Thousands of additional trucks could be coming and going from Delta if a proposal by Lehigh Hanson Materials Ltd. to build a grinding facility with a marine terminal is approved.
Located adjacent to its existing cement plant on Tilbury Island, the Delta Grinding Facility Project would produce up to 650,000 tonnes of supplementary cementitious material per year when fully operational, and would have an operational life of at least 40 years, according to the company.
The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency this week announced it will determine whether an environmental assessment is required for the project.
To help it decide, the agency says it’s inviting public comments until April 7.
“The project is located in a region that has not been the subject of federal regional environmental studies. The site of the proposed project is surrounded by several projects that have been subject to environmental assessment (under both the provincial and federal review processes), including the WesPac Tilbury Marine Jetty Project, South Fraser Perimeter Road Project, George Massey Tunnel Replacement Project, Vancouver Airport Fuel Delivery Project and the Roberts Bank Terminal 2 Project. Publicly available information from these projects that can inform the effects assessment of the Delta Grinding Facility will be drawn upon,” the company explains in its project description.
Panamax or Handymax vessels would deliver raw materials to the facility, while the final product would be delivered equally to customers by truck and barge. It would result in 7,917 trucks per year transporting product from the facility.
Should an environmental assessment be required, the B.C. government has asked to take the lead.
Lehigh Hanson Materials Ltd. supplies construction aggregates and concrete with operations in Western Canada that include the cement plant in Delta. Lehigh is a North American subsidiary of HeidelbergCement, one of the world’s largest producers of construction material.
For more information about the Delta grinding project and providing comment, check here.
