Read this editorial from Stephen Hume in the Vancouver Sun on the debate over the risks posed by increased oil tanker traffic on BC's coast (May 16, 2012)
Listen to the rhetoric generated by questions about the risk from supertankers carrying an additional million barrels a day of heavy oil through B.C. waters and one might be persuaded that a conspiracy of Luddite dunces advocates a return to mud huts and riding donkeys to work.
Huh? How does asking for an unbiased evaluation of risk mutate into an assumed automatic veto of the use of oil?
The point is not whether we should or should not use oil - it's whether the risks of using a particular oil resource in a particular way under particular circumstances may or may not out-weigh the claimed benefits.
Proponents of these pipelines naturally minimize the risks. And why wouldn't they present the best possible case for their projects since they want them to proceed? But that doesn't mean that B.C.'s public - which ultimately will pay the costs for cleaning up any major spill while the foreign-owned proponents pocket the bulk of profits and pay them out of the country - should swallow such assertions at face value.
Nor does it mean that subjecting such schemes to rigorous scrutiny is some kind of betrayal of Canadian society.
There is risk. And there is risk. Jaywalking downtown at 3 a.m. carries significantly less risk than jaywalking on the free-way during rush hour. One risk might be acceptable, the other looks like stupidity. Among the issues emerging from the present pipeline debate is the question of whether the risks cited by the proponents are the actual risks and potential liabilities.
Proponents of the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline, for example, postulate a worst-case spill of limited size that occurs in sheltered waters during the calmest summer months.
Critics reasonably ask what the consequences - and costs - of a spill would be were a super-tanker to break up during winter on the exposed outer coast, where winds, tides and currents have the capacity to distribute heavy oil over a vast area.
Critics reasonably wonder whether the assessment of risks, both environmental and economic, and who bears the brunt of them, takes place in an unbiased forum given the official demonizing of those expressing doubt.
The principal demonizer - our federal government - has now arbitrarily rewritten the rules to both redefine the criteria for environmental assessment while usurping the final decision-making power from the body intended to do so at arm's length.
The province has not even sub-mitted its position to the Joint Review Panel on this incredibly important subject. Instead, it has surrendered to the federal power its right to hold an independent environmental review in the interests of British Columbians.
Yet the risks could be far greater than those framed in the documents filed by the proponents.
Read this story from Alberta Oil Magazine on BC Premier Christy Clark's idea that BC could share in resource revenues from Alberta Tar Sands to help compensate the province for risks associated with piping and shipping bitumen across BC and down its coast. (May 14, 2012)
British Columbia Premier Christy Clark is becoming a particularly uncomfortable thorn in Alberta’s side.
In a wide-ranging interview with Brian Hutchinson at the National Post, the B.C. Liberal Party leader suggests – without explicitly saying so – that her government will not lend its support to Enbridge Inc.’s $5.5-billion Northern Gateway pipeline without first seeing a commitment to oil sands royalty sharing.
“Because at the moment, what we know about it is, we’re moving an Alberta product through British Columbia, with no value added in our province, and we’re taking 100 per cent of the risk,” she said.
Clark is understandably reluctant to back the Pacific-bound oil sands pipeline. With a provincial election on the horizon, Hutchinson notes, polls show the B.C. Liberals trailing a resurgent New Democratic party. Adrian Dix, the NDP leader, is blunt about his party’s opposition to the Gateway scheme.
From an April 30 caucus letter submitted to the Gateway Joint Review Panel:
We believe that the NGP will cause significant adverse economic and environmental effects and is not in the public interest. Therefore the NGP should not be permitted to proceed.
Against this backdrop, Clark has wholeheartedly endorsed plans to liquefy and ship tanker-loads of super-cooled natural gas to many of the same markets targeted by Enbridge.
The B.C. premier is so enthusiastic about LNG that she is prepared to alter the western province’s climate-change policies to take credit for greenhouse-gas reductions in countries that import B.C. gas, Justine Hunter reports at the Globe and Mail.
