Ecojustice recaps the week in Canadian environmental news: August 24, 2012

 

Summer's fading away and today’s Friday, which means it’s time to recap the week in Canadian environmental news. The pipeline debate continues with some interesting developments — a proposed oil refinery in Kitimat, B.C., and personal stories from concerned Canadians. The federal government cancelled thousands of environmental assessments after weakening the laws and regulations that protect us from environmental harm. And a lot of folks are talking about endangered species. 

 

 

• British Columbia newspaper magnate David Black wants to refine the crude sent through the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline in Kitimat, B.C. “Environmentalists should be overjoyed,” Gordon Gibson wrote in a Globe and Mail article. We’re not. Instead of shipping the harder-to-clean-up crude, the refinery would turn the oilsands bitumen into diesel, gasoline or jet fuel, which would reduce the harm to oceans if a tanker did spill. Apparently, those refined products evaporate faster than the unrefined oilsands crude. Our position is that not building the pipeline is the best way to reduce the harm to our oceans.

 

• Canadians learned on Thursday that almost 3,000 environmental reviews on development projects were axed by the federal government. Mike De Souza of Postmedia News wrote that of those 3,000 reviews, “678 involved fossil fuel energy and 248 involved a pipeline, including proposals from Alberta-based energy companies, Enbridge and TransCanada.” That’s Bill C-38 in action, folks. To make way for oilsands expansion, pipelines and resource development the federal government dismantled and weakened the laws that protect us from environmental harm. 

 

• More than 500 of these assessments were supposed to happen in B.C., where 10 linked power plants built near McBride, B.C., could threaten salmon and the endangered Haller’s Apple Moss. We’re helping the David Suzuki Foundation and Watershed Watch Salmon Society. These power plants need a proper environmental review. The issue was covered in this Victoria Times Colonist story. 

Alberta’s oilsands and environmental balancing act

• Alberta released version No. 3 of its Lower Athabasca Regional Plan, which aims to balance oilsands expansion and the environment. What we know is that the plan protects habitat for endangered woodland caribou and creates six new conservation areas. That’s a good thing. But it’s not all good and that’s why our team is taking a closer look. While we’re doing that, you can read the article at CBC News.     

Stories from the pipeline

• Nigel Fox of Prince George, B.C., says that “no one in BC wants this proposed pipeline. Nigel is the one of the Canadians Paul Fletcher and Daniel Sikorskyi have photographed for Ride The Pipe, a website where they’re telling stories about people who live along the path of the proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline. You can also see the photos and follow the ride here.

 

   

 

Forest Ethics has created a website called Enbridge’s Pipe Dreams, where you can see videos and hear testimonials from people that could be affected by the proposed pipeline. Get a taste below, where Wayne Brown says that building and operating the pipeline is a gamble and he doesn’t want to risk his access to clean air and water.

 

     

 

 

 

*This is not an Enbridge animation from Shortt and Epic Productions on Vimeo.

Wildlife & Wilderness

• CBC News is reporting that some of B.C.’s orcas have less food this year because their favourite meal, chinook salmon, is scarce. This news is disturbing, especially when you consider our victory from earlier this year: the federal government is required by law to protect the habitat and food supply of B.C’s killer whales. That victory will also help more than 90 other endangered and threatened marine species, which just like you and I, require a healthy habitat to survive. You know we’ll be monitoring this situation. 

 

Where have all the bees gone? 

• Did you know that bees “pollinate crops that produce one-third of the human food supply?” That’s why it’s disturbing to learn that they may go extinct. Margaret Munro of the Vancouver Sun investigates why in To bee or not to bee: endangered species vanishing without explanation. Climate change, pesticides, habitat loss and pathogens may be to blame, but there’s no smoking gun. 

 

• Turtle lover Jode Roberts, who works for the David Suzuki Foundation, wants to protect endangered species. To do that DSF is vying for a share of $100,000 in the Call of the Wild contest. Jamieson, a vitamin and natural products company, is donating $100,000 to wildlife and wilderness organizations. Visitors to the contest site can read about five organizations vying for the cash and then cast their vote. Each group will earn their share of the funds based on those votes. I know Jode so I cast my vote for DSF. Feel free to go your own way.