April 16, 2010 - Glebe Report

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20 Glebe Report April 16, 2010 HOMES Combining a beautiful aesthetic with eco-friendly gardening practices. Offering general garden design and maintenance services from May to August. n a t u r a l g a r d e n c r e a t i o n s @ g m a i l . c o m - 6 1 3 . 2 0 4 . 3 2 3 3 w e b s i t e : w w w . r e n t a b i k e . c a / n a t u r a l c r e a t i o n s . h t m l 33 Morris St Listed at $1,295,000 4 Bed, 4 Bath SOLD! Dr. K.E. Hashem Glebe Dental Office 738-a Bank st. [at Second Ave.] For Appts: 613-232-2222 Welcoming students to the Glebe. Direct billing to your provider. • Implants • Bridges • Braces • Dentures • Cosmetic dentistry • Gum surgery • Teeth whitening • Crowns • Wisdom teeth extraction • Root canal treatment 7 Day Emergency: 613-232-2610 SOLD! 127 Fourth Ave 4 Bed, 4 Bath Listed at $645,000 Glebe household moves off the grid By Anik Lacroix Intrigued by the recent Ontario MicroFIT program launched last October by the Ontario government, we took the opportunity to be green (and make money doing so), by having 12 solar PV panels installed on our roof for a total of 2.5 kW. Our house in the Glebe is one of the first two houses in Ottawa to move off the grid. The Ontario Power Authority MicroFIT program is designed for homeowners, farmers or small business owners. It provides the opportunity to develop a small renewable electricity generation project (10 kilowatts or less in size) on your property. Ottawa Hydro commits to buy all the power you produce and gives you a guaranteed price over 20 years. MicroFIT is all part of the Ontario government’s attempts to wean the province’s power supply away from polluting coal-fired power stations and towards renewable energy such as solar or wind power. Solar power is particularly good because it provides the most power to the grid on hot, sunny days, just when the province’s grid is under the most pressure. Having no expertise in this field, we hired a firm that specializes in renewable energy installations to take care of the key steps: registration with Micro- FIT, obtaining the building permit, installing the panels and taking care of the whole connection process with Ottawa Hydro. This system is now installed and hooked up to the grid. With all the sun we’ve been having recently, the panels have been soaking up a fair amount of sunshine! Please feel free to walk by 229 Third Avenue and take a look. Anik Lacroix is a proud green enthusiast, living at 229 Third Avenue. Inspect your foundation: Due diligence in home maintenance by Patrick LeCours Proper care of your foundation is very important to preserving the integrity of the structure. Soils have the ability to expand (when wet) at alarming rates. This requires that an even and relatively constant level of moisture be maintained in the soil supporting the foundation. Defects in foundations occur when the supporting soil is either too wet or too dry, or when one area around the foundation is overly wet, while other areas remain dry. Improper foundation maintenance can result in severe movement in just a few days. This is true regardless of the type or age of the foundation. To avoid additional problems, you must avoid non-uniform moisture content in the soil supporting the foundation. Non-uniform moisture content can be caused by any of the following: • improper drainage • allowing the soil to become dry • excess watering near the foundation • plumbing leaks • an improper watering program • neglect • runoff water not properly diverted away from the foundation/ • inadequate eavestroughing • improper grading of soil away from the foundation • trees and large bushes growing too close to the foundation • improper interior sealing of the foundation The Glebe area typically has two types of foundations: cut limestone and poured rubble foundations. With proper care and maintenance, cut limestone foundations will last a long time as long as there is no water leakage or penetration. Poured rubble foundations are made of a very inconsistent mixture of concrete and rubble. If left unprotected, this type of foundation will deteriorate and become very unstable. Patrick LeCours is the president of Mr. Foundation Inc. Matt McQuillan Master Electrician McQuillan Electric Electrical Contractor License No. 7005472 Specializing in: • Knob & Tube Re-wire • Service Upgrades • Additions and Renovations • New Construction • Satisfying Insurance Companies We take pride in our work & make sure your home is safe ESA Registered, Insured & Qualified 613-850-8274
HEALTH Keeping drugs out of our drinking water by Dr. Dianne Saxe and Jackie Campbell Two years ago, we told you about the growing problem of pharmaceuticals in our drinking water. Since then, has government done anything about it? Ontario Ministry of the Environment survey In January, the Ministry of the Environment quietly posted new data. Some 258 samples were collected from 17 municipal drinking water systems (half from source water, and half from treated drinking water). The samples were analyzed for 46 pharmaceuticals plus Bisphenol A and 27 of them were detected. (They did not check for the presence of illegal drugs, like cocaine or marijuana.) In untreated source waters (rivers, lakes ): the most frequently detected categories of drugs were: anticonvulsants; lipid-lowering agents; analgesics; antimicrobials; veterinary-only anti-infectives: and other drugs, such as Bisphenol A (a plasticizer now banned in baby bottles). In treated drinking water: the most frequently detected drugs were Carbamazepine (an anticonvulsant), Gemfibrozil (a lipid-lowering agent), Ibuprofen (a commonly used fever/pain medication) and Bisphenol A (a notorious plasticizer). Unfortunately, there are no regulatory standards for safe levels of drugs in drinking water, and no one knows the effects of lifelong exposure to mixtures of different drugs. Nor is there any evidence that bottled water is any better; bottled water is usually made from tap water, or from the same types of source water that municipalities use. The good news? 1. Drug levels in drinking water are tiny. 2. Current water treatment plants may not be designed to treat pharmaceuticals, but they do help. Drug concentrations in finished (treated) drinking water were usually lower than those in untreated source water. 