Last week, countries across the Caribbean were hit by Hurricane Melissa, one of the strongest hurricanes to make landfall in Atlantic history. The storm brought flooding to a number of islands in the region and devastated Jamaica, with at least 32 people dead and parts of the country still “underwater” as of October 28, according to officials.

As climate change makes storms more frequent and intense, the brunt of the devastation is borne by countries in the Global South, or lower-income countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Latin America and the Middle East. These regions experience a disproportionate share of the impacts of climate change — including rising temperatures, droughts, floods and storms — despite having much smaller carbon footprints than wealthier nations, like Canada. Researchers predict climate change will impact 143 million people in the Global South by 2050. 

For those in Canada’s immigrant diasporas watching the destruction of their homelands from afar, Melissa is just the latest natural disaster bringing together two disparate concerns: money and climate change. In 2017, $5.2 billion was sent outside of Canada by residents originally from countries designated as eligible for “official development assistance,” according to Statistics Canada. These funds were mostly used for living and medical expenses, with the largest share going to Southeast Asia and Oceania. Transfers to Jamaica that year totalled $96 million. 

The international remittance company JN Money sees about 8,000 to 10,000 transactions from Canada to Jamaica every month, according to Claude Thompson, a Toronto-based regional manager. In the wake of Melissa, Thompson says he expects to see transactions temporarily jump by 10 per cent. But as of Oct. 30, many affected areas in Jamaica were still without electricity, leaving them with no way to receive money. 

Despite Canada’s persistent wage gap between immigrants and residents born here, many still send aid in spite of the cost-of-living squeeze. “I don’t think that anyone is thinking so much about the cost [of sending aid],” Didan Wedderburn, lead of the Newfoundland and Labrador chapter of the Jamaican Canadian Association, says. “We haven’t gotten to the stage of thinking, is this worth the cost? Even if we might typically compare figures when we’re not in crisis.”

After disasters, communities step in when governments fail

For immigrants living in Canada, sending money to their home countries isn’t just about financial support. Remittances are “also signs of love and kinship and affection and obligation,” York University professor Ethel Tungohan explains. 

A Canada Research Chair in Canadian Migration Policy, Impacts and Activism, Tungohan says one reason immigrants send funds during climate disasters is because they “acknowledge failed state responses to the immediate needs that climate-ravaged communities are facing.”  

Much of that help is sent directly to family members as remittances, rather than in donations to disaster response organizations on the ground. “There’s a lot of distrust when it comes to horrible institutional channels,” Tungohan says. “People worry about the professionalization of aid organizations and are most likely to trust people they know and have vetted.” 

After Typhoon Haiyan, which claimed over 6,000 lives in the Philippines in 2013, Tungohan says scammers targeting that diaspora were rampant. And after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, millions of people around the world donated half a billion dollars to the American Red Cross  — money that NPR and ProPublica later reported went largely to poorly managed projects with unverified claims of success.   

The reported number and amount of remittances from Canada is likely an underestimate, Tungohan says, because many migrants use informal money-sending channels, such as the Philippines-based app GCash. “Because of state failure, there are people who are skeptical that the remittances they send actually go to the intended recipients,” she says. 

Hurricane Melissa highlights inequities facing Caribbean workers in Canada

Every year, tens of thousands of agricultural workers come here on seasonal permits and in 2020, about 12 per cent were from the Caribbean. Many head home for the winter around now — but this year, Jamaicans and other Caribbean nationals are unsure if they have homes to return to. 

Thousands of seasonal farm workers come to Canada from the Caribbean and Latin America every year. In a letter to the federal government, an advocacy group said Hurricane Melissa shows Canada should make their Employment Insurance contributions easier to count on in times of need. Photo: Christopher Katsarov Luna / The Narwhal

On Nov. 3, the advocacy group Justice for Migrant Workers sent an open letter to Prime Minister Mark Carney about flaws in the federal Employment Insurance program, drawing attention to the fact that migrant workers pay into the program, but are rarely able to access it in times of financial uncertainty like now. 

“This is not an act of charity. It’s a call to ensure migrant agricultural workers are able to access their entitlements to Employment Insurance in their time of need,” the letter reads. The group argues that powerful countries like Canada have long benefited from an extractive relationship with countries like Jamaica — echoing the United Nations, which has said wealthier countries should pay for climate adaptation in places that they’ve long exploited for labour and resources.

The diaspora is also stepping up to support their motherlands. Sylvanus Thompson, the disaster relief coordinator at the Jamaican Canadian Association, says his organization is working with Mississauga-based Atlas Cargo, which is offering to ship donated supplies to the island for free. 

As climate change makes natural disasters like hurricanes, typhoons and tropical storms more destructive, Thompson says organizations like his have been looking for ways to send aid right away when there’s a crisis, rather than having to fundraise first. The association has long discussed a general disaster relief fund, but no concrete action has taken place yet. 

‘They care about their plants and not us’: for migrant farmworkers in Ontario, COVID-19 made a bad situation worse

“We find that persons are more likely to respond in times of disaster,” he says. “But we won’t give up on [starting the fund]: it’s important to do that so we always have something to draw on.” The association is hosting a relief concert in Toronto this Thursday. 

Marcus Pereira, the founder of Reclaim Rebuild Eg West, agrees. “We can’t wait for disaster to strike, we should be redistributing these resources year-round when we know that these problems are occurring,” Pereira says. 

Pereira, whose family is from Grenada, says sending barrels full of supplies is a longstanding part of Caribbean immigrant culture. When Hurricane Beryl swept through the region last year and impacted Grenada, “the Jamaicans came through for us,” he says. “It’s a diaspora-wide effort to help those in need.” 

