November 9, 2015

For Immediate Release

Council of the Haida Nation seeks plan to protect oceans

The 2015 House of Assembly, the legislative body of the Haida Nation, passed a resolution expressing opposition to British Columbia’s LNG agenda and demanding that the mass export of any fossil fuel through its territory be prohibited.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

November 9, 2015

Over 70 First Nations Leaders, Scientists, Environmental Organizations, and Diverse Groups Across BC Join Hereditary Chief in Letter Calling on Federal Government to Reject PNW LNG on Lelu Island

A pump hose failed Saturday morning at the Burnaby Mountain construction site where heavy rains had already swept water thick with sand and sediment into a fish-bearing creek.

Emergency crews were called to the site where crews had been rehabilitating a culvert that runs directly underneath Gaglardi Way and a Kinder Morgan pipeline.

It took them about an hour to contain a leak “from a blown-out pump hose,” according to James Lota, an assistant director of engineering with the City of Burnaby..

Burnaby’s mayor says a Kinder Morgan pipeline incident that drew citizen concern over the weekend highlights the dangers of operating high pressure oil pipelines in urban areas.  

“These are the sorts of incidents that occur when pipelines are put near urban infrastructure,” said Mayor Derek Corrigan, “which is exactly why we are fighting so hard to ensure that Kinder Morgan’s proposed new pipeline never gets built in Burnaby."

A two-month-old letter from a First Nation that said granting an environmental assessment certificate to Woodfibre LNG would be a "legal error" was finally published after the BC Liberal government gave approval in principle to the project on Oct. 26. But it's unclear whether the First Nation's concerns were ever addressed.

The Aug. 18 letter from the Tsleil-Waututh Nation's chief negotiator to Environment Minister Mary Polak and Natural Gas Minister Rich Coleman urged the government not to issue the certificate before undertaking additional studies and assessment work.

An American coal company will no longer ship coal through Delta’s Westshore Terminals starting in 2016.

In an October 28 press release, Cloud Peak Energy announced it had entered into an amended agreement with Westshore to cease shipping coal starting in 2016 and through to 2018. Cloud Peak will make a series of payments to Westshore in lieu of its take-or-pay commitments — worth $454 million for 2016 to 2018 — to ship coal through the terminal.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

OCT. 28, 2015

SQUAMISH NATION COMMENTS ON PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT'S EA APPROVAL OF WOODFIBRE LNG PROPOSAL

NORTH VANCOUVER — After careful review of provincial government decision Monday to issue an environmental assessment certificate for Woodfibre LNG’s proposed $1.6-billion gas export facility, the Squamish Nation (SN) today says it is looking forward to further discussions with the provincial government — on a government-to-government basis.

SN spokesperson Chief Ian Campbell points out:

TransCanada Corp. has received provincial permits to build a natural gas pipeline that would feed Pacific NorthWest LNG’s planned export terminal near Prince Rupert.

The Prince Rupert Gas Transmission (PRGT) route would start at a northeast B.C. site near Hudson’s Hope and stretch nearly 900 kilometres to finish on Lelu Island. The Pacific NorthWest LNG consortium led by Malaysia’s Petronas wants to construct an $11.4-billion plant on Lelu Island to export liquefied natural gas to Asia.

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – A local First Nation is bringing Kinder Morgan and the National Energy Board to the federal court of appeal, as it argues it was not appropriately consulted about the proposed twinning of the Trans Mountain pipeline.

The Tsleil-Waututh Nation hopes to force a restart of the environmental assessment process for that project.