Category Archives: Oil&Gas

Note to Justin: Pipelines don’t help transition to green economy

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Photo: Canada2020 / Flickr
Photo: Canada2020 / Flickr

When Justin Trudeau talks of oil pipeline projects as part of an energy transition, what exactly is he talking about?

That we will be on the path to reducing our dependency on fossil fuels by increasing our oil dependency in the short term? And that by immaculate conception we will reduce these very same dependencies over the long term? Supposedly, we will switch to a green economy sometime between now and when we are all dead, with the help of Adam Smith’s “invisible hand”.

Green is the future for jobs

When the Trudeau government repeatedly indicates we can grow the economy while protecting the environment, it knows full well that it is reinforcing the myth that the resource economy is about economic development and protecting the environment represents a cost. Journalists and most of the general public, who know nothing about green economics, can identify with this myth. This, despite the fact that the green economy offers better economic development models than the traditional resource economy model in terms of job creation.

If Trudeau was serious about working on a transition now, he could pursue his stated inclinations on the international scene to re-direct Canadian subsidies for the fossil fuel industry. For example, he could encourage, among other things, the diversification of the Alberta economy, and the Western Canadian economy in general, to join the global migration to the high-job creation, high-growth, green economy.

Corporate welfare for fossil fuel sector

The International Monetary Fund has estimated that the direct and indirect subsidies for Canadian fossil fuels work out to $46 Billion/year in US 2015 dollars. Reallocating these subsidies to help Western Canada catch up in the migration to the green economy would offer a more sound path to the country’s future prosperity

The pipeline capacity numbers speak for themselves – namely that we are headed in the wrong direction. The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain project would increase the capacity of that pipeline from 300,000 barrels/day to 890,000; Enbridge Line # 3 would be doubled to 760,000 barrels/day and Keystone XL is set for Canadian and US approvals to carry 830,000 barrels/day. Energy East has not as of yet been approved, but Trudeau has claimed that opposition to the 1.1 million barrel/day Energy East pipeline is not based on science.

Stars aligned for green economy

Science is telling us that to avoid catastrophic climate change, 80% of known fossil fuel reserves must remain in the ground. The 100 megatonne ceiling that Trudeau likes to brag about as an example of putting limits on tar sands development will increase tar sands emissions by 40%.

The time is ripe for beginning the transition because solar and wind have come down so far in cost that they are often cheaper than fossil fuels. China, the world’s largest energy consumer, has figured this out and continues to set the pace for the rest of the planet with a $361 Billion commitment to renewables in its 5 year plan for 2016 to 2020.

Shells leads way diversifying into clean tech

Somehow, it is the oil giants themselves who have come to the realization that they will have to diversify if they are to avoid being left with large volumes of “stranded assets.” Fitch Ratings have gone so far as to forewarn that the oil companies will have difficulty gaining access to capital if they do not diversify into renewables.

Shell gets it! Shell has successfully won a bid for the 630 Megawatt Borssele 3&4 zone offshore wind project off the coast of the Netherlands. Shell’s chief energy advisor claimed “the penny has now dropped that this is the new business space.” Thus Shell will be more active in offshore wind in 2017, currently eying offshore tenders in Germany and the UK. Shell is also planning to divest from the tar sands. Norway’s Statoil has already done it.

France’s Total has ambitions to be a top-three solar player within 20 years after taking over battery maker Saft and having bought out a majority share in SunPower.

Dong of Denmark is divesting from petroleum and has become the world leading investor in offshore wind with 4.4 GW of offshore wind projects presently under construction off Europe’s coasts.

Cleaner cars en route

This brings us to the matter of the transition in the transportation sector. At this point, the US automakers, such as the CEO of Ford, Mark Fields, are gearing up to tell Donald Trump that the current US automobile fuel economy standards – which incrementally become more stringent through to 2025 – will cost US jobs and raise the average cost of vehicles. But the rest of the developed world will continue to require that the industry dramatically reduce its emissions.

A Morgan Stanley report projects that electric car sales will represent 10% to 15% of vehicle sales by 2025. This is less than Volkswagen’s projection of 20% to 25% of sales for the 2020 to 2025 period but nevertheless reinforces the growing consensus that the tipping point favouring electric vehicles will come in the 2020-25 period.

In effect, Fields is conveying half of the truth. That is, the vehicle manufacturers are investing in getting more efficiency out of the internal combustion engine, something which adds to the manufacturer’s costs. But the other half of the truth is that they will reach a point where investing in electric vehicles will be the more cost effective way to reduce vehicle emissions.  This is what can be appropriately called a transition, as opposed to the Trudeau version of the word, which calls for more petroleum production.

No business case for new pipelines

Stanford University’s Tony Seba predicts that the falling costs of electric vehicle technologies will contribute to oil becoming redundant by 2030. That translates into a too-short life span for tar sands pipelines to be an acceptable economic proposition.

Further on the Fields argument on the cost of change, innovation should be regarded as a normal cost of doing business because the alternative is that of no improvements and being outclassed by one’s competitors.

Improved fuel economy a good investment

The US Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers laments about the cost of improved fuel economy. It lies.

The increasing cost of new vehicles has little to do with fuel efficiency improvements and more to do with consumers buying more fully-equipped vehicles for both comfort and entertainment; the shift away from cars to the high-profit margin light duty trucks and SUVs in particular; and automakers’ increasing pursuit of the higher end luxury market.

The reality is that Canada can support a more aggressive transition to zero and low-emission vehicles with standards more stringent than those of the US federal government. In doing so, the Government of Canada could join US states and the Government of Quebec, all of which have taken a different path than that of the US federal government.

Enough of Trudeau’s greenwashing

We could agree with Trudeau’s greenwashing line that we need to engage in a transition and that we can develop the economy while protecting the environment. But the transition needs to begin now to guarantee the economy of tomorrow. To do this we need a green economic development model.

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Despite Trump & Trudeau’s pipeline fetish, green economy will keep booming

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US President-Elect Trump (Flickr/Gage Skidmore) and Canadian PM Trudeau (Flickr/Canada 2020) are both big on pipelines
US President-Elect Trump (Flickr/Gage Skidmore) and Canadian PM Trudeau (Flickr/Canada 2020) are both big on pipelines

Forces at play suggest there will continue to be significant advancements in the global migration to a green economy.  Trudeau and Trump are rowing against the current.

Despite Trudeau’s continued focus on tar sands extraction and limiting provincial action on climate change; despite Trump’s obsession with fossil fuels – coal in particular – the US and Canada will be swept up in these global green economy currents.

Moreover, these global forces strengthen the case that the proposed tar sands pipelines – Kinder Morgan, Energy East and Keystone XL in particular – are redundant, superfluous or pipelines to nowhere.

Trudeau stuck on resource economy

One can be understandably be pessimistic with Trump’s appointment of climate change deniers to his Cabinet. In Canada, there are also grounds for pessimism given Trudeau’s recent track record, including:

  • Approving or backing the Kinder Morgan, Line 3 and Keystone XL pipelines, plus two BC LNG plants – Petronas and Woodfibre – and BC’s Site C dam
  • His favourable view on the Energy East pipeline, to the effect that he said that opposition to this pipeline is not based on science
  • A razor-thin climate plan, stemming from the agreement with most of the provinces
  • This means it would be very difficult to meet even the Conservative GHG reduction target, one now adopted by the Liberals and calling for a measly 30% yearly GHG reduction in 2030 relative to 2005 levels
  • His heavy reliance on carbon pricing, despite the fact that, as a stand-alone measure, this is not likely to be very effective – especially with low oil prices and the low carbon price proposed
  • Confirming in his 2016-17 Budget the National Energy Board’s (NEB) role for environmental impact assessments for pipelines
  • His plan to modernize the NEB subsequent to a 3 year-long process entailing advice from a panel of 5 people, 3 of whom are close to the oil and gas industry

On the issue of over-relying on carbon pricing, two provinces come to mind. First, BC has a $30/tonne carbon tax, but the government is quite comfortable with the Petronas-backed Pacific Northwest LNG facility and the $6 Billion Pacific Trails gas pipeline to connect to BC’s northeast shale gas to the LNG facility. This project alone would raise BC’s emissions by 6.5 to 8.7 megatonnes/year or an 8.5% increase in GHGs/year

A second case in point is Quebec. Despite its cap and trade system, it went ahead with new legislation to facilitate the exploitation of fossil fuels in the province and $450 million in public subsidies for a cement facility in Port-Daniel, which would become one of the greatest sources of emissions in the province at 1.7 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent/year.