His youth-led advocacy group is dedicated to fighting gentrification and preserving the cultural heritage of Toronto’s Little Jamaica neighbourhood. Now, it’s running a campaign to collect monetary and in-kind donations in collaboration with the Jamaican Canadian Association.

“It feels like almost every year, there’s going to be a hurricane ripping through so we need to be ahead of the curve,” Pereira says. “It’s our doing in North America that is currently impacting the Global South. They’re paying for our emissions and our poor environmental practices, so it’s only right for us to get ahead of the game.”

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Smoke-filled skies and air quality warnings are becoming a feature of Ontario summers, but for most of the population, the source has felt far away.

As southern Ontarians stayed indoors or avoided strenuous activity under air quality warnings this summer, fires closer to home ignited. In July and August, the province experienced a number of wildfires in places including the Kawarthas, a couple hours northeast of Toronto, and near the town of Huntsville, in the cottage country region of Muskoka.

Farther north, First Nations communities like the Pikangikum First Nation and North Spirit Lake First Nation were evacuated due to wildfires and smoke — with more than 2,000 people sent to southern cities like Mississauga and Toronto for refuge, as well as the northern city of Thunder Bay. Various smaller southern cities also played host to wildfire evacuees from First Nations across the North.

Canada as a whole is experiencing its second-worst wildfire season on record. So far, more than 78,000 square kilometres have burned this year — that’s more land than the entire province of New Brunswick and more than double the 10-year average for this time of year. This massive uptick in Canadian fires can be attributed mostly to those raging across the Prairie provinces, like Manitoba, where about 20,000 square kilometres have burned.

How do wildfires in southern Ontario stack up to the massive fires farther north, and what can be done? Here’s what you need to know.

Are we seeing more fires in southern Ontario?

As of Sept. 2, there have been 521 wildfires inside Ontario’s fire region — the area north of Haliburton that’s within the jurisdiction of the provincial government. For comparison, there were 354 wildfires in that region in 2024, but the average number of fires over the past decade is 660, according to the province.

The province doesn’t count fires outside of the fire region, as they fall under local and regional governments, David Martell, professor emeritus at the Institute of Forestry and Conservation at the University of Toronto, tells The Narwhal. So, it’s difficult to know exactly how many fires are happening farther south.

I have seasonal depression in the summer now

But we are certainly hearing more about fires in southern Ontario. The fact that wildfires in these areas are rare, and happening close to big communities, is driving headlines, Chelene Hanes, a wildland fire research scientist with the Canadian Forest Service, says.

“They don’t happen very often, but they’re not unheard of,” she says. “Any fire of any size is going to have more media attention because there’s more people here, which ramps up the scale of concern — as it should.”

Is a fire in southern Ontario equal to a fire in other parts of Canada?

Compared to the north and other parts of Canada, fires in southern Ontario are different for two main reasons: the forest type and the many, many people here.

Southern Ontario is the most densely populated area in Canada, and there’s a lot of what those in the wildfire world call “interface,” meaning the places where forests and human developments meet, Hanes says. More interface means more wildfire suppression and prevention efforts year-round and little fires are generally put out very quickly, which can limit out-of-control spread.

The forests of southern Ontario are also home to more deciduous trees, which are a less effective wildfire fuel than the conifers of the boreal forest that cover much of the rest of the country.

Conifers that make up the boreal forest, like spruce and jack pine, are highly flammable and have low-lying branches that can allow a fire to climb quickly from the ground to the crown of the tree. The boreal forest is also dense, meaning once a fire climbs to the crown, it can easily jump from one to another, spreading quickly.

Firefighters respond to a wildfire near Parry Sound, Ont., in 2018. Climate change is making wildfires more likely in southern Ontario, as hot and dry conditions become more frequent and forest health deteriorates. Photo: Nathan Denette / The Canadian Press

“When we hear about big fires in the North in the news, those are typically conifer forests,” explains Mike Wotton, a research scientist with the Canadian Forest Service, based at the University of Toronto.

But deciduous trees, and their leaves in particular, hold more water and burn slower. If a fire does spark in these forests, it’s less likely to find low-lying branches and other fuel to climb in order to reach the crown, where it can start to spread.

If you think of a deciduous or hardwood tree, like a maple or oak, it has a bushy top. Pressed together with other deciduous trees, that closed canopy leaves little room for sunlight and its heat to get through, Wotton says, creating less of a fire risk on the ground.

Why was there such a high fire risk in southern Ontario this summer, then?

In short, climate change.

Climate change is altering Canada’s weather patterns. As greenhouse gas emissions, like those emitted by burning fossil fuels, trap the sun’s heat, temperatures around the world rise and extreme weather events like droughts, floods and wildfires become more common. Canada is actually warming at twice the global average, according to a climate report released by the federal government in 2019.

This summer, much of southern Ontario has experienced hot and dry weather, with many areas experiencing days-long Environment Canada heat advisories. Coupled with strong winds, these are “perfect conditions for fire to occur, especially when those fuels are really dry on the surface,” Hanes says. “Any spark, whether from an unattended campfire or a cigarette, when those surface fuels are extremely dry, it doesn’t take much to get an ignition going. Add wind and fire can expand quite quickly.”

Climate change is also altering the health of Ontario’s forests. According to Trevor Jones, a research scientist at Natural Resources Canada’s Great Lakes Forestry Centre, mortality rates of forests are changing. For trees that are already in a less-than-ideal zone, climate change is altering their environment and making it even harder for them to thrive.

