Sydney Tar Ponds remediation wins top award

The remediation of the Sydney Tar Ponds and Coke Ovens site in Sydney, Nova Scotia has won the Canadian Urban Institute’s 2012 Brownie Award for best overall project. The awards, which are given for excellence in transforming brownfield industrial sites, were announced at Niagara Falls on October 4.

The Sydney Tar Ponds site in Cape Breton is one of Canada’s most notorious industrially polluted lands. The site was occupied by a steel mill and after 100 years of steel and coke production was left with a million tonnes of contaminated soil and sediment. Scores of engineers have been involved over the years in preparing reports and remediation efforts.

Now the remediation work is well under way under the guidance of the Sydney Tar Ponds Agency.

Exp provided engineering and consulting services during the site assessment and planning stages. The consulting engineers were also involved with the design and construction of 3 kilometres of realigned channels and provided materials testing, quality control, environmental monitoring, as well as health and safety services to contractors involved in remediation activities.

CRA Consultants are acting as the independent engineer for the tar ponds and coke oven remediation.

On October 28 the federal and provincial governments announced $17 million in contracts to construction parks and green space on the site. The total clean-up remains within its $400 million budget and is on schedule for completion by March 2014.

The other Brownie winners included the CCOC Beaver Barracks housing redevelopment in downtown Ottawa and the George Brown College Waterfront Health Sciences Campus in downtown Toronto (KPMB and Stantec lead design consultants).