Overlooked in her zeal for natural gas – a jobs plan calls for three LNG terminals to be built by 2020 – is the fact that a good deal of B.C. exports currently pass through Alberta (via the Alliance Pipeline) en route to the Chicago market.
The City of Vancouver passed a motion this month demanding that Kinder Morgan pipeline company carry full liability to cover the costs of an oil spill in our Vancouver Harbour. The request is just common sense but demonstrated very uncommon courage in the public political realm.
So, how much liability would Kinder Morgan – the now notorious ex-Enron billionaires from Texas, who bought BC Gas and flipped it for the pipelines – need to carry to indemnify our city from the ravages of an oil spill?
Well, for starters, some $40 billion, as I explain below. But let’s keep in mind:
There is no such thing as “cleaning up” an oil spill. Most “clean ups” get about 10 percent of the oil spilled, like the way a 3-year-old “cleans up” milk spilled on the kitchen floor.
There is no price to cover the soul of this region, the promises of indigenous rights, the food we take from this water, the childhoods on our beaches, the families of creatures and forests of fauna, the identity of this city and region, our heritage, and our dignity. There is no price for that.
Economic costs of an oil spill
The Aframax tankers now using Vancouver Harbour carry up to 700,000 barrels of bitumen, the deadliest crude oil on Earth. To estimate the costs of responding to such a spill, one must examine comparable costs for similar accidents. One method uses the historic “costs/barrel” for responding to oil spills.
The Exxon Valdez spilled 270,000 barrels, about one-third of an Aframax tanker. The Alaska tourism industry lost 26,000 jobs and $2.4 billion immediately - and another $2.8 billion over the next decade. Total loss for tourism alone: $5.2 billion. Ouch.
British Petroleum set aside $20 billion for clean up and compensation in the Gulf of Mexico, but Credit Suisse estimated total BP liabilities of $37 billion, just for cleanup and injury claims.
So, who pays this cost? Exxon has been in and out of court for 23 years over the Exxon Valdez spill, and still hasn’t paid its liability claims. BP is fighting injury claims, but in Vancouver Harbour there may be no such company that would even accept liability. The oil companies – Shell, Syncrude, Sinopec – and pipeline company Kinder Morgan have already indemnified themselves and would decline liability once the oil is on a ship. The ship owner has liability by Canadian marine law, but these days oil tankers are owned by obscure numbered companies with few assets, in slippery jurisdictions, where they can and literally do disappear overnight in the case of serious accidents.
The response costs would fall to Canadians – municipalities, the Province, the Federal government – that is, to the people. Imagine a $40 billion Canadian bill to mop up 10% of a marine and economic disaster, while our schools and social programs disintegrate.
Bitumen’s abrasive personality
Consider a 500,000-barrel bitumen oil spill in Burrard Inlet, 70% of an Aframax tanker. Globally, there has been an oil spill of this size about every 18 months worldwide for the last 40 years.
Bitumen (tar from tar sands) is a particularly dense, toxic version of crude oil. It has to be mixed with some thinner petroleum product to even move through a pipeline, whereby the pipeline industry calls it “dilbit” - for “diluted bitumen.” Something like arsenic diluted with vinyl chloride.
In July 2010, a 30-inch bitumen pipeline owned by Enbridge Energy – that other pipeline outfit angling for the BC coast – burst, spilling 20,000 barrels of tar sands bitumen into a tributary of the Kalamazoo River in Michigan. The challenges of dealing with the heavy, sinking bitumen shocked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which Mitchell Anderson wrote about in the Tyee.
Bitumen, diluted with solvents such as condensate or naphtha, separates in the marine environment. Volatile gases – toluene and the carcinogenic benzene – rise into the air, causing headaches, nausea, dizziness, coughing, and fatigue among the local population. One may fairly assume all other animals that breathe air experience similar symptoms.
After the Kalamazoo River spill, the toxic fumes remained for weeks and could be smelled up to 50 kilometres away. A major Aframax spill in Burrard Inlet – 25-times larger than in Michigan – would likely require evacuations in the lower BC mainland and islands. Clean up crews would battle toxic fumes as they watched the bitumen sink below their skimmers.