Sugar maples, for example, are used to having more moisture. “If you start to turn the screws on them with these drier, hotter conditions, they start to experience greater mortality, which leads to standing dead trees on the landscape,” Jones says.

Those dead trees result in more branches dropping and more sunlight hitting the forest floor, which leads to a vicious cycle: though important to forest health, until they decompose, dead branches and leaves on the ground provide more potential fuel for fires, and the added light helps smaller trees and vegetation grow there as well. That dense underbush can also dry out in the additional sun, particularly if it’s coniferous, providing more fuel for wildfires.

Jones says the changing climate is also shifting the types of species in this part of the country and, therefore, how the forest interacts with wildfire.

“It takes a long time for forests to change, so they’re suffering for quite a while before change is evident,” Jones explains. It can take decades or even centuries for tree species that are more adapted to the new conditions to take over, he says. But there are some species shifts occurring, like in parts of Algonquin Park, just east of Huntsville, where they’re seeing more and more sugar maples die off. “We’ve been seeing it for a while and I think we’ll continue to see more of it,” Jones says.

What can I do if my property is at risk?

Across the board, experts recommend following the FireSmart Canada program for guarding against wildfires, and protecting properties in particular. Founded in 1993, the program teaches you how to keep your home safe by conducting an assessment, managing the vegetation around your house and using fire-resistant building materials. There is also an online training course that can help homeowners learn more about fire-smarting their home.

In an email to The Narwhal, a spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources’ Aviation, Forest Fire and Emergency Services branch says making a small change around your property can have a big impact. “One example would be to reduce what is called ‘ladder fuel’ that may be around a home or cottage. Ladder fuel can be branches or shrubs that could carry a ground fire to the crown of larger trees,” the spokesperson writes. “Start by pruning branches to a height of two metres from the ground, especially on conifer trees. This is an important step to take to FireSmart your property.”

And, of course, adhering to fire bans and the law is critical, as is limiting the use of equipment like quads that could spark a fire in a high-risk area. If you do spot a wildfire in southern Ontario, call 911.

Are all fires bad?

No.

Fire is a natural part of a forest’s life and necessary for its regeneration. Some trees, like jack pine, need fire to open their cones and release their seeds. Across Canada, government agencies use controlled, prescribed burns to help regenerate forests and keep them healthy, including the Ontario government and Parks Canada. In Toronto’s High Park, the city holds regular prescribed burns to regenerate the park’s black oak savannah.

For many Indigenous communities, fire is an important part of their cultural practices and stewardship of the land.

Amy Cardinal Christianson, the senior fire advisor for the Indigenous Leadership Initiative and a Métis woman from Treaty 8 territory in Alberta, researches Indigenous fire stewardship, including cultural fire practices, Indigenous firefighting and better evacuation and recovery responses after fire.

There isn’t a pan-Indigenous approach to fires, Christianson says, but many Indigenous communities conduct burns to achieve cultural objectives. That might mean improving the health of medicinal plants, increasing berry patches, regenerating grasslands and more. Cultural burns “create healthy forests that have less dry and dead vegetation and monoculture-type forests that are more likely to burn in these high-severity fires.”

In a world on fire, making the case for burning more

Unlike government prescribed burns, Indigenous cultural fires always have a community and cultural purpose and take place on a more grassroots level. While agencies might burn whole areas using helicopters, torches, gas and diesel, even a small bush-burning can be considered a cultural burn, Christianson says.

Across Canada, Indigenous communities represent just five per cent of the population, but made up 42 per cent of wildfire evacuations from 1980 to 2021. Despite that, “Indigenous people have been effectively removed from being able to make any sort of management decisions about fire,” Christianson says. “What we’re seeing is increasing risk to Indigenous communities and sadly, we’re the ones bearing the brunt of the impacts of these decisions.”

Along with climate change exacerbating fire risk, part of why Canada is experiencing so many “bad” fires is years of colonial forest management strategies and an idea of conservation that aims to preserve the environment rather than live in harmony with it, Christianson says. Despite some prescribed burns in some areas of Canada, settlers are still mostly “focused on fire exclusion and putting fires out.”

“The boreal forests and other forests in Canada are fire-dependent,” she adds. “No matter how much we try to control that or change that, that doesn’t change the relationship that that forest has with fire.”

Updated on Sept. 3, 2025 at 8:59 p.m. ET: This story has been updated to correct a transcription error, replacing the word ‘fields’ with ‘fuels‘ in a quote about dry surface areas that can easily catch fire.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

When temperatures climb, the staff at Regina’s SOFIA House are even busier than usual. The organization, whose name stands for Support Of Families In Affliction, provides transition housing for people escaping intimate partner violence. Executive director Christa Baron says there are “noticeable” differences in the calls and requests it receives during heat waves.

There are more calls per day and more frequent calls from those already on the waitlist, expressing renewed urgency. Victims are also more distressed because of how the weather makes them feel — especially those whose homes don’t have a way of keeping them cool.

“Maybe you are in a situation that is volatile and then the presence of, say, smoke in the air for days on end exacerbates that and results in heightened irritability and crisis,” Baron explains. “The impact of heat and hunger and wanting to be safe and secure all contribute to that.” 

Extreme heat is a major stressor on the human body. Physically, it can lead to heat exhaustion, which shows up as dizziness, nausea or vomiting, headaches and extreme thirst. Mentally, heat can impair decision-making and the ability to concentrate. Together, these physical and cognitive symptoms can cause frustration and irritability — and aggression. 

