British Columbia

Now that we are in a sunny lull between the end of flooding season and the start of fire season, it’s time we had a talk about fossil fuels and climate change in BC.

If Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain expansion project proceeds, the land, resources, and rights of more than 130 Indigenous communities and groups from Alberta’s oilsands to British Columbia’s coast could be affected.

July 9, 2018 - Just imagine if a consortium of First Nations owned a sizable stake in the Trans Mountain pipeline and were determined to push it through because it would put more money in the hands of Indigenous people.

There is a plan afoot to do exactly that and later this month First Nations leaders will meet in Vancouver to advance the idea.

It’s a bold move but it would also give some First Nations the kind of control over resource projects in their own backyards they have long dreamed of.

Of course, not all First Nations would be happy.

Experts say it only takes one First Nation to stop the Trans Mountain Expansion Project in court.

Kinder Morgan is the big winner and Canadians are the big losers of a deal to purchase the Trans Mountain pipeline and Expansion Project with public funds, one Vancouver-based lawyer says.

Eugene Kung with West Coast Environmental Law says the project won't have legal certainty any time soon, as several First Nations are currently awaiting a ruling from the Federal Court of Appeal on whether they were adequately consulted by the Canadian government.

[Arrested on March 17, Burgess was sentenced to a $3000 fine on June 28 after a 5 day trial.]

I wish to first say something about myself, and then propose a sentence.

I have been found guilty of breaching a Court order to not obstruct access to part of the Trans Mountain Pipeline, and for bringing the administration of justice into disrepute by doing this in a public way.

PetroChina has shipped its first gasoline to Canada on June 20, the company's official newspaper said on Thursday.
 
35,000 tonnes of gasoline was shipped from PetroChina's Guangxi Qinzhou refinery to Vancouver, PetroChina said, marking the company's latest efforts to expand sales in new markets such as Japan and Australia amid a rising domestic glut in fuel .

Sinopec's Tianjin refinery also shipped diesel to Australia for the first time on Tuesday.

Trans Mountain Pipeline / defence - Court File S-183541

To: Justice Affleck         From: George Rammell, arrested March 22^nd.

I’m pleading guilty to the charge of criminal contempt for protesting at the gates of Kinder Morgan’s oil tank farm in Burnaby on March 22^nd, 2018.

At least nine people were arrested Saturday (June 30) afternoon at the gates of Kinder Morgan’s Burnaby Mountain tank farm in the first mass arrest since a beefed-up injunction was approved by a judge.

Included in the group of people arrested was Order of Canada recipient and current Vancouver council candidate Jean Swanson, who is 75 years old.

She could face as much as seven days in jail and a hefty fine.

If you have a public pension in B.C., your retirement savings are likely fuelling the climate change crisis.

The pensions of over half a million British Columbians are administered by the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI), formerly known as the bcIMC. It’s the fourth-largest pension fund manager in Canada and controls one of the province’s largest pools of wealth, totalling $135.5 billion.