Bitumen contains sulphur, paraffins, asphaltics, benzenes, and other toxic compounds. Animals and plants are suffocated and poisoned. The die-off starts at the foundation of the food chain, obliterating the vital mudflat biofilm – the bacteria, diatoms, and mucopolysaccharides that provide a high-energy food source for shorebirds in Burrard Inlet and Georgia Strait. As the bitumen moves with wind and tides, it kills all bottom life, mixes with the intertidal sediments, and kills shellfish, ocean plants, fin fish, and marine mammals.
On top of this, the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (“PAHs”) in bitumen, dissolve in the water. Two years after the Michigan spill, 30 miles of the Kalamazoo River remained closed to fishing, swimming, or even wading in the water.
After a bitumen spill in Burrard Inlet, the toxins would contaminate the entire marine ecosystem from Seattle to Campbell River, and beyond. Most of this damage could not be “cleaned up” at any price
Show me the money
Cleanup: According to the US EPA, historic U.S. crude oil cleanup costs have been about $80/gallon ($3,400 per barrel). The added problems with tar sands bitumen – toxic gas, sinking sludge, and soluble hydrocarbons – push costs up. The Kalamazoo River spill by Enbridge cost 10 times the traditional crude oil clean up costs - about $35,000 per barrel. Comparatively, the cleanup response to a 500,000-barrel bitumen spill in Burrard Inlet would be:
$ 17 billion
Tourism losses: “Tourism is dead,” said Charlotte Randolph, president of the Lafourche Parish in Louisiana, after the Gulf Oil spill. “We're dying a slow death.” Oxford Economics estimated the Gulf region’s tourism industry would lose $7.6 to $22.7 billion over 3 years. Tourism dropped by 35 percent in some Gulf regions. Economist Sean Snaith, from the Institute for Economic Competitiveness in Florida, estimated that Florida alone would lose $11 billion in business activity job losses. BC brings in $14 billion annually in tourism, and we could lose half of this for 2-4 years, so added to the clean-up costs would be the tourism loss to BC over several years, on the order of:
$ 20 billion
Fishing: “I’ve been fishing in BC since 1973,” says B.C. fisherman Ron Fowler, a Pacific Salmon Commissioner and Director of the Area-F Trollers Association. “If we get an oil spill anywhere in these waters, it would wipe out every fishery we have, shellfish, salmon, herring, and the plankton that they feed on. An oil spill would move with the wind and tides and devastate the intertidal zones.” The BC fishing industry wholesale value is about $1.2 billion per year. An oil spill on the coast could destroy a large portion of this for 3-4 years and some shoreline intertidal fisheries for a decade or more. A 40% fisheries loss in the first year could be expected, with recovery to perhaps 10% loss within five years. The potential fisheries loss over several years is in the range of:
$ 1 billion
Health costs: Oil companies, public, and private workers during the Exxon Valdez spill described health effects that forced them from the area and into hospitals. Some first responders in Alaska still suffer from the toxic intake. Bitumen is worse. In Michigan, the volatile benzene and toluene caused nausea, dizziness, headaches, coughing, and fatigue to some 60% of the local population for weeks after the spill. The health department encouraged an evacuation within a mile of the river. As with other oil spills, there will be a spike of cancer and other diseases. A 500,000-barrel bitumen spill in Burrard Inlet would likely cause a mass evacuation and severe health impact for over a million people. The costs could easily reach:
$ 1 billion
Lost Time: The lost time for families, students, workers, business owners, and others in the lower mainland and up to 50 kilometers way, likely farther up the Fraser River past Fort Langley, and south past Whiterock, would be massive. Given our normal tides and winds, the crude oil would be in Nanaimo, Sechelt, and the Southern Gulf Islands within a few days. The lost time for hundreds of coastal communities would likely reach at least millions of person-hours at a cost of another:
$ 1 billion
Port losses: An oil spill would disrupt Port of Vancouver shipping business. The Port contributes over $2 billion in direct revenue per year and over $4 billion in direct economic output. The port generates some 30,000 jobs (~ $1 billion annual wages & salaries). Shipping could be virtually stopped for months and disrupted for several years, so the costs would be on the order of:
$ 1 billion
So there it is, in round figures: a $41 billion price tag for an oil spill, with no one to accept liability except a renegade shipping company in Somalia or the Cayman Islands.