Studies from around the world have shown that as the temperature goes up, so do rates of all kinds of violence, from assault to gun violence. While in theory that affects everyone, in reality, those who are already vulnerable to the effects of climate change are impacted the most. 

Graph: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

Extreme weather such as heat “brings to light systemic inequalities that are in communities in Saskatchewan and across Canada,” Baron says. That means its effects are felt more acutely by residents of dense neighbourhoods with less green space and by people who live in housing without air conditioning. 

It also means the risk of heat-related violence threatens women and girls the most.

A brief from the United Nations found every single degree Celsius of increased global temperature is associated with a 4.7 per cent increase in domestic violence. A study from Spain found intimate partner femicide, or murder of a female partner or relative, increases as much as 28 per cent during heat waves. 

Across Canada, police statistics suggest a similar link. Saskatchewan has the country’s highest reported rates of intimate partner violence, which its RCMP force defines as assault, harassment, uttering threats, sexual assault and more by a spouse, ex-spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, ex-partner or other intimate relationship. According to new data from Statistics Canada, Saskatchewan saw 128 instances of intimate partner violence per 100,000 people in July and August 2023 and 126 per 100,000 people in July and August 2024. In the cooler months of January and February, meanwhile, there were 115 cases per 100,000 in 2023 and 112 per 100,000 in 2024.  

Source: Statistics Canada. Graphs: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

It’s far from the only place in Canada with this problem. Statistics Canada showed similar seasonal trends in every single province and territory, as did data from local police departments in Victoria, Calgary and Toronto. And globally, it’s a troubling pattern that is predicted to increase. By the end of the 21st century, the United Nations estimates that 10 per cent of intimate partner violence will be linked to climate change — billions of cases that could be prevented if climate change is mitigated.

As Earth warms up, experts say there are steps governments can take now to protect women, girls and everyone in Canada from heat-related violence. But it’s a complex problem that requires wide-ranging solutions, from education on healthy relationships, to more funding for emergency and permanent housing, to simply helping people stay cool on hot days.

The link between heat and violence 

The cross-country summertime increase in domestic violence is part of a general spike in violent crime that happens as temperatures rise. The American Psychological Association is another body that’s found violent crimes, including murder and aggravated assault, are more common in the hot summer months. Here at home, Statistics Canada recorded a of 25 per cent increase in overall reports of violent crime nationwide in the summer of 2021, compared to colder months.

That includes gendered violence. In the country’s most populous province, Ontario, there were 22 per cent more intimate partner violence cases reported in July and August 2023 compared to January and February of the same year: 6,635 compared to 5,302. Last summer — when Environment and Climate Change Canada reported record-breaking heat across the country — Ontario had almost 16 per cent more intimate partner violence calls than in the winter, accounting for 985 more cases during hot months.  

Looking at police data from a few big cities, the trend holds. In Victoria, Calgary and Toronto, reports of intimate partner violence were higher in summer than winter in both 2023 and 2024, with the biggest difference being a 23 per cent spike in calls in Toronto two years ago. 

Reduced mobility is one cause of climate-related violence. When wildfires or floods cut off roads and communication lines, it “prevents any kind of escape or intervention,” Angela Marie MacDougall, the executive director of Vancouver-based Battered Women’s Support Services, says. Illustration: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

Heat makes us irritable, impairs our cognitive function and makes us more impulsive. Those debilitating impacts compound with factors like sleep deprivation — whether because of a too-hot sleep environment or socializing into the night — that increase the risk of violence as well. So do drinking and recreational drugs, whether used to address insomnia or mental health challenges or simply because there are more opportunities to hang out and indulge on sweaty summer nights, including at parties and festivals. 

Patricia Kostouros points to the Calgary Stampede as an example. A professor in the faculty of health, community and education at the city’s Mount Royal University, she has studied how emergency services support victims of intimate partner violence. At the summertime Stampede, she says, people often drink excess alcohol and police reports of domestic violence spike. 

It’s not easy to pin down a single cause. It could be alcohol: in 2017, University of Calgary researchers found that domestic violence calls increased during the Stampede, but noted similar increases after big sports games and on New Years Eve, other occasions known for excessive drinking. But it could also be temperature, since Calgary’s police force reported an almost 25 per cent increase in domestic violence and domestic assaults in the hottest months of 2024. 

Both together certainly aren’t good. Kostouros says there are ways the Stampede’s organizers could limit temperature-related risks, such as keeping water accessible for easy hydration and cool-down. In an email, a spokesperson for the Stampede told The Narwhal the organization does do that: following public health authority guidance, it adds extra water fountains and misting stations when temperatures exceed 28 C.

“At the Calgary Stampede, we believe that putting on a cowboy hat should elevate your behaviour and sense of class — not diminish it,” the email said. 

Things that alleviate heat, like access to air conditioning, can diminish related risks — but not everyone has access to it. Take outdoor workers, for example. Shamminaz Polen, the manager of international programs at Oxfam Canada, says they might be especially vulnerable to the type of physical and mental heat stresses that increase the risk of violence, since there’s no relief from the heat at all. 

‘An invisible emergency’: how governments are preparing for extreme heat

“If you are working under the sun when it’s 40 C outside, you are definitely not in the same mental health space as you would be if you were in an air-conditioned office,” Polen says. 

Yet if heat prevents a family member from working, that loss of vital income can also turn the tension up in a home, too. 

Because hot environments contribute to irritation, impaired decision-making and aggression, there are regional risks. While 61 per cent of Canadian households have air conditioning nationally, it varies widely across the country. B.C. is the lowest, with just 32 per cent of homes having it — a number that drops to 17 per cent for low-income households. 