The current Quebec government is also favourable on Energy East.

And yet…renewables are now cheaper than coal

Obama-gets-tough-on-coal-plant-emissions-with-30-percent-reduction
Outgoing President Obama visiting Copper Mountain solar plant in 2012 (Photo: Sempra U.S. Gas & Power)

Let’s take a look at the emerging energy landscape in the US. 

Trump’s rhetoric aside, the falling cost of renewables will make it hard for Trump to give full priority to fossil fuels in the electricity sector.  Since 2009 in the US, the cost of solar has been cut by nearly half and wind has fallen by two thirds.  Solar and wind installations are now cheaper than coal in many parts of the US. This trend is exemplified by the fact that 99% of new US generation capacity in the first quarter of 2016 was represented by renewables, 64% from solar. For the year 2016, renewables will likely account for two thirds of new capacity.

As a result, there is now 20 gigawatts (GW) of wind capacity under construction in the US, or in an advanced development stage, which will ultimately raise the US total wind capacity beyond its current 75 GW.  What Trump will not be able to ignore are the 88,000 jobs in the US wind sector, especially the 21,000 jobs in US wind tech manufacturing. 

As for solar, it is poised to shake up global markets as unsubsidized solar is beginning to outcompete coal and is coming in below the cost of wind projects. 

This reality undermines Trump’s ambitions for revitalizing the industry with “clean coal.”  Not only has the popularity of renewables and natural gas resulted in the producers of 45% of the country’s coal output having filed for bankruptcy, but also the least expensive, least costly and easiest to mine US coal sources have been fully exploited, making a return to the good old, cheap coal days unlikely.  Against this backdrop, 11 GW to 14 GW of US coal capacity went offline in 2015.

Further on Trump’s promise to bring back coal jobs, these new economics had the US solar sector adding more jobs in 2015 than the US oil, gas and pipeline sectors combined.

And despite Trump’s rhetoric, he will not be able to counteract the global implications of China, the world’s largest energy consumer, which continues to shake up global energy economics with its massive investments in renewables and its war on coal.  Not only has coal dropped from 80% of China’s electrical generation sources in 2011 to 70% in 2015, but the projections are that by 2025 coal will represent just 55% of China’s electricity mix.

With the 2 principal consumers of coal, China and the US, at the precipice of massive declines in demand for coal, the International Energy Agency is projecting global coal demand to stagnate over the next 5 years.

Also on the global scale, emerging economies are giving priority to solar energy.  Auctions in Chile and India have had solar coming in at half the price of coal power.  Accordingly, the amount of solar PV added globally is likely to exceed wind capacity additions with as much as 70 GW installed in 2016, compared to 59 GW of wind.

With US coal exports largely dependent on China and India, this all spells more bad news for the US coal industry.

Within the next decade, global clean energy installations will represent more new capacity added than coal and natural gas combined. This green revolution is advancing more quickly in emerging markets, where renewable energy investments were greater in 2015, at $154.1 Billion, than in OECD countries, at $153.7 Billion.

Automotive sector shifting fast to electric

A solar ev charging station in San Francisco
A solar ev charging station in San Francisco

But the most significant cause for optimism lies ahead, with the shift towards low and zero-emission vehicles being imminent.  This has major implications for future oil demand, since the transportation sector represents 55% of global petroleum demand

Here, China continues to lead the way. Up from 331,000 electric vehicles sold in the country in 2015, the projection for 2016 is for 400,000 vehicles – giving us every reason to believe China will meet its target to manufacture 2 million eco-vehicles/year by 2020.

European nations are joining the bandwagon.  The German federal upper house, the Bundesrat, adopted a motion to ban internal combustion engine vehicles from the new vehicle market after 2030.  Meanwhile, Norway has passed legislation to do the same by 2025, and the Netherlands may well join them.

In effect, Norway is leading the pack, as this country is well on its way to achieving its targets, with nearly half of its 2016 new vehicle sales being plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles, up from 28% in 2015.

With respect to the vehicle manufacturers, it is not just that Volkswagen has announced an investment of $11 Billion in a battery manufacturing facility or its projection that 20% to 25% of its sales will be electric during the 2020 to 2025 period.  Many vehicle manufacturers are actively preparing for the introduction of low and zero emission vehicles. FordHyundai-KiaVolkswagen, Mercedes, BMW, Toyota and Volvo, all have ambitious plans for a wide range of electric and plug-in hybrid models by 2020.

Concurrently, the entry of electric trucks into the marketplace will also make a difference.

China’s electric vehicle-leading enterprise, BYD, will soon triple the 400 employees at its e-bus manufacturing facility in California to make trucks, as well as more buses. Canada’s Lion Bus, manufacturer of electric school buses, will be adding class 5, 6, 7 and 8 trucks to its lineup.  Mack Trucks is working in collaboration with Wrightspeed to produce an electric garbage truck and Tesla has added trucks to its Master Plan.

In keeping with these considerations, by 2020, the UK will have more charging stations than gasoline stations. In effect, it appears that Shell’s UK arm also sees the writing on the wall in that the company is thinking of introducing charging stations at its service stations.  This my happen as early as 2017.

European automakers are also getting into the act. In November, 2016, Daimler, BMW, Ford and the Volkswagen group (the latter includes Audi and Porsche) signed a Memorandum of Understanding to set up a fast Combined Charging System to cover common long distance travel routes in Europe – 400 station locations in all. The development of the network would begin in 2017 and the goal will be to have thousands of fast charging points on the continent by 2020. Other partners/manufacturers would be welcome to join the network.  These fast charging stations will offer up to 350 kW of power, compared with Tesla’s fast chargers, which deliver 120-135 kW.

The Combined Charging System will be complemented by Hubject,  a cross-provider, cross-border e-Roaming platform that connects 40,000 charge points worldwide. Charging point locations, availability and payments will be possible with the one application. The application is backed by a European consortium that includes Volkswagen, Daimler, BMW and Siemens.

Going one step further, the EU recently approved regulations that all new and renovated homes and apartments must have charging stations in place beginning 2019. 

California will be adopting similar requirements to the effect that all new buildings and parking lots must have the wiring and control panels in place to receive charging stations.

Speaking of the US, Chargepoint, a private supplier of charging stations, installed its 30,000th station in August 2016. 

On the downside, Trump may weaken or eliminate regulations for the vehicle manufacturers to improve their respective corporate average fuel economies. That said, the global government policy momentum and global private sector competition among the world’s vehicle manufacturers will ensure a progression to low and zero emission vehicles regardless.

Canada and the US will have to change

Currently, the global supply of petroleum on the market exceeds global demand. This is the result of a flattening of demand, combined with an abundance of new supply sources, due in part to the production of US shale oil, together with existing tar sands exploitation.

An internal memo to the federal Deputy Minister of Finance, released to the public in mid-July, 2016, indicated that existing pipeline capacity is sufficient to accommodate tar sands industry needs until 2025.

Not surprisingly, Dinara Millington, Vice-President of the Canadian Energy Research Institute, echoes the end of the era of exponential oil demand growth by pointing out that the decline oil prices is a reflection of the collapse of the traditional supply-demand model.  The demand has not materialized to accommodate increased supply in international markets.

To this effect, Exxon is reassessing 3.6 Billion barrels of oil sands reserves and several other oil firms, Chevron and Shell included, have lowered their valuations of reserves by more than $50 Billion since 2014. More recently, Norway’s Statoil announced its withdrawal from tar sands investments at a loss of $500-550 million.

