Lanxess said it does not believe the filmmakers will provide an “objective review of the situation” or of the company’s efforts to remediate the chemical contamination, which has been linked to years of Agent Orange and DDT production at the plant.
ELMIRA — A pair of documentaries exploring the contamination of Elmira’s water supply are in limbo after the new owner of the chemical plant at the heart of the story refused to give final approval for the inclusion of an interview with a former plant employee.
The interview with Jeff Merriman, manager of environmental remediation for former owner Chemtura Corp., was filmed before the company was sold in 2017, and new owner Lanxess does not want that footage to be used.
"We need final written approval, and Lanxess doesn’t want to give written approval," said Kitchener resident Mike Heitmann, one of two local filmmakers looking to tell the story of the contamination.
The two started working together more than three years ago to make a documentary about the contamination, but they disagreed on what the scope of the film should be and decided to produce two separate films using many of the same interviews.
In an email statement to the Record, Lanxess said it does not believe the filmmakers will provide an "objective review of the situation" or of the company’s efforts to remediate the chemical contamination, which has been linked to years of Agent Orange and DDT production at the plant.
"Without written approval, footage shot on Chemtura property may not be used," the agreement stated.
Heitmann and Wagler also had Merriman sign a separate release form acknowledging the recordings would be included in the final film and become the property of the filmmakers.
A carcinogenic chemical known as nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) was found in town wells, and a pipeline was built to bring water from Waterloo to Elmira.
Cleanup is expected to continue until at least 2028, the provincially mandated deadline for groundwater remediation to be complete.

Amritsar
The water harvesting project in Kot Dharam Chand Kalan village of the district has resulted in water contamination for the villagers.
It has made the underground water unfit not only for consumption but also for washing clothes.
At that time, the officials concerned had stated that the project would do away with the problem of waterlogging in streets as waste water would be drained into the catchment area.
As many as 500 families were connected with the project.
The water collected in here was to be used for irrigation or other purposes.
With the passage of time, the stored water made the underground water contaminated.
It has made underground water contaminated.
Residents said the problem has forced them to bring water from a nearby gurdwara.
People said they have been demanding potable water facility.

The issue with debris leaving the landfill site and ending up on Andrea Weissenborn’s property has been ongoing for years, and the CSRD has made an agreement to enter her property to clean up the waste on a regular basis.
CSRD workers had been visiting the Weissenborn property a couple of times a week to clean up the litter that ended up outside of the landfill, which Weissenborn believes is mostly carried there by ravens.
“In the past, we have been open to them cleaning it up, but it has never been satisfactory,” Weissenborn said.
“In the past, we thought that was just part of living next to a landfill.” Between June and October 2018, the CSRD collected more than 200 bags of litter from the Weissenborn property, weighing nearly 1,000 kg.
Over the next year, the CSRD plans to continue site improvements at the Golden Landfill, including completing the litter netting, which should help prevent litter from exiting the property, and they hope to continue discussions with the neighbouring property owner regarding increased buffer area acquisition.
Weissenborn also voiced concerns about water contamination in Town of Golden wells, but the CSRD’s hydrogeologist with Western Water Bryer Manwell, says the numbers aren’t out of the ordinary, and it would be difficult to tell if any contaminants came directly from the landfill.
“There is likely another source.” Manwell hopes to complete the well at the southwest of the property, and is recommending to drill another well in the valley bottom, somewhere between the landfill and the Town wells, but not too close to a roadway.
Westbound on the Trans-Canada Highway, and accident has snarled traffic coming into town at Golden View Road, at the Golden Upper Donald overpass, prompting emergency response.
Winter driving is in full effect, and drivers are expected to have winter-rated tires on all vehicles from October 1 to March 31.
Snowfall in Golden is expected to continue over the next three days, and sunny weather is expected on Saturday.