But even when a way to cool homes is available, paying for it could present a different problem. Angela Marie MacDougall, the executive director of Vancouver-based Battered Women’s Support Services, says more costly utility bills during heat waves can “exacerbate financial stresses and economic abuse” — she says it’s common for an abusive partner to withhold money and cite rising bills as the reason. 

Illustration: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

Similar factors were at play during the early COVID-19 pandemic, which saw people trapped at home, many suddenly without an income. The resulting increased rates of gender-based violence globally, including in Canada, were a clear example of how disasters layer on top of societal vulnerability to make risk spike — some experts refer to intimate partner violence during lockdown as the “shadow pandemic.” 

The COVID-19 pandemic also showed how ineffective Canadian governments can be at supporting victims. Kostouros says the federal government gave provinces money to work with shelters to do “whatever they needed to do to make sure everybody was safe.” But each province had different approaches to how the money could be used, rules that in some cases made the funds useless. 

She says that some shelters wanted to build extra bathrooms, to reduce spaces in which clients would be gathered together, but some provinces considered that a long-term capital expense, not a pandemic-specific accommodation. A 2024 report from Women’s Shelters Canada breaking down 2020 emergency funding found that money for renovations was the biggest gap. 

Which women are most vulnerable to heat-related violence? 

Data provided by police simply lists reported crimes, not the sex or gender of perpetrators and victims. But it’s impossible not to read an uptick of cases of intimate partner violence as an increase in violence against women. 

That’s not to say that men don’t experience violence from people they know and even love, but it’s indisputable that women experience domestic violence more commonly. Statistics Canada reports women and girls are “significantly” more likely than men and boys to have reported any form of intimate violence, including physical abuse (23 per cent of all women and girls compared to 17 per cent of all men and boys), sexual abuse (12 per cent compared to 2) and psychological abuse (43 per cent versus 35). 

Extreme heat warning: should kids play outside anymore?

Violence experienced by women is also considerably worse, according to Statistics Canada: they’re much more likely to experience severe forms of intimate partner violence such as performing sex acts they didn’t want to, being confined or locked in a room, being forced to have sex and being choked.

Reduced mobility is one reason women bear the brunt of climate-related violence, Polen says. Around the world, when the environment is hostile, people stay at home “as a survival strategy,” she explains. 

Heat, wildfires and floods often leave women trapped at home, taking care of children and isolated from friends and family. Shelters or police can also be out of reach when it’s too hot to leave the house, especially given underfunding of rural public transit. 

“Heat is a threat multiplier,” Sean Kidd, senior scientist and co-director of the Institute for Mental Health Policy Research at Toronto’s Centre of Addiction and Mental Health, says. 

Source: Statistics Canada. Graph: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

Certain mental health diagnoses, like schizophrenia, are strongly associated with heat-related mortality, he says. Older adults are at greater risk, as are those who are pregnant. Unhoused individuals are more exposed to extreme heat and thus, see more grave health impacts. 

“Exposure to extreme heat, and climate change more broadly, are embedded in factors such as environmental racism and colonial violence,” Kidd, who is also an associate professor in the University of Toronto’s department of psychiatry, explains. 

This means that some women are more at risk than others. In early June, the Winnipeg Free Press reported Manitoba had already seen more than 17,000 wildfire evacuees this year, with at least 10,000 finding emergency lodging in the city. As columnist Niigaan Sinclair pointed out, the majority were from northern First Nations — creating an intersecting emergency for those attuned to the issue of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-Spirit People.

Research shows that heat makes us irritable, impairs our cognitive function and makes us more impulsive. Illustration: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

“This city has had an influx of thousands of Indigenous women, girls and Two-Spirit peoples — individuals preyed upon by many forces here,” he wrote. 

MacDougall, of Battered Women’s Support Services in Vancouver, points out rural Indigenous communities face challenges accessing services during ordinary times. In times of disaster, victims’ entrapment is “so much more profound,” she says. When wildfires — like those that have raged across northern and western Canada for months now  — cut off roads and communication lines, it “prevents any kind of escape or intervention.” 

All types of extreme weather increase gender-based violence risk in Canada

The effects of climate change have already led to increased risk of intimate partner violence in Canada. As wildfire forced thousands to flee Fort McMurray, Alta. in 2016, for example, support programs became almost impossible to access when the only emergency shelter in the area closed. 

Then came coping with the aftermath. “When the fires happened in Fort McMurray, there was an increase in domestic violence afterwards because of the stress response from being out of a job or not having a home or having to live with limited income,” Kostouros of Mount Royal University says. 

Kostouros and her research partner, D. Gaye Warthe, have studied how emergency services help shelters maintain the safety of their residents. “Of course, we found that they didn’t help,” Kostouros says. 

She and Warthe looked at the aftermath of the 2013 floods in southern Alberta, which displaced approximately 100,000 people. They saw clear evidence emergency responders didn’t know how to support victims of intimate partner violence. 

For instance: at one evacuation centre, the names of people who had been evacuated were put up on a board for loved ones to locate them. Those who evacuated from shelters were given the same treatment, even though these victims often need to stay anonymous or not have their locations compromised, especially if they’re escaping a stalker or other violent partner. Luckily, a shelter worker who was at the evacuation centre intervened in time.

“There’s no protocol in place for protecting people who are fleeing violence, and that’s true across Canada,” Kostouros says.

Governments not addressing disaster impacts on gendered violence in a ‘meaningful way:’ advocate

Temporary housing for those fleeing natural disasters has also been problematic for victims of intimate partner violence. Kostouros says that often, victims are housed in the same location as their abuser — such as a hotel that’s been converted into an evacuation centre. 

