Ecology/Environment

Feb. 8, 2023

About one million square kilometres of Quebec is covered by boreal forest, roughly 70 per cent of the entire province. In the north, where ecosystems are less likely to have been altered by human activity, those forests have been accumulating and sequestering immense quantities of carbon for centuries.

Jan. 28, 2023

We need to replace consumerism with “quality of life, human solidarity, and ecological sensibility”.

Much has happened in the interval that separates us from James Watson, who, by inventing the steam engine in 1784 formally marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and the world’s first fossil-fuel economy. If the Anthropocene epoch had begun by now, the revolution heightened its fervour, anticipating the emergence of modern human society.

Canada’s uneasy relationship between climate change and fossil fuel development was illustrated in November 2021 when seven atmospheric rivers hit southern B.C. The “big one” starting on Nov. 13 led to massive flooding and landslides that crippled infrastructure and isolated the south coast from the rest of Canada.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans is investigating a complaint that Coastal GasLink failed to prevent sediment stirred up by pipeline construction activities from flowing downstream at a construction site on the Lho Kwa (Clore River) in B.C.

Sediment pollution poses a serious risk to salmon and steelhead eggs, effectively smothering them. Clore River is a large tributary of the Skeena River, which is an important habitat for both salmon and steelhead trout.