IQALUIT - Iqaluit's scrap metal holding area should be empty by the end of the sealift season.

Randy Popkins inspects a battery with a broken case, from which the acid had long since leaked out into the ground. - Gabriel Zarate/NNSL photo

A spokesperson for the City of Iqaluit said the dozens of cars, barrels, car batteries and other industrial trash are set to head south within the next month.

The city has been using the West 40 to concentrate its scrap metal in one out-of-the-way, temporary location.

Rob Eno, director of environmental protection division with the government of Nunavut, said the West 40 area was selected because its soil has been contaminated for decades.

The U.S. military used the area as a storage area for fuel and vehicles in the 1940s and 1950s.

The City of Iqaluit has committed to cleaning up the area in the summer of 2010 once the metal has been shipped out.

"We've tried to cut them a bit of slack on this," Eno said. "Not that we're relaxing environmental regulations, but you have to remember this site will be cleaned up after it's done."

There are dark patches of soil beneath many of the vehicles stored at the West 40. A quick inspection revealed many of the cars and trucks still retain oil, gas, brake fluid and/or antifreeze.

Beneath the crushing machine, the soil is saturated from fluids that ran out of vehicles that were incompletely drained before they were crushed.

"We're talking about old vehicles," said Eno. "You can drain the vehicles to the best you can, but you're not going to get 100 per cent out. There's going to be residue no matter how well you try to drain it."

One Iqaluit businessman said some of the dumping of scrap metal at the West 40 was illegal. When someone wants to scrap a car they can take it to the landfill and pay a fee, or they can illegally ditch it among the other cars at the West 40 for free, without worrying about such niceties as draining it of fluids.

"There's lots of stuff not supposed to be here," said Randy Popkins, owner of North Coast Customs and Towing. "It's a free-for-all."

Popkins said the area was supposed to be "metal-only," yet there were massive metal containers with hundreds of car batteries there, many of them leaking corrosive acid. The containers visibly overflowed with batteries, and some had fallen onto the ground.

Eno said the batteries were there legally as long as they were in the big containers to keep the acid off the soil.

The batteries are scheduled to go south on sealift with the rest of the metal, Eno said. The chemicals in the batteries are expensive and can be profitably recycled.

Eno said there had been some talk of shipping much of the metal south last year, but the global economic crash had killed the market for scrap. By holding off for a year, the city stands to make some cash from the scrap if the market is better.