The federal government does acknowledge survivors of gender-based violence, including domestic violence, are often at great risk during emergencies. In a statement to The Narwhal, Public Safety Canada said emergency management falls under provincial and territorial jurisdiction and those governments can access federal funding “to support survivors during emergencies” as long as the money is used in a way that aligns with the National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence. 

Housing access is key to addressing the problem of intimate partner violence: making sure survivors have places to go when needed, and building affordable housing that can keep people cool enough to reduce the risk of aggression between partners. lllustration: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal  

The department points to Prince Edward Island, which integrated emergency planning with federally funded gender-based violence efforts following Hurricane Fiona. Public Safety said Women and Gender Equality Canada can provide guidance to other provinces that want to do the same. 

For its part, the Public Health Agency of Canada recognizes that “during an emergency, any existing health inequities are often exacerbated,” a spokesperson said in an emailed statement to The Narwhal. Its wildfire toolkit for public health authorities was recently updated with information on how evacuations can lead to increased risk of family violence, and the agency is developing a toolkit on evacuations which will include plans “to protect people who have experienced or are experiencing interpersonal violence, sexual violence and human trafficking.” 

Even if some governments are trying to address how emergencies affect gendered violence, “that’s not happening in a meaningful way,” MacDougall says, as the leader of a frontline organization responsible for providing real-time services for victims. 

“We want to be monitoring and reporting on [intimate partner violence] indicators during the climate crisis: things like [emergency room] visits and shelter access as well as deaths related to femicide,” she says. “But we’re just not seeing a climate policy right now that addresses risks for women generally.” 

Housing, education are crucial solutions to reduce climate-related risk of gendered violence 

At Regina’s SOFIA House, hot weather also brings schedule changes. There are a lot of kids on site when school is out, Baron says, so programming is adjusted. During times of extreme heat, her team moves events indoors, asks for seasonal donations of sunscreen, bug spray and water bottles and provides access to transit or rides so residents don’t have to walk. 

This is the type of programming Baron needs governments to support. She also wants more funding to support survivors as they transition out of the long-term shelter and return to independent living. 

From $2,600 to $775: how social housing in Metro Vancouver is changing lives — and fighting climate change

Researchers and service providers all say addressing Canada’s housing affordability crisis is key. “The chances of somebody going back to a partner is quite high because they don’t have money, don’t have housing, their kids are unhoused. All these pressures make it easier to just return,” Kostouros says. 

MacDougall would like to see programs that automatically house victims or take abusers out of the home. Instead, she says, nation-wide waitlists for safe housing or other services stretch into months and even years. 

Kidd, from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, says housing access includes reducing  environmental stressors and ensuring people are safe and cool. This means designing communities to have adequate water and building affordable, climate-resilient housing with cooling mechanisms so that families trapped indoors are cool enough to reduce the risk of aggression between partners. 

He’d also like service providers and everyone else to learn about the impacts of heat on the body and mind, as well as strategies for cooling down to reduce heat-induced impacts like violence. 

“Early education is one of the best things we can do to change an issue,” Kotsouros says. For her, that means teaching people to watch out for the signs of intimate partner violence, including mandatory programs in schools.  

Ultimately, the most important way to decrease climate change-related intimate partner violence is to fight climate change itself. 

“The first step is to acknowledge that heat and warming is a problem,” Polen says. “Canada should emphasize that climate justice is gender justice. Any meaningful response to climate change must also account for how it increases violence against women and girls.” 

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Construction is set to start on Highway 413 — a megaproject that would cut through endangered species habitat, including the protected Greenbelt — in the northwestern parts of the Greater Toronto Area.

On Wednesday, Aug. 27, Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced that the first two contracts for the project had been awarded. He made the announcement in Caledon, Ont., where Highway 10 is being upgraded to include a bridge for the new highway. Upgrades will also soon begin on Highway 401/407, which will be the western terminus of Highway 413 and link the Halton and Peel regions to York.

Ford has pushed through legislation to fast-track projects like these, and the new prime minister has promised to “build, baby, build.” But the changing political climate leaves a lot of questions about how the project will proceed.

Michael DiMuccio, a director of grassroots organization Stop the 413 Now, who lives close to the proposed path of Highway 413 in Vaughan, Ont., said he’s noticed a lot more action in the area. “All of a sudden, we have construction people moving into the neighbourhood,” DiMuccio said.

Ontario Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria shared a video update showing crews on the ground back in December.

In its 2025 budget, released in mid-May, the Ontario government said it had identified 500 properties the province will need to acquire to build Highway 413. Expropriation notices have already gone out to some residents along the route.

Ontario’s Highway 413, mapped

Highway 413 would connect Toronto’s north and western suburbs, while another proposed highway project, the Bradford Bypass, would connect Highway 400 to the 404 in Bradford West Gwillimbury. Map: Jeannie Phan / The Narwhal

Ford and his Progressive Conservatives have been trying to build the highway — a 52-kilometre route through the York, Peel and Halton regions — since they were first elected in 2018. The project, which critics noted would run through Ontario’s protected Greenbelt and swaths of endangered species habitat, was a major tenet of Ford’s 2022 and 2025 re-election campaigns. 

For the last seven years, the Highway 413 project has seen its share of controversy. The National Observer found developers with real estate near the proposed route had ties to the Ford government. Then opposition parties promised to cancel the project if elected in 2022. And the federal government designated the project for an impact assessment in 2021, only to drop that review in April 2024 and refuse another request later that year from environmental groups. 