Also a liability for Canada’s tar sands, Canada’s bitumen is a lower quality oil which only US Gulf Coast refineries are capable of handling.  The result is Canada’s bitumen will acquire a lower price in European and Asian markets than conventional supplies.

Trudeau on wrong track

Justin Trudeau and Christy Clark (Province of BC/Flickr CC)
Justin Trudeau has backed BC Premier Christy Clark’s LNG vision (Province of BC/Flickr CC)

The pending decline in the appetite of the transportation sector for petroleum combined with the unstoppable momentum of the global green economy, indicate that Canada, with its big push on pipelines, is on the wrong track. 

The Trudeau’s continued focus on pipelines and resource economy means it is unlikely that Canada will achieve even the poor Conservative GHG reduction target it has adopted. This is sad since there are 6 to 8 times more jobs per government investment unit created by investments in green jobs than from funds sunk into the traditional resource sectors.

Case in point: Quebec’s electric vehicle sector is not on the federal radar screen.  (This sector includes 2 battery manufacturers; work underway on the development of a super battery; 2 charging station manufacturers; a developer of an electric motor wheel; an electric school bus manufacturer which plans on branching out into truck classes 5 to 8; a manufacturer of an urban transit electric bus soon to be included in a pilot project in Montreal; and several research facilities)

Whether they like it or not, the above facts mean that Trudeau and Trump will soon be forced to adjust their respective mindsets to address the emerging global green economy.

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Rafe’s New Year’s letter to Trudeau: Time for PM to get to know BC…for real

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Justin Trudeau hasn't learned much about BC in the time he lived here and through visits like this one to the north coast in 2014 (Flickr/Justin Trudeau)
Justin Trudeau hasn’t learned much about BC in the time he lived here and from visits like this one to the central coast in 2014 (Flickr/Justin Trudeau)

Dear Prime Minister Trudeau,

Allow me to introduce myself. I am a lifelong, pretty old British Columbian who loves his province with the same passion I’m sure people in Trois Rivières love theirs. Your inferential calling BC’s patriotism into question because we will vigorously oppose your approval of the Kinder Morgan pipeline demonstrates clearly that you’re quite unable to understand this, your connections to BC notwithstanding.

There’s a sense that British Columbians think that because they’re different that “different” means “better”. That simply isn’t so. What we cherish is our distinctness (a word I use advisedly). When BC is included in the term “The West”, we bristle because we are indeed a very separate region but also because it does a great disservice to our neighbours to meld them into a fictional, however convenient, sameness as us.

Let me tell you a personal anecdote. I’m a writer who’s written 11 books and God only knows how many columns. For many years I wrote for the Financial Post and during that time, perhaps 20 years ago, I was offered a column with the Toronto Globe and Mail to be called “The View From The West”.

I protested that this would be badly received because I didn’t live in the West but on the Pacific Coast. I told Sarah Murdoch, the editor, that people in Brandon, Saskatoon, and Lethbridge would be justifiably outraged that I pretended to speak for them and their issues, as I would be if they spoke for mine.

Recent Kinder Morgan protest in Vancouver (Photo: Lu Iz/Facebook)
Recent Kinder Morgan protest in Vancouver (Photo: Lu Iz/Facebook)

Your decision to support the Kinder Morgan pipeline and the horrific Site C Dam demonstrates that in spite of your connections to this province, you don’t come close to understanding this – or you understand it perfectly but, for strictly political reasons, choose to ignore the inconvenient truth. More on that point later.

Sir, may I suggest that you read The West Beyond The West by Dr. Jean Barman, professor emeritus, Department of Educational Studies, at your old alma mater and mine, the University of British Columbia. Dr. Barman, a Winnipegger by birth, came to British Columbia many years ago and, like so many converts, became more devout than the natives. This highly readable book is a fascinating history of how this province really came into being, which was quite unlike Ottawa’s more preferred, vague version and I can assure you it contains much that will surprise you considerably.

Let’s deal with one area that you should know about. There are close to as many First Nation tribes and discrete languages here than in the rest of the country combined. I was surprised indeed to learn from Grand Chief Ed John that while he couldn’t understand the language of the nation next door, he could understand the Navajo in New Mexico. Our ignorance of First Nations is astonishing, except how could it be different when my generation were only taught about Iroquois, Algonquin and Hurons, not Salish, Secwepemc or Musqueam. This not terribly subtle effort to “Ontario-ize” English speaking Canada has been energetically applied in BC and just as energetically resisted. It spawns resentment, not national unity.

I don’t pretend to speak for all British Columbians but I believe, based on a long and multifaceted experience – including being a BC cabinet minister responsible for constitutional affairs – that there’s a general defiance in BC towards unfair treatment of their beloved province, endemic to Ottawa from the beginning. You may well see that defiance in action.

An existing BC salmon farm (Damien Gillis)
A BC salmon farm filled with a million Atlantic salmon (Damien Gillis)

I need only point to federal fisheries policy going back to 1871, continuing to this day with Atlantic salmon farms. Science, always brushed aside by the highly politicized Department of Fisheries and Oceans, has demonstrated that fish farms containing the alien Atlantic salmon carry, multiply and spread disease to wild Pacific salmon. They also propagate sea lice that damage and often wipe out wild salmon runs. This redounds to the enormous disadvantage of First Nations who rely upon wild salmon for food and ceremony, not to mention the damage to the commercial industry and sport fishing sector.

Your government, Mr. Trudeau, persists in defying science and not only permitting Atlantic salmon farms in BC, but promoting them. The Pacific salmon is, for us British Columbians, Prime Minister, our symbol – our icon. And you want us to believe that you really give a damn about BC?

Let me put it plainly – are the Tar Sands of Alberta really more important than the renewable salmon from which so many British Columbians derive their daily bread, prosper and enjoy as sports people?

Mr. Trudeau, a question: As Canada’s prime minister and grandson of a former fisheries minister, can you (without peeking or prompting) name the seven species of Pacific salmon (8 if you count Asia) and tell us which five are commercially caught? What about your fisheries minister? How about your cabinet ministers?

The ignorance in Ottawa of the Pacific fishery – what it is, where it is and where each species spawns – goes back to 1871 and gets worse by the year. This appalling ignorance is part of Ottawa’s built-in lack of concern about the discrete character and makeup of this province and its people who love it so much.

This symbolizes, sir, the difficulties between our province and your autocratic attitude, as evidenced by the Kinder Morgan decision.

Let’s get down to cases. This is our home.

OIl lingering on the Kalamazoo River long after Enbridge's 2010 spill (Jason W Lacey/Flickr)
OIl lingering on the Kalamazoo River long after Enbridge’s 2010 spill (Jason W Lacey/Flickr)

The land between the Tar Sands in Alberta and the ocean is extremely important to us, not only economically but as part of the ecology we have learned, often the hard way, that we must protect. Oil spills on land are permanent disasters because, even if they are reachable, bitumen is virtually impervious to clean-up. In the ocean, they are far worse. I urge you to spend a moment of your valuable time examining the spill in the Kalamazoo River six years ago which still hasn’t been cleaned up and never will be. In spite of the mindless blathering of our premier, there simply is no such thing as a “world class” cleanup that works on bitumen.

Like people everywhere, British Columbians had to learn environmentalism. This took time, a lot of effort, careful and often hard to accept education and a great deal of political shifting to decide that you couldn’t chop down all the trees, dam all the rivers and clog up the inlets with garbage. We discovered that the extraordinary beauty with which we, and I might add the entire country, were blessed with did not last without considerable, care, cost and sacrifice.

This is our home every bit as much as where you live is yours, Prime Minister, and we don’t intend to allow you or anybody else to damage, much less destroy it. I believe that the vast majority of British Columbians would endorse that statement and stand behind their province with every effort available to them.

