The Sudbury Effect: Lessons from a regreened city

They said it couldn't be done, but Sudbury did it! Forty years ago, nickel mines and smelters around a relatively small city in Northern Ontario had created one of the most dramatic examples of environmental devastation in the history of this planet. The adjacent landscape was completely dead and totally blackened. Nothing could grow, and people were dying. These days, Sudbury boasts the cleanest air of any city in Ontario. Lakes — and there are 330 substantial lakes within the city limits — have come back to life. The surrounding countryside is almost completely green!