Instead, a federal-provincial working group was established last year with the goal of guiding Highway 413’s development, especially as it relates to federal environmental legislation like the Fisheries Act, the Migratory Birds Convention Act and the Species At Risk Act. Documents recently released to The Narwhal through access to information legislation show how provincial and federal members of the working group viewed their role and mandate differently.

Most recently, Bill 5, also known as the Protect Ontario by Unleashing our Economy Act, which passed on June 5, weakens the rules that protect land, water and wildlife. It will give the province the power to create “special economic zones” where regulations can be circumvented, and rewrites the Endangered Species Act.

Late last year, the province introduced Bill 212, or the Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act, allowing the Ford government to exempt projects like Highway 413 from undergoing a provincial environmental assessment (as well as being the bill behind the much-publicized removal of bike lanes in Toronto). 

With so much change afoot, here’s what we know about Highway 413’s path forward, and where Ontario and Canada stand on seeing it through.

Highway 413 would cut through the protected Greenbelt, including forest and farmland that sequesters carbon and provides habitat for at-risk species. Photo: Katherine KY Cheng / The Narwhal

What do Ontario’s Bill 212 and Bill 5 mean for Highway 413?

Passed in late 2024, Bill 212 gives the Ford government the ability to exempt projects from typical provincial environmental assessments. Environmental assessments for the 413 have been ongoing since 2007, with several stops and starts. 

Bill 212’s passing in late 2024 meant Highway 413 can now go through an “accelerated” assessment with a more limited review of the highway’s environmental impacts. Crucially, this would allow the province to start on early work like bridges before the assessments are completed. Bill 212 would also allow the province to not publish the studies done as part of those assessments. 

While Bill 212 would essentially undo the province’s Environmental Assessment Act, Bill 5 would repeal its Endangered Species Act, Tim Gray, the executive director of advocacy organization Environmental Defence. This would mean “all the onus and responsibility ensuring that [endangered] species are not impacted now falls on the federal government,” he said in an interview, adding that despite the working group and Ford’s recent cozying up to Prime Minister Mark Carney, the provincial government “has put themselves into a direct line of conflict with the federal government because the highway goes through some of the best remaining high-quality habitats for federally listed endangered species.” 

And this could do more to slow down than speed up construction, Gray said. Since the province still has to comply with federal laws like the Species At Risk Act and the Fisheries Act, Highway 413 won’t necessarily be expedited.

Across Canada, courts have required governments to demonstrate proper due diligence and consultations, including with Indigenous groups, which these bills also circumvent. Projects without that due diligence have “been held up and delayed with those consultations being forced to take place,” Gray said. 

“We see this repeated pattern of the provincial government in Ontario thinking that the path to doing whatever they want is to bulldoze over other responsibilities. But in fact, it’s delaying projects, not accelerating them.” 

And it’s not just Highway 413 that these two bills impact: going forward, the provincial government has the power to designate any number of projects as being within special economic zones. On top of having major impacts for the environment by skirting important assessments and protections, the bills may also result in conflict with Indigenous groups, who say Bill 5 infringes on their Treaty Rights. 

Bill 5: a guide to Ontario’s spring 2025 development and mining legislation

Is the Highway 413 working group really working? 

The federal-provincial working group for Highway 413 was established in 2024, and it includes the province’s Ministry of Transportation and the federal Impact Assessment Agency. It sets aside the previously started (but never finished) federal impact assessment and, instead, asks the two agencies to work in tandem to find ways to avoid and mitigate environmental damage from the project. Other federal ministries like Fisheries and Oceans and Environment and Climate Change are also pulled in for input and comment. 

Documents acquired by The Narwhal through the Access to Information Act illustrate the push and pull over the terms of reference for the working group. Combined comments from the federal Fisheries and Environment ministries and the Impact Assessment Agency suggest federal members of the group were pushing back on the idea they were there to steward Highway 413 through to completion.

In a document prepared for a meeting last July, the discrepancies were on display. Under a subsection called mandate and responsibility, federal members crossed out several references to project delivery and supporting construction, replacing them with wording around better informing decision-making on the project. In a comment in the document attached to these changes, they note: “The scope of the technical working groups as per the [memorandum of understanding] is to support assessment of effects, support efficacy of mitigation measures identified by the proponent to lessen or avoid effects on fish, fish habitat, [species at risk], etc. in areas of federal jurisdiction. Our role is not a project delivery role.”

The Ontario government’s own research has confirmed 11 species at risk are living along the planned route of Highway 413. Clockwise, they are: butternut tree, bobolink, chimney swift, bank swallow, rapids clubtail, redside dace, western chorus frog, wood thrush, eastern meadowlark, barn swallow and olive-sided flycatcher. Illustration: Shawn Parkinson / The Narwhal

In a document for another meeting last August, the federal members again crossed out similar statements, including a new point under responsibilities that read, “Share information and assist with delivery of the Highway 413 project.”

As of November 2024, Gray said, Ontario was about a year away from having to apply for permits under the Species At Risk Act and the Fisheries Act. And construction couldn’t start until those permits came through. While Bill 5 creates the possibility of “special economic zones” where local and provincial laws no longer apply, as well as reforming endangered species protections, projects are still at the mercy of federal permits and their timelines. “The provincial government is looking to wipe away all provincial and municipal laws, but they’re going to have no impact on the application of federal law,” Gray said. 

In the documents laying out terms for the working group, the province initially suggested the working group would help “establish timelines for federal permitting that take into account the operational and construction timelines of the project.” The federal government corrected that and clarified “the operational and construction timelines of the project will be considered alongside the regulatory requirements, to the extent possible, to support a timely decision-making process.”