This nonsense that bringing 400+ tankers laden with bitumen, plus many more with LNG, is of little or no consequence is, frankly, pure barnyard droppings. The constant statement by industry that that accidents are extremely unlikely, or if they do happen, they will be quickly cleaned up, is typical corporate bullshit from Kinder Morgan, and the people of British Columbia know it and will fight it desperately.

Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna with BC Premier Christy Clark (right) announcing her government's approval of PNWLNG (Province of BC/Flickr)
Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna with BC Premier Christy Clark (right) announcing the Trudeau government’s approval of PNWLNG (Province of BC/Flickr)

The Laws of Probabilities tell us that there will be serious accidents in Burrard Inlet, Howe Sound, Saanich Inlet, the Salish Sea and any of a number of passes, including Juan de Fuca. Moreover these explosive, poison-laden vessels won’t cease being a threat when they are outside the inner waters into the Pacific coast. You have to know what we’re dealing with here, Prime Minister – a substance which simply cannot be cleaned up.

Let me close with this. We will fight for our homes in the Peace Valley, which I’ve only touched upon, but you’ll soon know a lot more about that very grave issue. We will battle for our homes and safety on the coast. We will put up one hell of a fight.

What have you won if, through the enormous advantage you have, you beat us down? Think on that Mr. Trudeau.

Will Canada be a better place if, by force, you compel the Province of British Columbia, to facilitate the full exploitation of the Tar Sands of Alberta, the acknowledged worst polluter in the world, make the wealthy wealthier, save the political bacon of Premier Notley and give your party lots of Alberta seats?

The fossil fuel industry will be better off, as will Premier Notley, and so will you. But will Canada be better off with a badly alienated British Columbia – an alienation which will increase every time there’s a tanker collision or an oil spill?

British Columbia didn’t provoke or ask for this fight, Prime Minister – you did, and whatever defence you may mount, or noble motive you preach, the evidence will shine through that you and the Liberal Party of Canada had a substantial interest in the outcome.

That, sir, will be your everlasting legacy – not just to this province, but to the country.

Ponder that, Prime Minister.

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If not Civil Disobedience, what? Letters to the editor?…Rafe Mair on the necessary response to Site C Dam, Kinder Morgan

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84 year-old retried librarian Barbara Grant getting arrested at Burnaby Mountain (Burnaby Mountain Updates/facebook)
84 year-old retired librarian Barbara Grant getting arrested at Burnaby Mountain (Burnaby Mountain Updates/facebook)

Beyond doubt, British Columbia must get involved in two separate and substantial actions of civil disobedience, one with Site C and the other with the proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline.

Civil disobedience runs against the grain of many people but I beg you to hear me out because we have reached the point where there is nothing left for our free society to do if it seriously wants to maintain any semblance of that freedom.

Sham dictatorship

Let me state a critical axiom of democracy: It’s not important that those who dissent get their way but what is critically important, fundamentally important, is that they get to be heard in a meaningful way. The moment people are denied the right to speak their opinion freely and with a clear opportunity to convince the government that they are right, there is no democracy left but only a sham dictatorship of the elite.

Let’s examine our system and see if we meet that test and use the Kinder Morgan pipeline decision as the example.

British Columbians, I think it’s fair to say, are vehemently opposed to this; what then is the answer Premier Clark and Prime Minister Trudeau would give to those who complain that they cannot get a hearing that matters?

Why, they would be told, you have both the legislature and the Parliament of Canada and all you need do is persuade 50% +1 of either of those bodies and your complaint will be satisfied. It is at this point that I have a lot of trouble containing my anger.

We’ve been told a lot of rubbish, starting in childhood. I did a paper on this so-called system of “responsible government”, which paper has been highly praised by people who understand government. It’s easy to understand – you will be appalled at the simplicity of the methods used to steal away your democracy.

In the last federal election, it was impossible for any British Columbian to elect an MP who opposed the Kinder Morgan pipeline because the leaders of both the Liberal and Tory party supported it. Every Liberal and Tory MP were bound by party discipline to support the leader’s policy or be thrown out of caucus and the party. Think about that. Their judgment on this issue was already made for them. Even if the leader waited until after the election, his decision was also automatically that of all his MPs.

The fix is in

Now, if I am right that a majority of BC citizens oppose Kinder Morgan, of what use was their parliament? Their concerns would never be discussed, much less voted upon. Even if the Opposition were against the project, since no government MP would dare vote against it, the entire process becomes a sham, a make-believe debate and a vote where the fix is in. In fact, no longer can government be bothered and cabinet endorses the deal behind closed doors.

Since the BC government has always been in favour, over 4 million British Columbians have turned its forests, rivers, streams, land, coastline, marine line and public safety over to the tender mercies of the fossil fuel industry without any say in the matter!

And somehow it would be undemocratic to say “fuck you, we’re going to stop you, without using violence, from ravaging our beautiful province”?

In a nutshell, it’s lawful to be a thief and unlawful to try to stop him!

Media part of the problem

We are in a very different world from that even a few years ago. The people have caught onto big business and big government and know they’ve have been lying through their teeth for years. It’s taken a while but voters now realize that their vote really doesn’t mean much. Capital now owns governments – one only has to look at the situation in British Columbia to see how the fossil fuel-dominated media has not only supported the industry’s actions but meekly supports the lickspittles that make up the government. As long as the government behaves and does as it’s told then the muckrakers confine themselves to accepting large fees for making speeches before gatherings of friends of the government. It has become a pathetic sight, especially for a former cabinet minister like me who still bears the justifiable scars inflicted by Jack Webster, Marjorie Nichols, Jim Hume, Pat Burns, Gary Bannerman, Allan Fotheringham, Jack Wasserman, and the like, upon whom the public could rely to keep our feet firmly to the fire.

With respect, you the public must ask yourselves what you will do where there is an absence of any legitimate democratic process, where there is no place you can effectively voice your concerns and where the media won’t do it because they, the government and the domineering fossil fuel industry are all on the same team.

I have no hesitation in concluding that civil disobedience, properly exercised, is the only tool left to the voter to replace the meaningful vote they are supposed to have but have been cheated out of.

Next week, a look at Site C Dam.

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Rafe: Trudeau, Notley’s defence of Kinder Morgan doesn’t wash for BC

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Justin Trudeau is greeted in Alberta by Rachel Notley (Premier of Alberta/Flickr CC licence)
Justin Trudeau is greeted in Alberta by Rachel Notley (Premier of Alberta/Flickr CC licence)

I listened to Alberta Premier Rachel Notley on CBC with Rick Cluff this week and must say she said nothing to give me cause to change my mind on Kinder Morgan. To the contrary, I asked myself how could she be so indifferent to the problems 400-plus tankers a year full of bitumen would bring to the BC coast.

I have a lot of trouble with the Trudeau/Notley attitude because the position British Columbians take is so obviously rational and natural. Just why people in the rest of Canada can’t understand eludes me. Wouldn’t they protect themselves and their homes?

Clark cutting a deal for BC?

The light went on when premier Notley talked about Christy Clark trying to make a deal with Kinder Morgan for money, saying that she understood that they were pretty close.

Justin Trudeau and Christy Clark (Province of BC/Flickr CC)
Justin Trudeau and Christy Clark (Province of BC/Flickr CC)

Of course! Clark, being a far-right-wing airhead (forgive the redundancy) has never concerned herself with the impacts all these extra tankers plus would have on our coast.

It would never occur to her that the colossal damage done by the inevitable spill would be permanent. It would never cross her mind that a simple understanding of the law of probabilities tells you accidents will happen over and over again and that, given the filthy nature of the cargo of these tankers, the damage is bound to be extremely serious. If these things don’t bother her, why would others care?

I dare say that if you mentioned Kalamazoo to Christy Clark, she would immediately think of the old Glenn Miller song of the 40s;  it wouldn’t  occur to her that it now signified the worst pipeline spill in history, six years ago, which has never been cleaned up and never will.   

If the premier of our province is not telling other Canadian leaders how serious the Kinder Morgan issue is to her province, then the press, such as it is, won’t pick up the story and all people east of the Rockies will have read is Gary Mason in the Toronto Globe and Mail.

