Historic mercury and heavy metal deposition in Flin Flon, Manitoba reconstructed from lake sediment cores

The Flin Flon copper–zinc smelter is a site of concern as it has been the largest single source of atmospheric mercury emissions in Canada until operations ceased on July 1, 2010. The smelting and mining activities resulted in mercury contamination to the local environment. Elevated levels of mercury and other trace metals were found in soil humus, peat, plants, fish and sediment cores.

The Flin Flon smelter of the Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Company is located near the Manitoba–Saskatchewan border, 600 km Northwest of Winnipeg and over 400 km away from other major industrial complexes.This study examined nine lakes (Nekik, Douglas, Loucks, Phantom, McClurg, Cleaver, Naosep, Hamel, and Meridian) each lake was located at varying differences within 75 km of the smelter stack these lakes were selected for sediment coring analysis and heavy metal deposition trends.

Given the significant legacy of contamination of the Flin Flon region by mercury and other heavy metals emitted by the smelter complex, the region should remain a concern and deserves further study.

Supplemental Information

The Climate Change and Air Pollution (CCAP) program was established in 2016 to identify the severity and extent of adverse impacts of current and future air emissions on aquatic ecosystems to support regulatory actions and policy development. The program includes a number of components, including identifying, monitoring and defining air quality and greenhouse gas (GHG) concerns; improving our understanding of the short- and long-term effects of atmospheric pollutants on the environment; developing a plan to combat climate change; and monitoring and reducing both domestic and transboundary emissions of GHGs. The program is also responsible for identifying and studying emerging issues including multipollutant impacts, major urban sources, and effects of increasing heat on air pollutant formation, among others.

On-going cooperation and support with the Provinces and Territories, international governments and organizations and academia are vital to deliver these priorities to Canadians.

Datasets available for download

• CCAP_FlinFlonArea_Elements_SedimentCores_EN_FR.csvCSV
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• Scientific Publication - Mercury...HTML
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• View ECCC Data Mart (English)HTML
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• View ECCC Data Mart (French)HTML
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• Historic mercury and heavy metal deposition...
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• Historic mercury and heavy metal deposition...
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• Atmospheric deposition
• Climate Change and...
• Climate change
• Contaminants
• Flin Flon
• Heavy metals
• Historic trends
• Lake sediment cores
• Manitoba
• Mercury
• Nature and Environment

Additional Info

• Maturity Level 1 (46%)
• Maturity Level 2 (23%)
• Maturity Level 3 (0%)
• Maturity Level 4 (0%)
• Maturity Level 5 (0%)
• Maturity Level 6 (0%)

Field	Value
Last Updated	October 20, 2025, 03:54 (UTC)
Created	October 20, 2025, 03:54 (UTC)
Domain / Topic Domain or topic of the dataset being cataloged.
Title Title for the Dataset.	Historic mercury and heavy metal deposition in Flin Flon, Manitoba reconstructed from lake sediment cores
Description A description of the dataset.	The Flin Flon copper–zinc smelter is a site of concern as it has been the largest single source of atmospheric mercury emissions in Canada until operations ceased on July 1, 2010. The smelting and mining activities resulted in mercury contamination to the local environment. Elevated levels of mercury and other trace metals were found in soil humus, peat, plants, fish and sediment cores. The Flin Flon smelter of the Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Company is located near the Manitoba–Saskatchewan border, 600 km Northwest of Winnipeg and over 400 km away from other major industrial complexes.This study examined nine lakes (Nekik, Douglas, Loucks, Phantom, McClurg, Cleaver, Naosep, Hamel, and Meridian) each lake was located at varying differences within 75 km of the smelter stack these lakes were selected for sediment coring analysis and heavy metal deposition trends. Given the significant legacy of contamination of the Flin Flon region by mercury and other heavy metals emitted by the smelter complex, the region should remain a concern and deserves further study. Supplemental Information The Climate Change and Air Pollution (CCAP) program was established in 2016 to identify the severity and extent of adverse impacts of current and future air emissions on aquatic ecosystems to support regulatory actions and policy development. The program includes a number of components, including identifying, monitoring and defining air quality and greenhouse gas (GHG) concerns; improving our understanding of the short- and long-term effects of atmospheric pollutants on the environment; developing a plan to combat climate change; and monitoring and reducing both domestic and transboundary emissions of GHGs. The program is also responsible for identifying and studying emerging issues including multipollutant impacts, major urban sources, and effects of increasing heat on air pollutant formation, among others. On-going cooperation and support with the Provinces and Territories, international governments and organizations and academia are vital to deliver these priorities to Canadians.
Tags / Keywords Keywords/tags categorizing the dataset.	Atmospheric deposition Climate Change and... Climate change Contaminants Flin Flon Heavy metals Historic trends Lake sediment cores Manitoba Mercury Nature and Environment
Format (CSV, XLS, TXT, PDF, etc) File format of the dataset.
Dataset Size Dataset size in megabytes.
Metadata Identifier Metadata identifier – can be used as the unique identifier for catalogue entry
Published Date Published date of the dataset.	2018-08-13
Time Period Data Span (start date) Start date of the data in the dataset.
Time Period Data Span (end date) End date of time data in the dataset.
GeoSpatial Area Data Span A spatial region or named place the dataset covers.

Field	Value
Access category Type of access granted for the dataset (open, closed, service, etc).
License License used to access the dataset.	Open Government Licence - Canada
Limits on use Limits on use of data.
Location Location of the dataset.	https://open.canada.ca/data/en/dataset/3a3942c7-5fcb-4143-a014-45287edd0e22
Data Service Data service for accessing a dataset.
Owner Owner of the dataset.	Environment and Climate Change Canada | Environnement et Changement climatique Canada
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Contact Point Email The email to contact regarding access?
Publisher Publisher of the dataset.
Publisher Email Email of the publisher.
Author Author of the dataset.
Author Email Email of the author.
Accessed At Date the data and metadata was accessed.

Field	Value
Identifier Unique identifier for the dataset.
Language Language(s) of the dataset
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Globally Unique Identifier Data is identified by a persistent and globally unique identifier.
Contains data about individuals Does the data hold data about individuals?
Contains data about identifiable individuals Does the data hold identifiable data about individual?
Contains Indigenous Data Does the data hold data about Indigenous communities?
Portal Type Platform type of the source portal.

Field	Value
Version Version of the datatset	None
Source Source of the dataset.	None
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Provenance Text Provenance Text of the data.
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GeoSpatial resolution in meters Describes how granular (in meters) geospatial data is in the dataset.
GeoSpatial resolution (in regions) Describes how granular (in regions) geospatial data is in the dataset.

Field	Value
Indigenous Community Permission Who holds the Indigenous Community Permission. Who to contact regarding access to a dataset that has data about Indigenous communities.
Community Permission Community permission (who gave permission).
The Indigenous communities the dataset is about Indigenous communities from which data is derived.

Field	Value
Number of data rows If tabular dataset, total number of rows.
Number of data columns If tabular dataset, total number of unique columns.
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