Vancouver and BC brand value: The “Beautiful BC” and “greenest city” reputations would be lost. How much is that worth? Billions more. Stanley Park would be devastated. How do we put a price tag on that? The lost reputation and destroyed ecosystems – if we could even place a dollar-cost on these losses – would double the $40 billion direct costs to make the loss more like $80 billion.
This is the aggregate risk that the Vancouver region must accept if it wants to be the Tar Sands Oil Port in exchange for some tugboat jobs, port fees, consulting gigs, and payoffs.
Normal spillage
All oil ports have oil spills. Most oil spilled into the world’s bays, harbours, and marine environments is “normal spillage,” acknowledged by the industry as a routine “expense,” which they write off as a tax deduction.
Oil terminal workers have admitted that they spill oil virtually every time they load a tanker. Every time. Normal spillage includes routine leaks and spills along pipelines and at refineries, tank farms, and terminals. This constant drain of heavy hydrocarbons into the marine environment kills the intertidal life and other marine species. Try going east of Second Narrows, near Kinder Morgan’s Westridge Terminal and find a healthy clam or crab.
This Inlet once fed the Tsleil-Waututh, Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsawwassen people, who retain rights to this unceded territory. “When the tide is out, our table was set,” recalls Rueben George, Sundance Chief of the Tsleil-Waututh, the indigenous People of the Inlet. Second narrows, the traditional waters of the Tsleil-Waututh, is a sacred place that provided food for many generations. That food resource is already virtually eradicated from the normal spillage from the oil refinery and terminal on Burrard Inlet. “We’ve had enough of seeing our waters destroyed,” says Rueben George. “Second Narrows is sacred to us. Our creation stories go back to this channel of water.”
What price would one place on this? What price for the obliterated natural livelihood of indigenous people, our regional heritage, our marine and intertidal ecosystems, our coastal economy, and our community identity and pride in the sea? There is no way to protect these values and real wealth of this region if Vancouver becomes the tar sands oil port. The only way Kinder Morgan can indemnify the land, water, creatures, plants, and people of Burrard Inlet is to return our pipelines and our public policy to this region and to its people.
As Rueben George said on Earth Day: “We’re doing this for Kinder Morgan’s children too. They deserve a world that is rich and wild and that provides food to people and a place to walk with your children. We’re doing this for their children too. Not just ours.”
This is the definitive moment that marks the turning point in the now long standing myth that the BC liberals are "neutral" or have chosen to take "no position" on the Northern Gateway Pipeline. And it was done with the stunning Liberal hypocrisy we have been forced to endure for too long.
By now anyone following the Joint Review Panel on the Northern Gateway Project is well aware that the process is deeply flawed, politically driven and resembles more of a dog and pony show than anything remotely close to an extensive review of the pertinent environmental and economic issues.
The BC Liberals have proven that they do support pipelines, no matter what the cost, just as the Premier admitted in Question Period. They have done so for a long time and with little if any understanding of the far reaching economic and environmental ramifications. And the only reason they cling to a false front of neutrality is to maintain the now long standing cover up of their complicity in advancing pipeline projects.
The myth that they maintain a neutral stance dominates the mainstream barrage of coverage. This is done in order to provide the political escape hatch this government may require in order to cling to power. It also is done to perpetuate the "mass deception" governments, oil and media have undertaken, according to Robyn Allan former ICBC CEO, who has worked to uncover the misdeeds of government and industry boosters.
The time for the Liberal myth of 'neutrality' and so called 'respect for public processes' has come to an end. This will happen in large part due to the effort of concerned and informed citizens who, at great risk, have not only fully explored the issues but have also uncovered reams of data supporting their claims including unseemly bilateral agreements, extensive economic analysis and strategic components of the proposals that have been kept from the public. The now retired former CEO of ICBC Robyn Allan outlines some of these major concerns in this presentation and her recent open letter to the Premier.
