Scientists to test Arctic vegetation in artificial wetlands

With lagoons across the territory full to the brim with sewage, municipalities could one day have the option of treating their muck with man-made swamps.

The technology, known as constructed wetlands, is well-established in the south, but scientists are starting from scratch when it comes to how artificial swamps work in Arctic climes.

A group of scientists based in Lindsay, Ont. will head north as part of the International Polar Year project to see if it's possible to build swamps with plants found north of the tree line.

Brent Wootton, senior scientist with the Centre for Alternative Wastewater Treatment, said artificial wetlands filter the wastewater from sewage through sand, plants and bacteria.

"What we're talking about is using Mother Nature to do the work for us," he said.

The challenge in the Arctic is that the natural processes that allow artificial wetlands to work slow down as the weather gets colder. And with almost no prior research done on artificial swamps north of 60, Wootton admits his groups is starting from scratch, though they do know they won't be trying to seed foreign plant species in the marsh.

"They wouldn't survive, so there would be no point…we have pretty strong feelings about the use of native [plant] species," he said. But he said the bacteria do most of the work of breaking down sewage and treating the water.

So while an artificial swamp can be run by a hamlet employee with no special training after the scientists leave, not every community is right for a sewage experiment. Communities with severe sewage problems need more help than Wootton's group can offer, he said.

That includes Iqaluit, where the city is considering a constructed wetland to help deal with the problem of runoff from its landfill, which contains sewage sludge from the city's lagoon, plus other chemicals from rotting garbage in the dump.

Wootton cautions that an artificial marsh is built to handle sewage only and not what could be leaking out of old cars, appliances, tires and other garbage.

"Landfill leachate could be anything," he said.

Wootton is coming to Iqaluit next month to talk about potential sites for the $700,000 IPY project with federal and territorial regulators. The project is to take place in the Kivalliq, but the scientists haven't identified a host community yet. This year "is about reconnaissance," Wootton said, with the actual swamp construction planned for 2008.

"We want to find sites that have the potential, whatever we learn from them, to benefit the entire territory," he said. "We're trying to bring an applied technology to the north that would be both socially and environmentally appropriate and it would leave a positive legacy behind after IPY."