The annual Thousand Islands Poker Run is often held up as a symbol of conspicuous waste of energy and environmental indifference.

But a new report by the city’s environmental committee — the first comprehensive report ever done on the impact of the annual event using independent data and figures from the boaters themselves — suggests that the impact of the event is more symbolic than real.

The report, drafted by Kingston Environmental Advisory Forum member Ian Dubin, a retired engineer, foud that the event does indeed have a negative environmental impact, but that impact is smaller than usually assumed.

His report estimates the extra emissions produced by the annual race to be equal to those caused by five stop signs on not-terrible-busy city streets in a year.

“The problem with the event is more the optics of it than the actual impact,” said Dubin, whose comprehensive report goes to council tomorrow as an information and discussion item.

For years, those opposed to the race, the largest international poker run that some years attracts more than 100 high-powered boats, have claimed different levels of pollution caused by the event, sometimes saying it produces as much as all the cars in Kingston do in almost a day.

Opponents also say the event is incompatible with the city’s stated goal of becoming the most environmentally sustainable city in Canada.

The committee decided to quantify that impact once and for all at last summer’s event.

Dubin surveyed boaters to estimate the amount of pollution produced during the three-hour run to Brockville and back.

Dubin also measured other factors associated with the boats, like whether the wake produced by the mass start damaged the city-owned marina structures and if the roar from the boats affected the surrounding marine habitat.

His conclusion is that the impact of the event is about the same as most other civic events that pass without comment on their environmental footprint:

“The total release of CO2 from the Poker Run is very small compared to the total release in Kingston and is comparable to other public events,” Dubin said.

No one is arguing that the cigarette boats that take part in the race are a fleet of floating Priuses -they are high-powered toys driven by very rich people whose sole purpose is to go obnoxiously fast using four high-performance engines that produce upward of 1,400 horsepower and that drink fuel like the water they rip across -but their actual impact is less than many more accepted activities.

The racers themselves are aware of the controversy and prefer to keep out of it.

Organizers have said if Kingston doesn’t want the event, other Lake Ontario cities would be quick to take it and its economic spinoffs. They also stress that the event raises money for charity and the boats are disqualified if they exceed a 40-m.p.h. limit enforced by speed traps.

“The boaters themselves are terrified of getting involved in this debate,” he said, noting that only 14% of the participants filled in a survey on gas mileage and technical information about their boats.

“They’re just trying to keep their heads down.”

He also found that the noise from the event is about that of a civic fireworks display and the damage caused by the mass start in Confederation Basin was negligible.

And a report will be coming to council on the economic benefits of the annual race, which organizers say attracts 50,000 people and pumps millions into the local economy against which the environmental cost of the event can be weighed.

Dubin’s report concludes that the impact of the boats could be mitigated by buying carbon offsets at a cost of roughly $10,000, or about $150 per participating boat.

That is literally pocket change to the well-heeled boaters, and Dubin’s report leaves the question of whether the boaters, the city or the downtown business association should purchase the offsets if the city decides to do so.

Carbon offsets are an increasingly popular, if contentious, form of making amends for environmental sins by buying emissions credits, most often from renewable energy projects such as windmills equal to the tonnes of greenhouse gases emitted by the activity in question.

Dubin was unable to compare the poker run boats to pleasure craft and runabouts because it is impossible to know how many boats there are in Kingston, but any craft with a two-stroke outboard pollutes more than the emission-controlled four-stroke cigarette boats per kilometre.

Dubin, though, estimates “the annual release of all pollutants … from the total Kingston pleasure boat fleet is likely to be several orders of magnitude greater than the release from this event.”

He stressed there was an environmental impact from the event, but its impact had to be weighed against its benefits, just like any other human activity.

“It all comes down to costs versus benefits,” he said.

“But I wouldn’t want to live in a world where you can’t put a boat in the water in the summertime.”

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Gas pains

Boats taking part in the annual Thousand Island Poker Run emit between 100 and 200 tonnes of the greenhouse gas C02 in total. The precise figure depends on a number of variables, among the the number of boats taking part, how fast they are going and whether additional emissions caused by traffic congestion and detours around the Ontario Street closure that accompanies the race are factored in, according to a new report by the city’s environmental advisory committee.

By comparison, here are the C02 emissions from other common activities based on publicly available engineering, performance and emissions data:

* Amount emitted per year by idling cars and light-duty trucks in Kingston, using federal criteria for estimating such emissions based on an average five minutes of idling per day per vehicle: 6,000 tonnes.

* Approximate annual emissions from vehicles idling in 55 drivethrus in the Kingston area (conservatively based on 20 vehicles per hour using the lane, with each vehicle idling three minutes and the drive-thru open 10 hours a day): 1,600 tonnes.

* Round-trip flight between Hong Kong and Toronto on a Boeing 747: 657 tonnes.

* One year of gases used for anaesthesia at Hotel Dieu hospital that are vented into the atmosphere afterward: 100-150 tonnes.

* Amount emitted each year by cars stopping at a stop sign on a road averaging 4,000 vehicles a day, or roughly three vehicles a minute: 34 tonnes.

* One hour of flight time for the nine Tutor jets used by the Canadian Forces Snowbirds: 31 tonnes.

* Annual emissions produced by a medium-efficiency passenger car driving 15,000km a year: five tonnes.

Source:Kingston Environmental Advisory Forum’s Information Note On Poker Run Kingston 2009, authored by Ian Dubin.