3. Regulators in both Canada and Australia conclude that one would have to drink thousands of glasses of water a day to exceed “acceptable” daily intakes of individual drugs. Australia has been thinking about how to set safe limits for pharmaceuticals in drinking water, and has proposed public guidelines. For example, regulators could divide the lowest daily therapeutic dose by a reasonable safety factor, which has to protect toddlers and pregnant women. After much discussion, they propose a safety factor from 1,000 to 10,000. As an example, Australian guidelines consider the antibiotic Norfloxacin (lowest daily dose 800 mg/ day): applying a safety factor of 1,000 would mean that 0.8 mg (i.e., 800 mcg) could be ingested each day via (the average) 2 litres of water individuals consume each day. That translates to a maximum acceptable concentration of 400 mcg/L, well above concentrations that have actually been measured. I admit, however, that this apparently scientific calculation doesn’t make me feel much better for the following reasons: • Drug safety tests never endure for an entire lifetime, and the “lowest daily therapeutic dose” isn’t calculated with lifetime exposure in mind. • What if the right safety factor for Norfloxacin ought to be 10,000 or 100,000? • What if I am from an ethnic group that is particularly sensitive to a particular drug or group of drugs? • Lots of drugs have additive or synergistic effects, meaning that exposure to one can amplify the effect of another. Even grapefruit or various herbal remedies are known to have this effect. • Many people are exposed to more than 2 L of water a day, in drinking and cooking. • What if the drugs can be absorbed through the skin, i.e. from swimming, laundry or bathing? • What if the drugs are also present in consumer products that are made with water, like shampoo or hand cream? Or in food that has been irrigated with water containing drugs? • Some drugs have hormonal effects and can affect the human body at incredibly tiny concentrations. • What about fish, and other plants and animals? What are the drugs doing to them? I think we need to do something about these drugs in our water supply. What can we do? Post-consumer pharmaceutical waste will be regulated as of July 1 in Ontario. Fortunately, there is one easy thing that can help. Leftover drugs should never be flushed down toilets or discarded with regular garbage. Consumers should return unused drugs to their pharmacies for incineration. So far, returning drugs to pharmacies is voluntary in most of the country; only BC requires it. Vancouver bans consumers from throwing unused medications into curbside garbage, which has prompted a huge increase in consumer awareness. As of July 1, Ontario will also regulate consumers’ unused drugs, and hopes to collect about 659 tons a year, all at the expense of the drug manufacturers. Believe it or not, 90 per cent of Ontario pharmacies already accept unused drugs, and the rest will have to this summer. Every pill bottle returned to a pharmacy may help to keep something important out of our drinking water. It is an easy thing to do right. Dr. Dianne Saxe is an environmental law specialist and Jackie Campbell is a lawyer and practising pharmacist who can be reached at admin@envirolaw. com or 416-962-5009. Details and reference material for this article can be sourced at http:// envirolaw.com. This piece was excerpted from the full-length article which is available on envirolaw.com. Paul Dewar, MP/Député Ottawa Centre Working for you! Au travail pour vous! I am pleased to: • provide assistance with federal agencies • arrange letters of greetings for special occasions • answer questions about federal legislation • listen to your feedback Je suis heureux de: • vous aider à traiter avec les organismes fédéraux • vous écrire des lettres de félicitations pour des occasions spéciales • répondre à vos questions sur les lois fédérales • vous écouter 304-1306 rue Wellington St. 613.946.8682 / dewarp@parl.gc.ca www.pauldewar.ca Glebe Report April 16, 2010 21
Page 1 and 2: April 16, 2010 Vol. 38 rvn No. 4 Se
Page 3 and 4: EVENTS 25 th anniversary for the Gr
Page 5 and 6: LETTERS Glebe Report April 16, 2010
Page 7 and 8: NEWS Glebe fires: déjà vu by Juli
Page 9 and 10: FOOTBRIDGE UPDATE Midtown footbridg
Page 11 and 12: CITIZENS INITIATIVES Hands off our
Page 13 and 14: BIA Glebe BIA protecting our villag
Page 15 and 16: GLEBE HISTORY Heritage spaces, not
Page 17 and 18: BUSINESS BUZZ Alana leads one of he
Page 19: NEWS The Glebe: A healthy neighbour
Page 23 and 24: Community parks of the Glebe by Car
Page 25 and 26: MUSIC St. Matthew’s spring concer
Page 27 and 28: FOOD By Karen Wallace-Graner Apple,
Page 29 and 30: ENVIRONMENT Keeping the Glebe green
Page 31 and 32: SCHOOLS Some updates from the board
Page 33 and 34: SCHOOLS Sustainability initiatives
Page 35 and 36: TRAVEL Glebe artist explores South-
Page 37 and 38: COMMUNITY Winners of Awesome Author
Page 39 and 40: BOOKS Egg on Mao, the story of a no
Page 41 and 42: RELIGION Tiptoe through the tulips
Page 43 and 44: Glebe Report April 16, 2010 43 BEST

April 16, 2010 - Glebe Report

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