News Release

For immediate release
July 17, 2007

COHEN AND COHEN FINED $5,000 FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION ACT VIOLATION

OTTAWA—Cohen and Cohen has been fined $5,000 after pleading guilty to one count of handling polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) waste without the required instruction from the ministry.

In 1999, Cohen and Cohen, registered as 3293696, was hired to remove a transformer from a former hospital site that was being demolished in Ottawa.  The transformer contents included PCBs. The company transferred the transformer to a storage facility it owned.

In early 2004, the contents, including the PCBs, were pumped from the transformer into a waste oil storage tank.  Cohen and Cohen hired a local waste management company to transfer the waste to a large tank, contaminating the contents of the second tank with PCBs.  Cohen and Cohen should have had instructions from MOE about disposing of the PCB waste before releasing it to the waste management company.  It did not have these required instructions.

Following an investigation by the ministry’s Investigations and Enforcement Branch, charges were laid.

Cohen and Cohen pleaded guilty to one count of disposing of, or otherwise managing PCB waste, without written instructions from the ministry, contrary to section 186(1) of the Environmental Protection Act.  The company was fined $5,000, plus a victim fine surcharge.

In assessing the fine, the Court took into account the company’s explanation that it understood there were no PCBs in the transformer.  The Court also took into account that the company paid a consulting engineer $35,000 to assess its site and paid $75,000 for site remediation.

Justice of the Peace Bernard Swords sentenced Cohen and Cohen on May 26, 2006 in the Ontario Court of Justice in Ottawa.

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For further information:
John Steele, (416) 314-6666 Communications Branch
Contact information for the general public: 416-325-4000 or 1-800-565-4923/ www.ontario.ca/environment

 

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