Thousands of plastic pellets flood into Delta, B.C. waterway amid heavy rain

Environmentalists are warning the industrial pellets, which are used to make things like plastic bags, appear to be getting into the Fraser River.

An environmental group is raising concerns about plastic pollution, after heavy rains washed thousands of industrial pellets into a drainage channel in Delta on Saturday.

It’s the second time in as many years that the incident has cropped up at the Audley Canal on Annacis Island, but Sufrider Foundation President David Boudinot said the most recent incident appeared to be worse than in February 2020.

“It’s worse. There’s an area of about 300 metres, it looks like snow on the sides of the water,” he said.

“But that’s not snow. It’s plastic.”

The pellets, known as “nurdles,” are an industrial-grade form of plastic polymer used in the production of single-use items like plastic bags and water bottles.

When pellets spill during transport or production and aren’t cleaned up, they can be caught up in rain events and flow away.

“It’s incredibly difficult to clean up — as the pellets disperse in the water, they soak up toxins. Marine life are known to eat them. They collect on the beach,” Boudinot said.

“It doesn’t just go away. When you hear about an oil spill, sometimes they say, ‘well, it’s OK, a little bit of oil it’ll dissipate and evaporate.’ Well, that doesn’t happen. In this case, the plastic persists. We like to call it a solidified oil spill that is going to last for generations.”