“The government still allows an astonishing amount of pollution to flow into our lakes and rivers,” Saxe said.
She pointed to raw municipal sewage from combined sewer overflows (CSOs), agricultural runoff, toxic industrial waste and road salt as the four biggest sources of water contamination in the province.
“All four are things that the Ontario government has known about for decades, but has consistently chosen not to regulate them effectively,” the commissioner said.
Municipalities struggle with curbing raw sewage discharges Sewage from combined sewer overflows may be the worst culprit of all.
Municipalities can be permitted to dump raw sewage into water bodies if they have “used all reasonable measures” to avoid it, Saxe said.
According to her report, Back to Basics, one in five Ontarians do not consume water that is protected by the Clean Water Act, legislation from 2006 that set in law how the province would protect source water (lakes, for example, or aquifers) on a watershed-by-watershed basis.
Of those residents not drinking water protected by provincial legislation, three percent are in northern or Indigenous communities, Saxe said.
And while 82 percent of Ontarians who get municipal drinking water have access to clean water, it’s unwise to expect that municipalities can provide safe drinking water indefinitely if source water protections set to expire on March 31, 2019 are not renewed.
“We have to get water from somewhere,” Saxe said.
“The more we pollute the water, not only do we lose biodiversity, but it becomes harder and harder to find water we can drink.” And across the province, more municipalities are seeing the effects of polluted water.

CITY OF NEWBURGH – Officials from the U.S. Department of Defense and Air Force will answer questions about their response to Stewart Air National Guard Base’s contamination of Newburgh’s drinking water during a public forum at 1 p.m. on Thursday in the city.
Two DoD officials – Robert McMahon, assistant secretary of defense for sustainment and Maureen Sullivan, deputy assistant secretary of defense (environment) – will be at the forum, which Orange County is hosting at the Newburgh Armory Unity Center, 321 S. William St. John Henderson, assistant secretary of the air force for installations, environment and energy will also be on-hand, along with state and county officials.
Washington Lake, Newburgh’s primary water supply, has been closed since May 2016 due to high levels of the toxic chemical PFOS.
The contamination has been traced to the use of PFOS-containing firefighting foams used at Stewart Air Base.
Following an open-house question-and-answer session, DoD officials will go over the current response to the contamination and planned steps.
“We welcome the DoD and Air Force in their agreement to come to Newburgh and address the concerns of both residents and local officials about the City’s water supply,” county Executive Steve Neuhaus said.

The Southampton Town supervisor called for a deeper investigation to be done November 1, looking into water flow tables and test results at locations near the Damascus Road landfill to determine if it, or other areas, are the source of high levels of perfluorooctanesulfonic and perfluorooctanoic acid.
The DEC listed the parcel as a problem or Class “P” site, or possible Superfund site, and the town was ordered to begin an investigation.
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During the DEC’s original testing, 11,200 parts per trillion of PFAS and 424 parts per trillion of PFOA were detected.
But Schneiderman said he’d like to see a water-mapping table developed to see if the flow of water could be carrying the contamination from other sources to the former landfill.
“But we don’t really have a lot of answers on that at this point.” He said the northern end of the main runway at Francis S. Gabreski Airport in Westhampton Beach, a nearby explosive storage facility, and what he called a “mysterious” one-acre site on which nothing seems to grow could be clues affecting the results at Damascus Road.
The county is currently testing wells at the airport, and findings are expected to be presented in the next week or two.
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Did they test it?
“There’s a foredrawn conclusion in the draft report that it’s one or the other, and I’m just not sure it is at this point,” the councilman said of declaring the former landfill site a Superfund or brownfield.

HINDIYAH, Iraq (AP) — Iraqi officials and fishermen are at a loss to explain how hundreds of tons of carp have suddenly died in fish farms in the Euphrates River, fueling anxieties about soaring water pollution.
Local authorities used excavators to skim dead fish from the river surface near the town of Hindiyah, 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of Baghdad, where residents and local farmers have long complained about substandard water management.
Ayad Talibi, head of Iraq’s Fish Producers’ Syndicate, called it "annihilation" and a blow to the country’s "strategic fish reserve."
Water pollution and scarcity have been on the forefront of Iraqi discourse after matters reached crisis levels last summer.
Health officials said some 100,000 people were taken to hospital for stomach illnesses in the southern Basra province, where sludge and yellow water was recorded flowing out of the taps.
Demonstrators rioted, demanding better services.
Wissam Muslani, deputy governor for Babil province, which includes Hindiyah, said initial tests suggested it was the result of a virus that infected the gills.
"My first message is that make sure nobody eats any fish.
Photos and video of the carp-clogged Euphrates have had an immediate impact on fish sales, according to fishmongers from Hindiyah to Baghdad.
Ali Ibrahim, a vendor by the side of the highway outside Hindiyah, said he was closing his stall and returning to his family.

