The owner of the Lachenaie landfill site in Terrebonne, Complexe Enviro Connexions, has taken steps with Quebec to receive more residual materials due to the increase in the quantity of waste generated by the economic recovery. The subsidiary of the multinational Waste Connections has also paid nearly 60 million dollars to buy land adjacent to its site and will soon take over 35 hectares of land in an agricultural zone.
Complexe Enviro Connexions (CEC) registered last March in the register of lobbyists of Quebec to be able to ensure “the management of additional tons of residual materials”. The year 2021 “resulted in the generation of volumes [de résidus] unprecedented and unexpected” because of the pandemic and the economic recovery, can we read there.
The Canadian subsidiary of Texan multinational Waste Connections refused interview requests from the To have to to comment further on this approach.
About 95% of what the Lachenaie site, nicknamed by some “the garbage can of the metropolitan community of Montreal”, receives comes from the 82 municipalities of the CMM. Unless expanded, the complex should no longer have the authorized capacity to receive new waste from 2029.
However, in recent years, the CEC has injected tens of millions to quietly expand its presence on the edge of Highway 640. The duty identified five transactions totaling $59.6 million since July 2020. The acquired land is adjacent to the landfill site.
The company has, among other things, seized the Sablière Thouin as well as the land belonging to the family that owns it. “These lands will be part of a transformation process for the development of green infrastructure to meet the current and future demands of society,” the company wrote in an email.
Does the latter rule out expanding its landfill there in the coming decades? CEC declined to answer this question. It states that “subject to government authorization” the current site could “be operated for an additional 30 years”.
Note: This fall, CEC sold part of the newly acquired land to the City of Terrebonne for $14.7 million. The transaction will allow the municipality to build an industrial park there. It would not be excluded that part of these lands be used to accommodate activities related to the recovery of residual materials.
This waltz of transactions does not surprise Karel Ménard, director general of the Quebec Common Front for ecological waste management: “We cannot say with certainty that it is for an expansion, but we can assume it” because of the sums spent. and land area.
For CEC, Mr. Ménard sees this as a strategy to position itself for the next few years: “Big companies like Waste Connexions are buying land near their site, left and right. Even though it’s fragmented, they try to put the puzzle together over the years. And when the capacity [d’un site] is reached, the urgency means that they come up with a solution: that of expanding. »
It is always easier to obtain permits to expand an active site than to build a new one, he observes: “The government does not consider an expansion as a new site. We, we rather consider that it is a new site which is developed alongside an old one. »
In addition to these acquisitions, CEC has received, in recent months, authorizations from the Commission for the Protection of Agricultural Lands to acquire two lands in an agricultural zone totaling 35 hectares, the equivalent of the area of Jarry Park in Montreal.
Transaction in Mascouche
These lands have belonged to the City of Mascouche since 2019. They are located 1.5 kilometers from its Lachenaie complex. The transaction is expected to take place in the coming months.
The mayor of Mascouche, Guillaume Tremblay, affirms that no landfilling or recovery of residual materials will take place in his city: “Part of the zoning is agricultural and part is recognized as being in metropolitan woodlands. This would be prohibited under Quebec law. »
The land transfer agreement between the city and CEC was intended to counter the projected development of the Aéroport des Moulins a few years ago. Not only did the municipality not want this airport, but the presence of birds attracted to the landfill would have made cohabitation difficult. “We had an agreement with them [CEC] so that we can say [aux promoteurs de l’aéroport] “take your clicks and your slaps and go settle elsewhere”. »
“There will be no facilities to treat residual materials, because it is a conservation area in addition to an agricultural area,” says CEC, who did not want to detail what it intends to develop. on this site.
The duty obtained an agreement which it entered into with Ferme Oli. This stipulates that this agricultural producer from Repentigny will be able to use part of CEC’s land without paying rent. In return, he will have to use fertilizing residual materials from the Lachenaie complex. In the longer term, CEC plans to build greenhouses there that could use biogas produced by its environmental complex.