Horgan ready to make Kinder Morgan an election issue?

The NDP's only shot at winning in BC: Embrace the NEW ECONOMY
BCNDP Leader John Horgan (BCNDP/Flickr)

Until very recently, John Horgan, leader of the BC NDP has been waffling, so any who gauge the opinion of a province by the pronouncements of their politicians would conclude that it was only a small group of crazies that were opposed to this pipeline. Somebody has obviously had a word with Mr. Horgan and he now realizes this is an issue upon which an election might depend. He’s seen the error of his ways and is now enthusiastically opposed.

The result of this misrepresentation of our general position makes us look bad in the eyes of other Canadians who simply don’t understand what our problem is. Although it is difficult for me to keep my cool on this subject I will try to put this in clear terms.

Public opposition based on common sense

Other Canadians must understand that the case against a multitude of bitumen loaded tankers on the BC Coast has never been stated by the government for the people. Quite, the opposite: the BC Liberal Government went as far as to sign away the province’s constitutional authority to represent its constituents on this matter, through a controversial “equivalency agreement”, which we’ve documented in these pages. Thus, it has been left to private individuals and groups. This is taken to mean that the environmentalists are hysterical and the government is calm and accurate.

In fact, environmentalists have all of the science as well as common sense on their side and, importantly, the law of probabilities. When you have this many tankers constantly using water ways such as exist in the routes out of Vancouver through the harbour and all of the channels involved, the law of probabilities says there’ll be more accidents as this traffic increases, as it surely will. 

What’s worse, the bitumen cargo ensures that an accident will have very serious consequences, especially near populated areas. Added to to this, Mr. Trudeau has approved an LNG plant near Squamish, sending tankers loaded with LNG  through Howe Sound to meet with the tankers coming from Vancouver. Mr. Trudeau chose to overlook the fact that even by standards of the tanker industry organization,SIGGTO, Howe Sound is far too narrow for the necessary tanker traffic. He doesn’t give a damn and neither does careless Christy.

It must also he understood that clean-up is a very iffy proposition. Both Kinder Morgan and the government play down the frequency and seriousness of spills and their inability to handle them, but they don’t mention that bitumen is impossible to clean up under the best of circumstances. I mentioned the Enbridge spill in the Kalamazoo River in 2010 and if one takes a moment to Google this tragedy, they’ll learn how catastrophic bitumen spills are, even when easily accessed.

Fellow Canadians, this is merely a thumbnail sketch of the consequences of the Kinder Morgan proposed pipeline extension.

Bad deal for BC

Now, here is the deal proposed to us by Justin Trudeau and Rachel Notley:

Alberta gets to fully reopen the world’s biggest polluter, the Tar Sands, and ship its shit through BC by pipeline and then, by some 400 and ever-increasing bitumen tankers a year, ship it through the hazardous Salish Sea (formerly Straits of Georgia) to foreign markets. It bears no risk and neither do the Feds.

For its part, BC stops complaining about statistically certain ruptures in the pipeline and statistically certain bitumen spills on their coast with the calamitous consequences they bring, including the safety of citizens, and agrees to support the pipeline and bear the damage.

That way, we’re advised, both Albertans and British Columbian will then be good Canadians.

Well, Madame Premier and Mr. Prime Minister, in the politest phrase I can think of, get lost. Don’t go away mad, just go away.

Neither the Kinder Morgan line, nor any other, is going to get built, next year or any other year. We have the inherent right, like all good Canadians, to protect our homes from any outside threat and that sure as hell includes the Tar Sands.

You have pushed us too far.

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Rafe: Gary Mason, quit lecturing Vancouverites for opposing pipelines

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Recent Kinder Morgan protest in Vancouver (Photo: Lu Iz/Facebook)
Recent Kinder Morgan protest in Vancouver (Photo: Lu Iz/Facebook)

I simply couldn’t believe Gary Mason in Friday’s Globe and Mail In his article entitled “Sorry Vancouver: The rest of Canada needs pipelines”. I urge you to read the article so that if I misrepresent Mr. Mason you will see it for yourself.

Mason gives Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson hell and by extension all of us the same for being overly proud and concerned about our coastline and other beauties we cherish. He tells us about the unemployment in the oil patch and tough times in Newfoundland and Labrador and praises Justin Trudeau for his decision on the Kinder Morgan pipeline, the strong implication being that this was in the best interest of all Canadians and therefore it didn’t matter if it was distinctly not in the interest of some of them.

We selfish British Columbians

The, dare I say, majority of British Columbians are bad Canadians because we are not prepared to sacrifice our coastline, homes, fjords, mountains, forests, rivers, farmland, lakes and oceans so that Alberta can reinvigorate the Tar Sands, the world’s worst polluter, and send its, forgive me, shit through our province, into our ocean and destroy what we hold dear.

Mason glosses over the environmental disaster that Alberta’s Tar Sands are. It’s evidently an act of patriotism to get it up and running again so that Alberta will be rich again and their employment problems all behind him. There isn’t a suggestion, perish the thought, that Trudeau has a large political stake in this decision.

It doesn’t seem to matter that this decision will wreak huge destruction in this province. Oh, a bit of a risk perhaps but nothing to be concerned about. Never mind that a risk is an event waiting to happen, never mind that, once started, not only does it never end but increases. Overlook the fact that statistically it’s a certainty that there will be bad spills and collisions and never mind that the consequences will be terrible, British Colombians are churlish in the extreme to withhold their support for such selfish reasons. Mason, at one point, sneers:

[quote]People in Vancouver need to get out of their Idyllic little bubble and see how things are in the rest of the country. Not everyone has fluked a small fortune as a result of home ownership. Many people across this country live day to day.[/quote]

This from Gary Mason surprises me a great deal. I believe that British Colombians have a great deal of empathy for other Canadians who are having financial difficulties. In fact, I was part of the debates on equalization in the 70s at first ministers conferences and our province was always supportive of the “equalization” being part of our Constitution and we consistently recognized that we were fortunate in our natural resources where others have not been so lucky. Alberta, I might add, wasn’t quite as supportive. However, it never occurred to me, nor did I ever hear it suggested, that it was part of our obligation to permit our resources to be damaged and destroyed in order to fulfill our patriotic duty.

BC has changed…for the better

British Columbians have made extraordinary adjustments in their outlook in the last several decades.  When I was a boy and a young man there was always another valley to log, another run of fish, more farmland around the corner, more rivers to dam or even reverse. This was considered our birthright. But though it took us a long time to realize it, we saw that we no longer had those luxuries. For far too long we carried on with blindfolds, in denial, but, helped considerably by brave men and women, mocked for their ideas, who marched, picketed, protested, harried, we changed. Groups seen as crazies, even outlaws, gained respectability and stature. I think of people like Colleen McCrory, Joe Foy, Paul Watson to name just a few. Resource extraction companies and politicians, however reluctantly, began to change. We started to ask questions and do research before we acted.

We left a hell of a lot to be desired but we did better and better. We began to respect what we have and not just see resources as dollar signs in the making. We accepted that conservation and restraint cost money. Not everyone did, of course, but more and more every day.

More environment than “resources”

Photo: Canada2020 / Flickr
Photo: Canada2020 / Flickr

Those who didn’t feel this way sometimes just said to hell with it as Stephen Harper did. Others, like Justin Trudeau learned duplicity, how to speak out of both sides of their mouth. They eloquently talked about saving the environment and changing our ways while doing the very opposite.

As I assess it, and I could be very wrong, the majority of British Columbians, in ever increasing numbers changed and saw their province as much more than a cash cow. They took increasing pride in what was around them and became determined to protect it. They also noted a great example of what past government follies unchanged can do to a great salmon fishery. This has become a daily reminder to British Columbians but unnoticed by Justin Trudeau and his crew.

