Drug superlabs leave a toxic mess. Some say B.C.’s cleanup rules are a mess, too

May, who co-owns Calgary-based Mayken Hazmat Solutions, has been cleaning the mess left behind by drug labs in Western Canada after police are done with the scene.

When Dean May’s team of cleaners entered the home, dressed head to toe in protective suits, thick green dust covered every surface.

“We literally left footprints when we were walking in the house,” he recalled.

They were traipsing through the toxic remnants of an illicit fentanyl pill-pressing operation in northern British Columbia three or four years ago, and May says it was one of the worst scenes he’s been to.

For 14 years, May, who co-owns Calgary-based Mayken Hazmat Solutions, has been cleaning the mess left behind by drug labs in Western Canada after police are done with the scene.

As clandestine drug labs become larger and more complex, so does the toxic mess they leave behind and the tools required to clean them up, creating expensive and dangerous situations for both people and the environment.

In B.C., the RCMP say they’ve spent millions over the last five years disposing of chemicals found in labs, but the rest of the hefty cleanup bill is often left to property owners who call private companies like May’s.

B.C.’s real estate association says consistent provincewide rules are needed for how to remediate properties back to being livable.

May said hidden labs making synthetic drugs including fentanyl and methamphetamines using industrial chemicals are both more toxic than mouldy marijuana grow operations and quicker to set up, meaning it’s easier for rented properties to be turned into labs without property owners knowing.