Aggregate summit to bring groups together

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A local group is looking to bring the aggregate industry, local government and environmental groups together to enhance their relationships and focus on rehabbing nearby quarries.

Aggregate Ontario head Gavin Houston has making the rounds to regional councils to garner support for a Nov. 5 summit in Embro being co-hosted with the Aggregate Ontario Alliance.

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“To have the local cities, towns and townships support this gives a lot more power and meaning to the initiative and would force (aggregate) producers to want to participate,” Houston told Woodstock council.

Aggregate Ontario – a group that works to improve the aggregate industry and provides services to improve the rehabilitation and sustainability of the industry – also wants to rehabilitate land and water sources to either create green spaces or return quarries back to agricultural lands.

Houston, who’s also a Southern Ontario Fisheries Enhancement Initiative member, noted Aggregate Ontario has been working near the city’s wellheads for two years to improve water quality at an adjacent below-water-table extraction site.

He also said the organization had spread about a million milkweed seeds throughout Southwestern Ontario, which could lead to several thousand monarch butterflies surviving to adulthood.

“We’re raising and distributing these native seeds and trying to convince (aggregate) producers to start using them with some success, so we can start bringing back some of these things that we’ve lost and supporting species that are at risk,” Houston said.

Houston also worked on the development of the Rural Oxford All-Inclusive Mobility Park – a collection of five former quarries along the Thames River – that span about 120 hectares. The plan also features 10 kilometres of trails, wetlands and places to canoe and kayak.

Woodstock council voted to have Coun. Mark Schadenberg attend the summit, which will also welcome groups from Norfolk and Middlesex counties. An estimated 300 people are expected at the summit.

“This is a big deal, and there’s so much potential,” Houston said.

Aggregate has been a key natural resource for Oxford County, specifically Zorra Township. Zorra has ranked in the provincial top 10 for aggregate production since 2009, according to statistics from the Ontario Aggregate Resources Corporation.

Preliminary numbers show Zorra producing 4.7-million tonnes of aggregate in 2018. More than 4.1 million tonnes has been extracted each year in the township since 2012, including a high of 5.1-million tonnes in 2017.

A staff report to Zorra Township council at its Sept. 4 meeting stated with the tonnage tax levy increasing from $0.06 to $0.12 per tonne, the township would receive about $564,000 based on their 2018 numbers.

South-West Oxford Township produced about 1.2 million tonnes of aggregate in 2018 while East Zorra-Tavistock and Norwich townships each produced roughly 267,000 tonnes. Blandford-Blenheim Township had almost 630,000 tonnes extracted. In total, Oxford County produced about 6.82-million tonnes of aggregate last year, almost seven per cent of the province’s total.

Statistics from the Ontario Aggregate Resources Corporation noted 1,760 truckloads of aggregate are needed for one kilometre of a four-lane highway, 3,760 truckloads are required for a 32,000-square-metre hospital and 4,560 truckloads go towards one kilometre of a subway line.