And they learned that oil companies and their own government obscured facts and in fact lied. They saw and remembered what Enbridge said was a minor pipeline rupture did to the Kalamazoo River. When they’re told that tankers don’t hit things they read publications like gCaptain and see about one serious collision a week. They see environmental assessments as about as honest as a the old Soviet show trials were. There is no trust of corporations and governments any more because they damn well don’t deserve it.

Now comes Gary Mason and the Toronto Globe and Mail telling us that British Columbians are wrong to be proud of caring about their surroundings and taking increasing steps to protect them and that when the likes of Justin Trudeau tells them they owe it to Canada to sacrifice them for the Tar Sands we should cheerfully do so.

The Prime Minister and Premier Christy Clark are prepared to do so.

Most British Columbians are not and to call their patriotism into question is disgraceful.  It is our Premier, Prime Minister, Gary Mason and The Toronto Globe and Mail who should be ashamed.

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Rafe Mair to Justin Trudeau: BC is not yours to give away

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Justin Trudeau speaks at the Paris climate talks - flanked by Canadian premiers (Province of BC/Flickr)
Justin Trudeau speaks at the Paris climate talks – flanked by Canadian premiers (Province of BC/Flickr)

“They hang the man, and flog the woman,
That steals the goose from off the common;
But let the greater villain loose,
That steals the common from the goose.”

I’ll not waste too many words on Prime Minister Trudeau’s treachery.

Of all the many political sins, surely the greatest of all is hypocrisy and this prime minister has taken that sin to new levels. He basked in the glory of Paris and being portrayed as the hero of the earth but had scarcely got home when he cast aside the cloak of righteousness, reverting to being a cheap hustler for the fossil fuel industry, even outshining Stephen Harper.

May takes a stand

Photo: Laurel L Russwurm/Flickr
Elizabeth May (Photo: Laurel L Russwurm/Flickr)

The consequences that would flow from Kinder Morgan’s pipeline would be a monumental contribution to global warming and killing the earth’s atmosphere but he’s consoled by the fact that the fossil fuel industry loves him and with their captive pseudo-journalists are falling all over themselves in support. I can’t help but comment on Gary Mason in the Globe and Mail, who criticizes Elizabeth May because she’s said she’ll go to jail if necessary in protest of the Kinder Morgan line. Mason, the sneer undisguised, quips, “Green Party Leader Elizabeth May has already said she is willing to go to jail over Kinder Morgan. Less clear is what good she thinks she can do behind bars.”

Gary Mason knows the answer to that full well and fears it because it would do one hell of a lot of good. There’s not a public figure in BC who could rally people against Kinder Morgan in a more effective way then she. Elizabeth May behind bars would be Kinder Morgan’s all-time, number one nightmare – not to mention a political horror story for the Liberals and the Tories. She has that commodity the media has abandoned – credibility.

From Brexit to Trump

Ms. May, along with other leaders of this fight like Grand Chief Stewart Philip, head of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs, understands something that Trudeau chooses to ignore: There’s been a sea change in politics in this world. The enemy is no longer the other political parties but the elite, regardless of individual political persuasion. Brewing for a decade, it recently manifested itself in the Brexit vote and the election of Donald Trump. No one needs to explain this to Ms. May or Grand Chief Philip and I’ve neither the time nor the inclination to explain it to Trudeau.

Not long ago I said this about the Brexit result and in predicting Trump’s victory:

[quote]The media and pollsters have been caught out making outdated assumptions and asking irrelevant questions. They’re looking at this contest through the prism of elections past and are still declaring their choice of issues and missing the main one.

It’s an entirely new ballgame and I refer back to articles I’ve done here and elsewhere saying that society as we have come to know it is mortally wounded …[/quote]

Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr CC Licence
Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr CC Licence

The accepted media wisdom, an oxymoron if there ever was one, is that mostly kooks voted for Trump. In fact, interview after interview discloses the underlying reason was deep anger with what the Anglican Book of Prayer so neatly calls “those set in authority over us”.

The phenomenon is not Donald Trump but a worldwide movement of ordinary people who are angry. Whoever looked less elite was going to win.

Tired of being lied to

Who are these angry people?

Not the poor and disadvantaged, although they are part of it; not the traditional left, many of whom are unwelcome. These are people pissed off at the entrenched wealthy, the elite, who have the power to do as they wish. Mr. Trudeau, your ilk, sir!

What was the cause? The catalyst?

Clearly, it was pollution, a phenomenon that showed the elite to be incompetent, serial liars who, since the start of the industrial revolution, had assured the public that no harm came from gunk emitted from smokestacks even though cities like London were blackened by these emissions.

The denouement began with Rachel Carson’s 1962 Silent Spring. It was just a matter of time before people realized they had been, and were being lied to. For the first time, the need to regulate industry in order to protect the environment became widely accepted, and modern environmentalism was born.

Industry and politicians went into denial. Tobacco smoke, hitherto claimed harmless, was proved to kill both smokers and innocent bystanders, yet the companies fought every inch of the way like cornered rats. The chemical companies went into full denial, even though companies like Union Carbide became massive killers.

The list seemed endless and the evidence piled, up but the elite kept on lying and hiring pliable scientists and clever PR specialists. Governments were willing accomplices and, every day, the elite lost credibility, yet clung to their denial.

Then, in a different but related area of public health, there was that kook Ralph Nader, denying the wonders of America’s icon, the automobile and its ever-increasing safety features, in his 1965 book Unsafe At Any Speed. Suddenly, the courts demonstrated that Nader had been right all along. Jesus! Was there nothing sacred?

More valuable than money

Prime Minister, we’ve come to the crux of the matter. 

It has dawned on people that the elite have only one standard of judging value – money – and that they would risk destroying the earth to make it.

More and more, people see that there’s real, tangible value to water, more than just making electricity and slaking our thirst. What, they asked, if it does no more than be beautiful in its untouched state? Can it be said that water is only valuable when destroyed for a dam?

Trees have a dollar value when they become lumber and paper. What about the life they harbour and perpetuate? Is an uncut forest not valuable in itself? Do we have to destroy it before it’s an asset?

Environmentalism went from being semi-admirable Kookism practiced by, you know, those sorts of people, to the respectable, then became mainstream, moving into the realm of the sacred.

Unholy catechism

No one believes developers or governments any more, not even Prime Ministers. Projects that once would scarcely cause a ripple of adverse reaction became hugely controversial and it was no longer just the “usual suspects” picketing and demonstrating against those in authority. Suddenly “Jack was as good as his master”, perhaps better. The elite, the “higher purpose persons”, have their knickers in a knot, unable to comprehend what’s going on or why. Lying, bribery and blatant hypocrisy constitute the only catechism they understand.

You are in denial, sir, because you can’t think of anything except business as usual, always hoping this all goes away.

“National Interest”

Let’s move into contemporary British Columbia.

You tell us, Mr. Trudeau, that our environment and way of life is subject to what you say is in “the national interest” – whether we like it or not. Money counts, especially oil money. Your political commitments, not to say bribes, are paramount.

Justing Trudeau and Jody Wilson-Raybould meet in Hartley Bay on the BC coast in 2014 (Flickr / Justin Trudeau)
Justing Trudeau and Jody Wilson-Raybould meet in Hartley Bay on the BC coast in 2014 (Flickr / Justin Trudeau)

We must accept that pipelines carrying deadly bitumen go through virgin forest where spills can’t be reached or, more likely, there’s nothing to be done anyway. You glibly dismiss the horrible, ongoing risks of tanker traffic – plain statistics tell us what will happen.

We’re told we must, in the interests of the “nation”, put our rivers, inlets, shorelines, fjords, public safety and unbeatable environment at risk to enhance the interests of others.

Why, Prime Minister? Please spell out this national interest. Don’t you really mean the interests of the Liberal party in Alberta? The political survival of premier Notley? Don’t you mean really the masses of investment capital which hasn’t a soupçon of social conscience?

I would never hold this against them Mr. Trudeau but I remember so well going to first ministers conferences on the patriation of the constitution and watching Alberta oppose equalization for poor provinces, lecturing them that if they only managed their affairs as Alberta did, they would be fine. That these provinces had no resources and Alberta was sitting on all that oil didn’t seem to count. It seems as if shoes have changed feet in this country.