Most recently Ms. Allan has completed a report entitled "Proposed Pipeline and Tanker Spill Risk for BC." In this exhaustive report Robyn shines the light on how these pipeline proposals have been designed to "low ball" the pipeline capacity in favour of adding additional capacity in the future. This strategy allows for a 60% increase in the daily flow of diluted bitumen in the case of Enbridge's proposal and in so doing does an end run on exhaustive environmental assessments that would be required had they originally proposed the full capacity. The following is from her report:
There is no reason to believe that the true environmental risk represented by the Northern Gateway Project is being—or ever will be—adequately addressed. The current JRP process has excluded a significant portion of the project's actual capacity and its implications for pipeline spill and marine spill, while in the future, there is no statutory obligation to do so. All indications from the Federal government suggests there will be no political will either.
Ms. Allan goes on to demand that BC regain its statutory right to a final decision on the Northern Gateway Project:
The government of British Columbia [needs] to take action and protect BC's statutory right for final decision for this project by removing Northern Gateway from the Equivalency Agreement with the NEB.
As a result of the fine work of Ms. Allan and others like her, the national and provincial mainstream media has been forced to cover the duplicitous nature of the Liberal stickhandling of this issue despite having moved mountains to maintain the delicate mythology that the liberals have "not taken a position on the issue." And the blogosphere has lit up (too many to link to) revealing this documentation that proves the Liberals are not only far from neutral but have taken outstanding measures in order to ensure that the pipeline projects proceed virtually unhindered by issues in the best economic interest of British Columbians and our environment.
And, while we are at it we should encourage the environment Minister to explain why he delegated his Ministerial powers as outlined in section 27 of the act, onto senior staff which enabled the "Equivalency Agreement", that forfeits our sovereign ability to properly review, participate and influence not just the Northern Gateway Project but four major proposed infrastructure developments. All of which will alter the very fabric of our Province and set BC on a course to a very bleak future. The relevant act clearly outlines the Minister has the right to enter into these agreements, not staff. It seems this was done in order to avoid political scrutiny while greasing the skids for major projects not necessarily in the best interest of British Columbians.
Furthermore, the Equivalency Agreement was absolutely unnecessary as there already was a long-standing agreement in place that would have allowed for Joint Review Panels to be established in order to prevent duplication. Indeed this was the entire purpose of this long standing, renewable agreement. The Minister should explain why he delegated his power to staff to establish the Equivalency Agreement, under what direction and for what purposes given the fact it was entirely unnecessary in order to "avoid duplication" or "streamline" the already entrenched agreement.
Equivalency Agreements were at one time an administrative tool used exclusively by Alberta to allow for that Province to undertake reviews and avoid duplication by the Federal Government. In recent highly contentious legislation, the use of Equivalency Agreements was forwarded by the Harper government to remove the Federal review components on so called "minor projects" making the Provinces sole arbiters. Given that Taseko's Fish Lake project was rejected by the Federal process but passed the provincial assessment we gain insight into why Harper made these adjustments.
However, in the case of the Equivalency Agreement in British Columbia the exact opposite is occurring and the Province is being cut out of the process in order "to avoid duplication." This stands in stark contrast to both the traditional application of these agreements and how they are being currently utilized by this government. Our environment Minister needs to clarify why. Otherwise, it seems that not only are they using it to remove the Province from the equation but they are doing so against the grain of the common application of these agreements, while at the same time ignoring the act which dictates the Minister makes these arrangements, not staff.
We should also be asking our Environment Minister when and where the required public notice for this Equivalency Agreement occurred, because in order for an Equivalency Agreement to be enabled it requires notice and a 60 day time period for input on behalf of stakeholders and interested participants.Furthermore, after the 60 day period is complete, the agreement is supposed to be published by the Minister, or put in the Gazette. None of which occurred.