GUWAHATI: Contaminated water has made Assam the second highest State in the country in reporting deaths due to acute diarrhoeal diseases and enteric fever (typhoid).
Both acute diarrhoeal diseases and enteric fever are caused by contaminated water.
In 2017, the state had reported 1, 65,377 cases of acute diarrhoeal diseases with 239 deaths.
Uttar Pradesh reported the maximum number of deaths, 302, of the 12, 19,071 cases of acute diarrhoeal diseases reported.
Out 15,137 enteric (typhoid) cases reported in Assam in 2017, there were 122 deaths.
Bihar and Karnataka reported more cases than Assam but deaths reported in the two States two and four respectively.
There were 248 deaths in Uttar Pradesh out of 6, 40,678 reported cases.
Such poor health scenario has come to light after the latest publication of National Health Profile 2018 by the Central Bureau of Health Intelligence.
“Flood ravaged people tend to stay together in camps set up by the administration in different districts and this close proximity gives rise to infection.
Dhubri district, one of the worst hit by floods last year, had reported more than 700 cases of enteric fever since the onset of heavy floods in June 2017.

Austin Mayor Steve Adler declared a local state of disaster Thursday as the city continues to grapple with flood damage and a contaminated water system.
Weeks of extended rainfall have set off a damaging chain reaction in the Central Texas region.
The disaster declaration signed by the mayor on Thursday highlights the damage set off by the floods and says it will likely continue into the “foreseeable future” and requires emergency action.
Travis County and the State of Texas have also signed disaster declarations for the area.
In a tweet sent out Thursday, Adler said the declaration is necessary for help with reimbursement of damage and procurement of assistance.
Water quality and reserves are improving!
In the meantime, I’ve declared a local state of disaster https://t.co/RX2ZzpflMn necessary to help with reimbursement & procurement.
— Mayor Adler (@MayorAdler) October 25, 2018 Adler said signing the disaster declaration could help in getting federal funding, as well as allows the city to go out and immediately procure resources, such as water, by circumventing what is typically a lengthy procurement process.
The most important message, Adler said, is that the city needs to continue conserving water.
Should conservation efforts continue, Adler said he expected the city to lift the boil water notice by the “late weekend.” Read the full disaster declaration here.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Chemicals associated with firefighting foam once used at a U.S. Air Force base in eastern New Mexico have been detected in groundwater on and near the military installation, prompting requests by state officials for more tests and a study to determine the extent of the toxic plume.
The New Mexico Environment Department confirmed the contamination Tuesday, saying officials at Cannon Air Force Base notified state environment, health and agricultural officials about the compounds.
The Air Force is making bottled water available for drinking and cooking for residents who rely on wells that exceed a health advisory level set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
"This is all in groundwater, so we’re concerned about protection and remediation of groundwater in that area.
The chemical compounds have been detected at military bases and other sites around the U.S. EPA testing from 2013 to 2015 found significant amounts of PFAS in public water supplies in 33 states, a finding that helped move PFAS up as a national priority.
Rick Snyder created a state response team and approved $23 million in emergency spending.
Some members of Congress also are pressing for the EPA to act faster to bring more of the country’s most hazardous industrial compounds under regulation.
New Mexico environment officials say this marks the first major detection of the chemicals in the state and more work needs to be done to determine the scope of the contamination at Cannon and areas bordering the base.
The state Environment Department is overseeing the Air Force’s investigation of the contamination at Cannon.
Aside from studying the plume, the agency is requiring the Air Force to sample all water wells within a 4-mile (6-kilometer) radius of the southeastern corner of the base.