Rights and Wrongs

Let me ask you a niggling question: Are Property and Civil Rights not a provincial right under our Constitution?

Attitudes have changed, Mr. Trudeau, and people all over the world now believe that those things that you cheerfully donate to your corporate friends don’t belong to you or the government but to all of the people.

Yes, you have the legal right to give them all away but that’s because our political system is a couple of centuries out of date and reposes in your office dictatorial powers while you pretend to run a democracy. You know, as does anyone who thinks about it, that MPs, particularly in the governing party, have absolutely no power and are just expensive cyphers whose main job is to make sure that pension checks are mailed on time.

Let me put it perhaps more bluntly, Mr. Trudeau: We in British Columbia – and especially First Nations whose unceded territories are at stake – regard those mountains as ours, the rivers are ours, trees are ours; so are the oceans, the beaches, the coastlines, the lakes and on it goes. Your right to steal them from us and give them to oil companies only rests upon a political system that, frankly, stinks.

BC doesn’t belong to you

If that was just the position of one ageing pol living in Lions Bay, British Columbia, you would be able to rest easy. What I’m trying to make you understand, sir, is that the ever-increasing masses of people all over the world are fed to the teeth with a phoney political system that takes away from people what is theirs and gives it to greedy supporters of politicians in power.

In short, British Columbians regard all of our forests, rivers, coastlines, as having enormous value to us simply as they are – not in their exploitation but their existence. This is where we live. our home, our legacy.

Why can’t you understand that, Prime Minister?

You, the hero of the Paris conference, ask us to sacrifice our home so that the Tar Sands, the world’s biggest polluter, can spew its poisons full time again? Why are you telling us, Mr. Trudeau, that we must pledge what God gave us to the tender mercies of the fossil fuel industry? .

Sir, we aren’t fools. We’ve seen how your lot cares about BC. When we hear soothing words from industry and the federal government about how they will treat our assets with care and respect, we think of our sacred salmon, which has been at the mercy of industry and the federal government – a government flooding our waters with diseased foreign fish to this day – ever since Confederation.

You are dead wrong, sir, letting hubris overcome common sense and you’re clearly spoiling for a fight.

If that’s what you truly want, you shall have it.

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Rafe: Trudeau will have hell to pay in BC if he approves Kinder Morgan

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Recent Vancouver rally against Kinder Morgan (Photo: David Suzuki Foundation/Facebook)
Recent Vancouver rally against Kinder Morgan (Photo: David Suzuki Foundation/Facebook)
None should be in the slightest surprised at the anti-British Columbia stance of Justin Trudeau and the Liberals. As Talleyrand famously noted when, after the fall of Napoleon the Bourbons were restored, “they learned nothing and forgot nothing”.

Thus it is with the Liberals who, once safely back in power, turn their attention to repaying supporters, namely Ontario financiers and the oil industry, often the same people. This ancient Liberal policy never fails.

Whose interest?

This time Justin Trudeau has overstepped the mark and as Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson warns, if he approves the Kinder Morgan pipeline, “…you’ll see protests like you’ve never seen before …” His Worship is right. British Columbians know that the standard Ottawa patter that something is “in the interests of Canada” is ill-concealed code for “in the interests of Bay Street and whatever they’ve invested in or covet.”

The operative words are “the interests of Canada”. To Industry, they cover material interests only and no value whatever is placed on assets like mountains, rivers, lakes, forests for their own sake, wildlife, peaceful safe inlets, beautiful views, peace, quiet, tranquility, and so on. Why aren’t these things material Canadian assets too? They sure as hell are once they’re gone!

Enough is Enough

Don’t British Columbians have a real interest, say, in protecting their lakes and rivers from being industrially developed? Or Howe Sound, our gorgeous southernmost fjord? Or the Peace River? The list is endless.

Who is Justin Trudeau to say that letting industry make money on LNG tankers is more important than the safety of people and property where they sail?

British Columbians say, “enough is enough!” From here on, our values speak as loudly as those from the businessmen’s clubs of Bay Street and the nests of political party strategists.

We are inspired as never before by the bravery of the Kinder Morgan protesters. Their guts and steadfastness has inspired a province as you seem determined to discover.

The right to protect our province

The Constitution Act, 1982, clearly states in Section 92:
“In each Province the Legislature may exclusively make Laws in relation to Matters coming within the Classes of Subjects next hereinafter enumerated; that is to say,…13. Property and Civil Rights in the Province.”

We say to you, Mr. Trudeau, that for those words to have any meaning at all, they give us the right, the power and indeed obligation, to protect provincial assets, including all those assets so clearly threatened by Kinder Morgan and other fossil fuel undertakings proposed, notwithstanding the fact that the federal government approves them.

More than this, we have “right” on our side. It’s Kinder Morgan, and its ilk, who would disturb, threaten and harm our precious environment, our property and our homes.

We resolve that this will not be permitted to happen. If you approve Kinder Morgan, sir, there indeed will be hell to pay.

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So much for “World Class” spill response, as Bella Bella, Saskatchewan incidents show

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Booms intended to corral a fuel spill near Bella Bella are blown apart by stormy weather (Photo: Tavish Campbell)
Booms intended to corral a fuel spill near Bella Bella are blown apart by stormy weather (Photo: Tavish Campbell)

In July, a pipeline leak near Maidstone, Saskatchewan, spilled about 250,000 litres of diluted oil sands bitumen into the North Saskatchewan River, killing wildlife and compromising drinking water for nearby communities, including Prince Albert. It was one of 11 spills in the province over the previous year.

The sunken Nathan E. Stewart tug (Photo: Tavish Campbell)
The sunken Nathan E. Stewart tug (Photo: Tavish Campbell)

In October, a tugboat pulling an empty fuel barge ran aground near Bella Bella on the Great Bear Rainforest coastline, spilling diesel into the water. Stormy weather caused some of the containment booms to break. Shellfish operations and clam beds were put at risk and wildlife contaminated.

Governments and industry promoting fossil fuel infrastructure often talk about “world class” spill response. It’s one of the conditions B.C.’s government has imposed for approval of new oil pipelines. But we’re either not there or the term has little meaning. “This ‘world-class marine response’ did not happen here in Bella Bella,” Heiltsuk Chief Councillor Marilyn Slett told Metro News.

Easier said than done

If authorities have this much trouble responding to a relatively minor spill from a tugboat, how can they expect to adequately deal with a spill from a pipeline or a tanker full of diluted bitumen? The simple and disturbing truth is that it’s impossible to adequately clean up a large oil spill. A 2015 report commissioned by the City of Vancouver and the Tsleil-Waututh and Tsawout First Nations concluded that “collecting and removing oil from the sea surface is a challenging, time-sensitive, and often ineffective process, even under the most favourable conditions.”

Botched English Bay oil spill confirms BC 'woefully unprepared' for more pipelines, tankers- Open letter
Ocean pollution specialist Dr. Peter Ross displays an oily substance from English Bay spill (Vancouver Aquarium)

What the oil and gas industry touts as “world class spill response” boils down to four methods: booms, skimmers, burning and chemical dispersants. An article at Smithsonian.com notes, “For small spills these technologies can sometimes make a difference, but only in sheltered waters. None has ever been effective in containing large spills.”

Booms don’t work well in rough or icy waters, as was clear at the Bella Bella spill; skimmers merely clean the surface and often not effectively; burning causes pollution and greenhouse gas emissions; and dispersants just spread contaminants around, when they work at all.

Heavy toll on fish and wildlife

Humpback whale swimming near Bella Bella fuel spill (Photo: Tavish Campbell)
Humpback whale swimming near Bella Bella fuel spill (Photo: Tavish Campbell)

Researchers have also found that cleaning oil-soaked birds rarely if ever increases their chances of survival. A tiny spot of oil can kill a seabird.