These striking anomalies just scratch the surface of the evidence that the BC Liberals have had an agenda for many years which involved a multi-faceted approach designed to set the legal and administrative stage for the successful development of exhaustive infrastructure projects in order to export Alberta's Dirty Dilbit. It was done so by intentionally removing the capacity of British Columbian stakeholders to influence the decision making and outcomes while ensuring we had no significant leverage or capacity to negotiate beneficial economic arrangements.
Its time to end the deception and mythology surrounding the future of British Columbia and the oil and gas agenda and start planning a future that benefits all British Columbians.
Kevin Logan was a Ministerial Assistant to former Premier and Minister of Energy Mines and Northern Development Dan Miller.
Read this editorial from the Globe and Mail, which argues that the Harper Government should stop its campaign of smearing environmental groups who oppose the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipelines and alleging criminal activity on their part, such as "money laundering". (May 7, 2012)
Environment Minister Peter Kent’s unsupported accusations of “money laundering” involving foreign and Canadian environmental charities are part of an apparent campaign of the Conservative government to smear and intimidate groups opposed to the Northern Gateway pipeline.
Mr. Kent’s accusation in Parliament and media interviews, and the pattern they are a part of, suggest the government is improperly taking sides between the environment and business – trying to discredit those who raise environmental concerns in a public-hearing process mandated under federal law.
This pipeline may well prove a financial boon to Canada, but there are legitimate environmental concerns that need to be heard, including the danger of oil spills in environmentally sensitive waters. The pipeline will take bitumen from Alberta to Kitimat, B.C., before it is loaded on ships bound for Asia. Business and the environment do not exist on two separate planes, where one matters and the other doesn’t.
The Environment Minister has accused unnamed environmental charities of criminal activity, and yet provides no specifics, except to point to the work of Conservative Senator Nicole Eaton. “There is political manipulation,” she said. “There is influence peddling. There are millions of dollars crossing borders masquerading as charitable foundations into bank accounts of sometimes phantom charities that do nothing more than act as a fiscal clearing house.” There is paranoia, there is partisanship, there are wild allegations. But evidence? No.
I ask because I’m going to be urging such a course in the times to come.
Although he didn’t invent the idea, Mahatma Gandhi invented the modern term when he protested a tax on salt imposed by the British which hurt the poor Indian especially. He broke the law deliberately and went to jail for doing so.
A more current example was that of the Freedom Marchers of the 1960s who challenged the segregation laws of the Southern US by “sitting in” at segregated restaurants; by Rosa Parks who defied the laws of Montgomery, Alabama, by sitting in the white only section of a bus; and by Dr. Martin Luther King who in the same time urged peaceful demonstrations.
Many would go back much further in time to Jesus.
What are some of the rules?
It must be non violent. That is a very important rule.
The law being protested must be unjust in one or more ways. It must be imposed unfairly or itself contrary to law or justice or both.
Those protesting must be prepared to go to jail.
There must be no other reasonable way to attain justice.
They must be effective.
Where do I suggest civil disobedience?
Fish farms, for one area. Government policy allows them yet they are not only in violation of the UN law requiring the Precautionary Principle but against Canadian law in this regard.
So-called “run of river” projects which, without fail, severely damage the river and its ecology usually to the point of - for all intents and purposes - utter destruction.
Pipelines - especially the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipelines taking the ultra toxic bitumen from The Tar Sands to Kitimat - which don’t pose a risk of huge environmental damage but the certainty of it.
The utter lack of government concern for the environment and the public that wishes to preserve it is underscored by the recent decision of the federal government to dam the Kokish river near Port McNeill – a river that is home to all species of salmon, resident Rainbow, Cutthroat, Dolly Varden and has both a winter and summer run of steelhead.
Tanker trafficking of bitumen from Kitimat or through Vancouver Harbour which, again, don’t pose risks but certainties of huge environmental damage.
Civil Disobedience has had successes in the past in BC but too often there have been one or two who have refused to obey the law and once they have been jailed, the protest has petered out.
We must organize such that scores, even hundreds, defy the law and are ready to do time.
