Describing something as being in “the national interest” gives it a sense of gravitas, of over-arching public purpose.
So it always struck me as odd to hear Justin Trudeau say that the building the Kinder Morgan pipeline was “in the national interest.”
How can something be in the national interest when it would significantly contribute to the destruction of the very planet that sustains us? Can something really serve our interest as a nation when it undermines our more basic interest as humans?
Thomas Homer-Dixon is a CIGI chair at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and professor in the faculty of environment at the University of Waterloo.
Yonatan Strauch is a doctoral candidate in the school of environment, resources and sustainability at the University of Waterloo.
This is a piece of the much larger acquisition of the Trans Mountain Pipeline, announced last month. An option to more than double the capacity of the small Washington spur line would create the potential for exports from the state — and huge pushback.
The Canadian government is purchasing a vital link in Washington’s oil network — a nearly 70-mile pipeline spur running through Whatcom and Skagit counties that feeds crude oil to four refineries, according to financial-disclosure documents.
The company spilled about 4,800 litres of medium crude oil at its Darfield station.
KAMLOOPS, B.C. — A spill from Kinder Morgan's Trans Mountain pipeline late last month was 48 times larger than initially reported, officials said.
The spill volume reported from the company's Darfield station north of Kamloops on May 27 was revised to 4,800 litres from 100 litres, the B.C. Ministry of Environment said Sunday.
Trudeau to visit B.C. briefly to participate in Indigenous Advisory and Monitoring Committee meeting
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will make a surprise and brief visit to Chilliwack on Tuesday
The Progress has learned.
Trudeau’s plan is to meet with one of the most outspoken B.C. Indigenous leaders in support of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project, Chief Ernie Crey of the Cheam First Nation.
The logic to Trudeau’s action may lie in an obscure and overlooked 2014 agreement to ensure China got a pipeline built
31 May 2018
Why is Justin Trudeau buying a pipeline?
Canada’s government announced yesterday it was planning to purchase the Trans Mountain pipeline for $4.5bn. This pipeline – which transports oil from Alberta’s tar sands to the western coast of British Columbia – is at the centre of a bitter political war that shows no signs of abating.
Unprecedented Crime By Peter D. Carter and Elizabeth Woodworth. Clarity Press, Inc., 269 pp, softcover
Nobody in the mainstream media ever asks Prime Minister Justin Trudeau or Finance Minister Bill Morneau if they're perpetrating an unprecedented crime on future generations.
Even after the Liberal government announced its intention to pay a Texas oil company $4.5 billion for its Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion project, coverage focused on the financial aspects of the deal, not its moral component.
Trans Mountain existing assets valued at $550 million in 2007.
Finance Minister Bill Morneau has proposed sacrificing Canadian taxpayers to bail out an uneconomic U.S. pipeline owned by former Enron executives.
Let’s parse the fantastic numbers, because they will affect all of us. And the bill for taxpayers won’t be $4.5 billion as Morneau claims, but much closer to $20 billion, says economist Robyn Allan.
Finance Minister Bill Morneau announced on May 29 that the Government of Canada will buy the existing Trans Mountain pipeline system from Kinder Morgan at a price of $4.5 billion.
