problems they cause. In the sun plastic gets brittle and breaks down. Soda bottles emit harmful chemicals into the lake when exposed to the sun and many of them stay in the lake,” said Mastin. “Plastic soda bottles were never meant to be used as buoys. They make very cheap buoys, but there are authorized buoys that should be used and are not costly.”
The world is awash in consumer products made with plastic, which is primarily produced from fossil fuels. It’s in practically everything we use including computers, telephones, televisions, carpets, recycled grocery bags, eyeglasses, furniture, stoves, diapers, hygiene products, clothing, vehicles and boats. And the majority of our food is packaged in plastic containers, plastic bags, plastic nets (e.g., avocadoes sold in bulk) or unnecessarily wrapped in plastic film (e.g., cucumbers).
Plastic production ramped up in the United States after the Second World War, and by the 1980s it was recognized that plastic was polluting the environment. That hasn’t stopped production, though.
“The worldwide production of plastics reached a staggering 400.3 million metric tons in 2022. This marks an increase of about 1.6 percent from the previous year. Plastics production has soared since 1950s,” states Statista online.
Plastic has contaminated every corner of the globe including the Arctic and Antarctic and boreal and tropical forests. It has been found on the highest mountain tops and in the deepest seas. Fragmented plastic or microplastic is also showing up in the human body, including our brains, and the vast soup of industrial chemicals used to manufacture plastic is leaching into our food and water. The effect of plastic on the human is only just beginning to be understood by medical researchers, and the prognosis is not looking good.
Mastin said she contacted commercial fisher Bill Buckels regarding the use of pop bottles and they had a good discussion about the health of Lake Winnipeg. She also spoke with Cornerstone, which doesn’t paint the bottles but ties them together and sells them in bundles to fishers.
Buckels told the Express that fishers have been using pop bottles as floats for several decades to keep their nets buoyant in the water column. Cornerstone rejigs the pop bottles for fishers as part of its occupational therapy program, and as far as he knows it’s the only Manitoba company making floats. Fishers use the floats for a season then remove them from the lake. When they’re no longer useful, they’re recycled.
He said plastic pollution is ubiquitous in the environment, and the issue of plastic floats used by the fishing industry is a “drop in the bucket” compared to wastewater. Microplastics are entering the lake from City of Winnipeg effluent and raw sewage and from rural lagoons and wastewater treatment plants that get emptied into the lake. It’s also transported to the lake from the agricultural industry that uses plastic twine, plastic feed and seed bags and plastic wrappers for hay bales.
“Some environmental groups are misdirecting their efforts with regard to plastic pollution in Lake Winnipeg and that’s why the lake is not being cleaned up. The issue of plastic in the lake is a valid issue, especially for our younger generations which are going to be poisoned by it,” said Buckels. “We as a society need to either come up with alternative materials or better recycle the plastic that continues to be manufactured despite the harms it’s doing. Plastic eventually breaks into tiny particles. Massive quantities of microplastic are getting carried to the lake in wastewater.”
A 2017 study on microplastics by researchers from the University of Manitoba and Lakehead University in Ontario showed Lake Winnipeg acting as a “sink” for microplastic pollution because of daily discharges of wastewater from three treatment plants in Winnipeg and from two rivers, the Red and the Assiniboine.
The study titled “Microplastics Flowing into Lake Winnipeg: Densities, Sources, Flux, and Fish Exposures” calculated microplastic (defined as plastic fragments, fibres, films, foams and pellets) loading in the lake. The researchers found that wastewater treatment plants are a “point source” for microplastic.
The estimated annual input of microplastics from the Red and Assiniboine rivers (the Saskatchewan and Winnipeg rivers were excluded), that carry wastewater and surface runoff to the lake were roughly 0.4 billion particles a year. Furthermore, 65 per cent of the fish tested (carp and sauger) had ingested microplastics. The majority (89 per cent) of microplastics found in the two rivers were plastic fibres, commonly found in clothing.
Buckels said the government should be “counting plastic” that’s entering Lake Winnipeg. If it can set nutrient targets for the lake, why can’t it set plastic targets?
“I want the government to set plastic targets so that we know how much plastic we’re getting from wastewater sources and from south of the Canada-U.S. border. How much plastic is coming from cottage country? How much from Ontario via the Winnipeg River or from Alberta and Saskatchewan, which are part of the Lake Winnipeg watershed?” he said. “Why can’t we monitor plastic use by major industries and make it mandatory for them to report every week?”
For the most part, commercial fishers don’t willfully abandon nets and pop bottle floats, but there have been cases of equipment – referred to as ghost gear – abandoned in the lake. Provincial conservation officers are supposed to be on top of that, said Buckels, but the province is “trying to manage everything on a skeleton crew.”
In addition to plastic nets, Buckels said he sees other sources of plastic in the lake including water bottles, plastic pickerel rigs used by anglers and plastic ropes used by boaters.
To help prevent plastic pollution, Buckels said his industry has been pressing the province to implement a plastic net recycling program – somewhat similar to an incentive program offered to agricultural producers – but can’t get a commitment.
“Commercial fishers have been asking for a recycling program for plastic or nylon nets¬¬ along the lines of what farmers have for hay bale twine, wrappers and so forth and which can end up in the environment,” he said. “I want to see an incentive program created for fishers to turn in their plastic nets. This way the province can track the nets and ensure that every net is present and accounted for. The program could offer a free new net to fishers who turn in say, 10 or 20 used nets.”
A spokesperson for the province’s fisheries department said it does not have a commercial fishing net recycling program when asked if it has one or is planning to introduce one. Nor does the province “track nets or utilize a ghost gear reporting system” similar to a program run by the federal government’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans.
“[Provincial] fisheries branch staff and conservation officers collect abandoned nets encountered during regular work,” said the spokesperson. “On Lake Winnipeg, conservation officers find and recover about 20 to 30 nets each year. The department, through the Fish and Wildlife Enhancement Fund, also funds clean-up initiatives by local groups that recover lost nets.”
Commercial fishers who fail to attend to their nets and have spoiled fish in the nets as a result of their neglect are subject to penalties meted out by conservation officers who catch them, he added.
“However, most commercial fishing gear that becomes lost is done unintentionally and generally is not traceable to a specific fisher,” said the spokesperson. “Commercial fishing gear can be lost due to high wind conditions in open water or due to unpredictable or unstable ice conditions in winter.”