There has been very little by way of organization in the overall community but First Nations appear to be ready and, if nothing else, the rest of us must be prepared to support them and face the same consequences.
Our first step must be, in my view, a clear statement by environmental organizations and individual British Columbians that we will stand shoulder with First Nations - and we at the Common Sense Canadian plan to meet with their leaders and see how we can help.
Read this story from the Chilliwack Times on a recent telephone townhall meeting held throughout the riding of Chilliwack-Hope to discuss proposed oil pipelines and tankers in BC in advance of the recent provincial byelection there. (May 1, 2012)
Thousands of residents in the provincial Chilliwack-Hope riding took part in a telephone townhall meeting on the topic of Kinder Morgan's oil pipeline expansion before Thursday's byelection.
The call was organized by Victoria-based Dogwood Initiative and went out to everyone listed in the phone book, approximately 14,000 homes.
Dogwood campaigns director Eric Swanson said 4,572 people opted in to the discussion, although most did not stay on the entire time.
"At any given moment we were talking to just under 400 people," Swanson said.
The call involved a number of poll questions about oil tankers and pipelines. On the line for a discussion were three panelists: former Socred MLA and current political commentator Rafe Mair; economist and former ICBC CEO Robyn Allan; and Abbotsford resident John Vissers, an outspoken critic of the pipeline.
The three main Chilliwack-Hope byelection candidates were asked to provide their positions on the issue, but only New Democrat Gwen O'Mahony responded.
When asked if those on the line supported or opposed projects like Kinder Morgan's, or the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline, 39 per cent supported, 44 per cent opposed and 17 per cent said they didn't know.
Sixty-eight per cent of respondents said the issue of pipelines and tankers would be a voting issue in the byelection, as opposed to 32 per cent who said it wouldn't be.
Mayor Gregor Robertson and his Vision-led Vancouver City Council took another bold step yesterday in their increasingly outspoken opposition to Texas pipeline giant Kinder Morgan's plans to increase dramatically oil tanker traffic through Vancouver's harbour. The vote, which passed with all but one in favour - NPA councillor George Affleck - is the latest move by municipal leaders against Kinder Morgan since the company formally announced the intention to twin its existing Trans Mountain Pipeline from the Alberta Tar Sands to its Westridge Terminal in Burnaby. The existing line carries 300,000 barrels of bitumen a day, whereas the new line would add an additional 550,000 - slightly more than the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline to Kitimat.
The result, as the motion filed by the mayor suggested, would be a five-fold increase in oil tanker traffic in the Burrard Inlet and South Coast region from the 2010 level of 71 tankers.The motion also noted, "It is estimated that even larger tankers will be required to take the increased volume of oil to foreign market, increasing the risk of a large oil spill, and requiring extensive dredging of the Vancouver Harbour and/or Fraser River."
Watch Ben West interview here (story continues below)
The motion called for the creation of a bylaw that "would require pipeline operators and oil tankers using Burrard Inlet, Vancouver Harbour and/or the Fraser River to indemnify the City of Vancouver and existing local industries through appropriate liability insurance at a level equal to the projected amount of clean up operation costs, and loss of business compensation for a worst case scenario oil spill."
In the interim, it also decreed that "the Mayor write to Prime Minister Harper expressing the City of Vancouver's strenuous opposition to any increase in oil tanker traffic, or measures that lead to increased oil tanker traffic, as it poses an unacceptable and unmitigated risk to Vancouver's economy and environment."
Council's bylaw follows on the heels of the Vancouver Parks Board's vote earlier this week to formally oppose Kinder's pipeline and tanker plans and vocal comments from Robertson in the media, vowing to do everything in his ability to foil Kinder's plans to turn Vancouver into a shipping port for the Tar Sands.
Council heard from Rueben George of the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation - on whose traditional territory the pipeline terminus and tanker terminal are located. The North Vancouver nation has come out in strong opposition to the project, reiterating its position Wednesday at City Hall. Other interveners included Ben West of the Wilderness Committee (see above video), Tarah Stafford of Tanker Free BC and West Coast Environmental Law's Rachel Forbes.
