The Howard Smith Paper Mill in Cornwall, Ontario, Canada has a long history that dates back to 1919 when the mill was purchased by the Howard Smith Paper Mills Company.
However, the mill's origins go back even further, as the original facility was built in 1881 by the Toronto Manufacturing Company. Over the years, the mill changed hands several times, with different companies taking ownership of the facility. During the early 1970s, the mill was owned by Domtar, which convinced the City of Cornwall to allow the dumping of its paper mill waste, including sludge, bark, and lime dregs, behind a shopping mall in the middle of the city. Some of the dump was covered with sod, and Domtar even funded a ski hill there known as "Big Ben." However, by the late 1980s, the company was pumping an average of 102 million liters of wastewater into the St. Lawrence River every day, making it one of the worst polluters in Ontario. In May 1988, Greenpeace hung a banner from the company's smokestacks demanding "Zero discharge now" to protest the discharge of heavy metals, PCBs, phenols, and dioxin. Despite these efforts, Domtar fought efforts to make it clean up, and by the mid-1990s, the landfill was rapidly filling up with sludge, bark, and lime dregs from the Cornwall kraft and fine paper mill. The Mill closed down in 2009 and is being demolished for future commercial development. The machinery is being sold to buyers from all over the world Location ID #BR0128
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