British Columbia’s Quarterly Environmental Enforcement Summaries, for the third and fourth quarters of 2017, are publicly available.

The summaries outline various environmental enforcement actions taken by the Province, along with associated penalties and fines.

Enforcement actions in the third and fourth quarters of 2017, included:

• 28 orders
• 176 administrative sanctions
• 1,593 violation tickets
• 11 administrative penalties
• 46 court convictions
• One community environmental justice forum

These enforcement actions resulted in over $715,000 in penalties. This brings the total, since 2006, to over $15 million in penalties levied against companies and individuals for non-compliance.

To date, more than 30,000 enforcement actions have been published in the summary, and entered into the ministry’s environmental violations database. 

Violations included in the quarterly summaries include:

• hunting and fishing without a licence;
• open burning out of season;
• non-compliance with environmental legislation; and
• introducing waste into the environment.

The latest summaries include enforcement actions from the Wildfire Act, including increased activity and enforcement of wildfire laws during the unprecedented 2017 wildfire season.

British Columbia has some of the highest wildfire-related violation ticket fines in Canada, and 124 violation tickets were issued by the Conservation Officer Service during peak wildfire season, totaling over $134,000 in fines.

Notable enforcement actions, for this period, include:

• Fruiticana Produce Ltd. received a $20,000 penalty for not meeting the requirements to take responsibility for the life-cycle management of its packaging and paper products.
• Teck Coal Ltd. received three penalties, totalling $78,100, for failure to comply with an effluent-discharge permit for its Line Creek Operations.
• Bralorne Gold Mines Ltd. received fines, totalling $73,150, for various effluent-discharge infractions.
• Grace-Mar Farms Ltd. received two penalties, totalling $17,000, in relation to the management of nitrate sources to the Hullcar aquifer.
• Two individuals were found guilty on six counts under the Wildlife Act for trafficking bear parts, resulting in $46,000 in penalties.

To view the full Quarterly Environmental Enforcement Summary, visit: https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/environment/research-monitoring-reporting/reporting/environmental-enforcement-reporting/quarterly-environmental-enforcement-summary