After the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill off the Alaska coast, industry only recovered about 14 per cent of the oil — which is about average — at a cost of $2 billion. The 2011 BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has cost more than $42 billion so far, and has not been overly effective. In that case, industry bombed the area with the dispersant Corexit, which killed bacteria that eat oil! Record numbers of bottlenose dolphins died.

Pipelines get a pass

We’re not going to stop transporting oil and gas overnight, so improving responses to spills on water and land is absolutely necessary. And increasing the safety of pipelines, tankers and trains that carry these dangerous products is also critical, as is stepping up monitoring and enforcement. With the Saskatchewan spill, the provincial government deemed an environmental assessment of a pipeline expansion connected to the one that leaked as unnecessary because the Environment Ministry did not consider it a “development.” University of Regina geography professor Emily Eaton, who has studied oil development, told the National Observer that Saskatchewan “gives a pass” to most pipelines it regulates.

Time to cut back

One pof many Heiltsuk responders who have remained on the scene for weeks, working on the spill that threatens their waters and seafood harvesting (Photo: Tavish Campbell)
One pof many Heiltsuk responders who have remained on the scene for weeks, working on the spill that threatens their waters and seafood harvesting (Photo: Tavish Campbell)

Beyond better response capability and technologies, and increased monitoring and enforcement, we have to stop shipping so much fossil fuel. The mad rush to exploit and sell as much oil, gas and coal as possible before markets dry up in the face of growing scarcity, climate change and ever-increasing and improving renewable energy options has led to a huge spike in the amount of fossil fuels shipped through pipelines, and by train and tanker — often with disastrous consequences, from the Gulf of Mexico BP spill to the tragic 2013 Lac-Mégantic railcar explosion.

Spills and disasters illustrate the immediate negative impacts of our overreliance on fossil fuels. Climate change shows we can’t continue to burn coal, oil and gas, that we have to leave much of it in the ground. If we get on with it, we may still have time to manage the transition without catastrophic consequences. But the longer we delay, the more difficult it will become.

David Suzuki is a scientist, broadcaster, author and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Senior Editor Ian Hanington.

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Central Coast diesel spill response slow, ineffective, serious damage done: Heiltsuk

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The Nathan E. Stewart fuel barge and part-sunken tug the morning of the incident (Jordan Wilson/Pacific Wild)
The DBL 55 fuel barge and part-sunken Nathan E. Stewart tug the morning of the incident (Jordan Wilson/Pacific Wild)

Judging by official statements in the aftermath of the ongoing Central Coast diesel fuel spill, the response to the disaster was relatively effective and damage minimized – a PR line largely soaked up by the mainstream media. To the people in whose territory the incident occurred, the Heiltsuk Nation, and local residents who will have to live with the consequences of the spill, nothing could be further from the truth.

“Recent press seems to suggest that containment efforts have been successful. Let me set the record straight: containment has not been successful, and clean-up efforts have barely begun,” says Heiltsuk On-Scene Commander William Housty. “The damage has been done, and the best we can work towards is mitigation.”

A Heiltsuk media statement this morning drives the point home in measurable terms:

[quote]Only 6,554 gallons of the 59,924 gallons of diesel onboard the tug were able to be pumped from the vessel before it sank in Heiltsuk Territory on the morning of October 13th. Since then, the sunken vessel has been leaking diesel into an area of enormous ecological, economic, and cultural significance to the Heiltsuk Nation.[/quote]

Diesel fuel slick in Gale Pass (Megan Humchitt)
Diesel fuel slick in Gale Pass (Megan Humchitt)

The spill occurred just outside Gale Pass – an important shellfish harvesting site for the Heiltsuk peoples – along with herring spawn on kelp and other fisheries. PR people for the cleanup company, Western Canada Marine Response Corporation (WCMRC), and the company that owns the fuel barge whose tug ran aground and leaked all this fuel, Texas-based Kirby Corporation, have insisted that the contents of the tug, marine diesel, easily dissipate and evaporate, downplaying contamination concerns. If this were the case, then why was Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) compelled to shut down shellfish harvesting for 11 sub-areas around the spill on Friday via an “emergency chemical contaminant closure”?

These PR people have also been quick to counter early concerns about slow response time to the spill. But here are a few key points to consider:

  • Initial response came via local contractors for WCMRC, employees of the Shearwater Fishing Resort – and they were not well positioned to respond effectively, according to Kelly Brown, director of the Heiltsuk Integrated Resource Management Department. “The first responding vessels were not equipped to deal with a spill, and had to return to town to gather more gear,” noted Brown, one of the first responders on the scene. “The Heiltsuk are providing our own equipment because what responders have been able to provide so far is insufficient.”
  • The main flotilla of response vessels dispatched from Prince Rupert the morning of the spill (which occurred around 1 AM) didn’t reach the site until later that evening
  • The tug boat had long since sunk – two thirds of its body underwater, though initially still coupled to the barge – before booms were deployed around it. It doesn’t take a marine engineer to understand that fuel leaking below the surface, amid strong currents and tides, can easily evade booms up above.
  • Gale Pass, the entrance to key shellfish waters and beaches, was not adequately boomed until much later, due to strong outflowing currents. Heiltsuk responders who were on the scene expressed in frustration to me that if the booms were deployed earlier, at high tide, they may have remained in place, but with the delay in placing them, they were not able to be properly secured, thus allowing more fuel to make its way up the pass at a critical time.
  • No skimming or cleanup efforts began until the day after the spill – initially it was only “contain and protect mode”.
  • There were many players involved – Shearwater contractors, Heitlsuk responders, Coast Guard, WCMRC; eventually other contractors brought in by Kirby, Resolve Marine Group and Meredith Management; plus the company’s own Incident Commander, Jim Guidry, along with Federal, Provincial and Heiltsuk incident commanders. Did this contribute to the confusion observed by eyewitnesses on the scene in the early hours of the response? This is something that should be studied for future incidents.
  • With all these different players coming and going, the Heiltsuk were left to carry much of the load themselves – which they did admirably, according to many of the players involved, much like their Gitga’at neighbours to the north were forced to do in the wake of the sinking of the Queen of the North a number of years ago.
  • We still don’t know the official cause of the incident. Was it mechanical or instrument failure? Did human error play a role? The tug and barge appear to have gone wildly off-course for a number of miles. Did the captain fall asleep at the wheel? Why did his co-pilot not take control? Or did he not even have a co-pilot? We know this American company was given a waiver exempting it from having a pilot on board from the Pacific Pilotage Authority – since revoked in the wake of this incident, according to Federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau. Why did it take such a disaster for this to occur? Why was the waiver issued in the first place? We need answers to these questions asap.

Long after the incident command is dismantled and the media loses interest in the story, the Heiltsuk and central coast residents will still be dealing with the consequences of this spill.

Heiltsuk responders (Megan Humchitt)
Heiltsuk responders (Megan Humchitt)

“The Heiltsuk are heartbroken and angry over this environmental disaster. We don’t know how many years or decades it will be before we are able to harvest in these waters again,” said Chief Councillor Marilyn Slett.

“Yet our community members are heroic. The overwhelming majority of vessels out on the water are Heiltsuk volunteer crews. Our community members are doing their best to assist with response efforts, but have not been receiving adequate direction or training from the Western Canada Marine Response Corporation in charge of the clean up.”

Bear in mind that despite these serious impacts to shellfish grounds and other natural resources, matters could have been much, much worse, had the fuel barge the tug was towing been full instead of making its return trip from Alaska to a southern port for refuelling.

This is why the Heiltsuk are calling for this incident to spur a long-discussed north coast tanker ban which the Trudeau government has yet to act upon. “We must take note, however, that tanker barges like this might not even be included in the ban. The ban needs to be complete, and spill response must be improved,” a recent statement noted.

In contemplating this ban, the Trudeau government would do well to ask itself: why does such a vessel need to take the inside passage? Why not direct it further west on the outer coast, avoiding the myriad navigational hazards, communities and sensitive ecological areas of the inner coast?

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