Read this story from the Vancouver Sun on the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation of the Burrard Inlet's strong stance in opposition to Kinder Morgan's plans to ship over 400 Tar Sands supertankers a year through their waters. (April 18, 2012)
The Tsleil-Waututh Nation says it "wants to make it crystal clear" that it opposes Kinder Morgan's $5-billion pipeline expansion to export oil from the Lower Mainland overseas to Asia.
Kinder Morgan announced last week its oil pipeline expansion plans grew even larger last after the company received huge commitments from Asian customers.
The new plans would ship enough crude oil from Alberta to fill 25 to 30 tankers a month through the company's Westridge, Burnaby terminal.
The Tsleil-Wautuh Nation's territory encompasses the Burrard Inlet, including the terminal. The first nation's main community is on the North Shore.
The company wants to have the pipeline - which will face a federal review - complete by 2017.
Tsleil-Waututh chief Justin George said the first nation will assert its aboriginal rights and title to the Burrard Inlet.
"We live in the most beautiful city in the world and we live here because of the great quality of life our environment provides us with," George said in a statement released early this morning.
"The idea of having 400 Super Tankers in our Inlet on an annual basis and turning Vancouver into an export facility for heavy oil is simply unacceptable," he said. "We will work with the mayors, all concerned first nations, all levels of government and the general public who oppose this project."
The company has said that design and routing work, along with consultation with communities and first nations, will take place during the next 18-24 months.
George said the first nation is not against economic development, pointing to development, construction, wind power, eco-tourism.
The Whispering Pines, Coldwater and Lower Nicola Indian bands in the interior have also stated concerns with the project.
Kinder Morgan's expansion will increase pipeline capacity for crude by 550,000 barrels a day, to 850,000 barrels from the current 300,000 barrels a day.
The two by-elections are very bad news for the Liberals, not much better for the Tories and excellent news for the NDP.
Let’s start with the last first.
The loyal opposition is now in the position where a couple of Liberals crossing the floor can bring the government down. I don’t believe that will happen but it’s a worry for the Liberals. Mostly this confirmed Adrian Dix’s leadership. Any time you have a contested election, the losers and their supporters have a death wish for the winner - more about that in a moment. Dix is firmly in control. The NDP made a brilliant move in saying that while they oppose Enbridge and coastal tanker traffic they promise a local referendum for Kinder Morgan. One of the moves of the Campbell/Clark government was to extinguish the right of local governments to pass judgment on environmentally sensitive projects and the NDP understand that the late US Speaker, Tip O’Neill, was right when he said “all politics is local”.
For the John Cummins Conservatives this by-election was a bitter blow, for if the Tories can’t win a by-election – governments usually have trouble with them – in a staunchly “conservative” riding, what chance do they have in a general election. This hardly enhances the opportunity for a new party along the Socred lines since Cummins brings nothing to the table.
For the Liberals, these votes can’t be put down to the usual anti-government pissed off voters. Premier Clark’s leadership was on the line and the Liberals know it.
Going into the by-elections all but one caucus and cabinet minister wanted someone else. She has stumbled from one gaffe to another since she took office. She must go and soon; if she stays, it will be the best news the NDP could get. She’s like Bill Vander Zalm was in 1991 – a loser brought to his knees as much by cabinet and caucus disloyalty as personal stupidity.
When a premier is in trouble he/she must be able to rally the troops – this Ms. Clark is utterly unable to do. She must go, with a temporary leader in place pending a leadership convention, for which time is very short.
Never mind the weeping that a split vote cost them Chilliwack and a turncoat won in Port Coquitlam – the fact is that the government lost two elections which were referenda on the Liberals and their leadership.
There was another winner – big time: the environment. In Chilliwack, the Kinder-Morgan pipeline was a big issue – to my memory, the first time the Environment was a large issue there.
These by-elections did more than alter the make-up of the Legislature; they altered politics in BC – Big Time.
rough a pipeline, whereby the pipeline industry calls it “dilbit” - for “diluted bitumen.” Something like arsenic diluted with vinyl chloride.