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Nanaimo forestry company fined for spill in Northumberland Channel

The fines collected will be directed towards projects that benefit the environment. 

Harmac Pacific, Nanaimo, Nanaimo Forest Products, Northumberland Channel
The Harmac Pacific mill near Nanaimo, B.C. Photo courtesy of Google Street View.

A Nanaimo-based timber company has been ordered to pay a penalty of $135,000 after spilling roughly 3.75 million litres of untreated wastewater into the Northumberland Channel during a power failure. 

On June 26, 2013, Nanaimo Forest Products Ltd. — under the trade name Harmac Pacific— was sentenced by Environment and Climate Change Canada to pay up after a blackout impacted its outfall pumphouse, dumping effluent for three hours into a channel that connects to the Pacific Ocean and Strait of Georgia. 

The company pled guilty in B.C. provincial court last month for one offence contravening the Fisheries Act. Upon payment, $130,000 of the resulting fine will be directed towards Canada's Environmental Damages Fund, which direct the cash to projects that will benefit the environment.

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