Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services

NNSL (Nov 02/98) - Nunasi, the Nunavut-wide economic development corporation, has formed a new environmental management services company.

Nunasi Environmental Inc. is a joint venture between Nunasi Corporation and Bodycote Technitrol Inc. of Montreal, a subsidiary of Bodycote International.

"I am very happy to see this new venture getting under way," Nunasi Environmental chairman Pat Lyall said.

The company will "provide a complete range of analytical and environmental management services helping to meet the needs of companies and government departments operating in the North," he said.

Nunasi Environmental is 51 per cent owned by Nunasi Corporation and 41 per cent owned by Bodycote Technitrol Inc.

"Our business plan calls for a gradual startup of operations," Nunasi Environmental president Fred Hunt said.

The new company's head offices will be in Yellowknife.

"But we hope before too long to establish a laboratory and environmental services centre in Nunavut."

Until then, the company will use labs of the Montreal partner.

Bodycote runs 29 labs in Europe, North America and the Middle East. The Canadian company has 120 engineers, scientists and technicians on staff.

The company's realm of testing covers, organic and inorganic contaminants like PCBs, hydrocarbons and heavy metals, water testing and environmental toxicology testing as well as air quality testing.

It can also develop an environmental management system in which a company's environmental risks can be assessed to reduce exposure.

David Clapperton, in a release, said he hopes the joint venture helps generate a trained personnel in the North.

One of the goals of the company is for scientific knowledge to be transferred to Inuit.

Cleanup of former DEW Line sites operated by Canadian and U.S. military, as well as other reclamation projects, could provide business for the new company.

Nunasi was established over 20 years ago as the economic arm of the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada. As regional land claims groups emerged, Nunasi became the entity representing the economic development interests of Inuit in Nunavut.