Read the latest from our Environment section
Waste to energy discussion missed the GHG point
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has committed Canada to aggressive reductions in our annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. It will take a coordinated national effort to get there, and that means small communities across the country, like the Comox Valley …
CVRD internal tension builds over waste to energy report
The tension between staff and elected officials of the Comox Strathcona Waste Management board (CSWM) ramped up another notch this week. The friction has increased since directors openly criticized Comox Valley Regional District staff at a full CSWM board …
No boil-water advisories in Cumberland
Cumberland residents have avoided boil-water advisories with their own water system, which they are improving with additional levels of treatment and rebuilding some 100-year-old infrastructure …
Ruth Masters — environmentalist
Ruth Jessie Masters was a war veteran, avid hiker, historian, naturalist, environmentalist, protester but maybe most importantly she was one of ours – born and raised in the Comox Valley. She was born at St. Joseph’s Hospital …
Should the north Island bury its garbage or convert it to energy?
The next time you drag your trash bins to the curb, think about what happens next to that garbage. If you have conscientiously reduced, recycled and reused, you will have sent just a small amount of waste to the Pigeon Lake dump, now known by the gentrified title …
Norma Morton remembers how Hollyhock Flats got its name
When Project Watershed and the K’omoks First Nation partnership finish restoring the former Field’s Sawmill site, an important piece of the K’omoks estuary will return to its natural state, a saltwater marsh. The partners have decided to name the newly preserved...
Hollyhock Flats in the Courtenay Estuary — the essay
It was this essay, written in 1966 by Sid Belsom, a member of the original Comox Strathcona Natural History Society, that gave Hollyhock Flats it's name. We urge readers to follow the article to the end. The first three and the last seven paragraphs are particularly...
Exclusive images of Field’s Sawmill after it closed
After the timber company Interfor closed Field’s Sawmill in 2004, they authorized Merville photographer Tim Penney to document what remained of the iconic Courtenay business. Penney visited the site in November 2005 and captured images with Nikon D100 and D200 cameras...