In the published terms of reference, they strike a balance: “The working group will establish a work plan and timelines for federal permitting that take into account the operational and construction timelines of the project, requirements set out in relevant regulations and the need for adequate provision of information and consultations before final decisions can be made.”

Feds warn Ontario falling short on Highway 413 consultations with Six Nations, Mississaugas of the Credit

In the documents, working group members from the Impact Assessment Agency shared a number of expectations in October 2024 related to federally protected species, including asking for a list of all the species not regulated by the province — like redside dace, bank swallows and western chorus frogs — and an outline of how Highway 413 impacts them. The federal representatives also proposed that the province publish these results. 

The Impact Assessment Agency told the Narwhal, “authorizations and permits are assessed and issued under the Fisheries Act and Species At Risk Act, which are also subject to consultation with impacted Indigenous communities.” The department also stated, “All parties of the working group worked together to finalize the terms of reference which remains current.”

When asked about Ontario’s Bill 5, the federal agency redirected The Narwhal to the province’s Ministry of Transportation, which did not respond.

Where does the federal government stand on Highway 413 now?

In a May 5 letter addressed to Prime Minister Carney, Ford identified Highway 413 as a key project he’d like the federal government to co-operate on. “I urge you to limit your government’s intervention into any other critical infrastructure projects where there is no federal jurisdiction to do so,” Ford wrote. 

The province published the letter alongside one sent from then-deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland in November 2024 that suggested the federal government was very much in line with the province’s plans for Highway 413. Freeland proposed another working group that would, among other things, “identify ways to advance additional early works and streamline the processes for Highway 413 and Highway 69 to get these projects built faster,” she said, referring also to a project to widen the highway that runs from just north of Parry Sound to Sudbury. She continued that it is “in the best interest of Canadians and Ontarians to continue our great work together.” 

Federal government advised Ontario to reroute Highway 413: documents

That was under former prime minister Justin Trudeau, and prior to Bill 5’s introduction. But, Carney has also signalled interest in speeding up approvals and limiting redundancy between federal and provincial approvals. In the case of Highway 413, certain federal protections are the only rules left standing.

Gray, of Environmental Defence, said Bill 5 and 212 actually make the federal government a bigger barrier to Highway 413 because the province is eschewing environmental assessments, pushing responsibility onto the federal government and making it more likely to intervene.  

In addition to private residential property, conservation areas and farms will also be cut through if Highway 413 gets built. Photo: Katherine KY Cheng / The Narwhal

“I think you’ll see people within agencies like Fisheries and Oceans and Environment and Climate Change Canada identifying major conflicts between their legislative requirements for protecting species at risk, fish and the planned design of the highway,” Gray said. “The Ford government will respond negatively to that … but the federal government has the responsibility of issuing these permits, and issuing them in a way that willfully ignores opportunity to mitigate impact is illegal under their own legislation.”  

From Gray’s perspective, it would be “very strange” to see the federal government support the Highway 413 project. “There’s so many other important priorities across the country in terms of building public transportation and the rationale for this highway is very, very weak,” he said. 

Nonetheless, expropriation notices are going out and early work is humming along in different locations.

In Halton Hills, Ont., Jeannine d’Entremont, a leader with grassroots organization Halton Hills Climate Action, said she and other locals have seen crews out drilling for soil samples this spring. Her group, along with others, pushed for a federal impact assessment of Highway 413 but were denied at the same time as Environmental Defence.

But, d’Entremont said, “We’re not throwing in the towel.”

Updated on August 27, 2025 at 1:59 p.m. ET: This story was updated to include new information about construction on Highway 413.

Updated on June 17, 2025, at 1:45 p.m. ET: This story was corrected to state that Jeannine d’Entremont lives in Halton Hills, Ont., not Caledon, Ont.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

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In 2021, the federal government listed “plastic manufactured items” as a toxic substance under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, clearing the way for its ban on certain categories of single-use plastics. Very quickly, a lobby group of plastics industry giants launched a lawsuit to challenge the feds’ “toxic” labelling, calling it “unconstitutional.” 

The courts initially sided with the lobbyists, but the government has appealed the decision and the case is currently making its way through the Federal Court of Appeal. The decision could have major implications for environmental policy — including eroding the foundation of the Liberals’ single-use plastics ban. 

Here’s everything you need to know about the lawsuit. 

Who’s involved?

There are two main parties involved in the case: the federal government and the plastics lobby group, the Responsible Plastic Use Coalition. The coalition includes some of the biggest petro corporations in the world, including Imperial Oil, Dow Chemical and NOVA Chemicals, the largest petrochemical producer in Canada.

There are also a number of interveners, or parties with an interest in the case who have been granted permission to offer their perspective. In the appeal, a number of petrochemical corporations and lobbies are intervening, including the American Chemistry Council, the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers and the Plastics Industry Association. 

A coalition of Canadian environmental and health groups is also intervening, including Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment, David Suzuki Foundation, Environmental Defence Canada, Greenpeace Canada, and Oceana Canada, all represented by Ecojustice. A few provincial governments are also involved: Alberta and Saskatchewan are backing the plastics industry coalition’s position, while British Columbia supports the federal government’s. 

Some say plastic recycling is ‘hopeless.’ Others are determined to fix it

What is the timeline of the case against Canada’s plastic ban? 

In 2021, Canada added “plastic manufactured items” to Schedule 1 of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, — entering them on the government’s official list of toxic chemicals. This is the first step in regulating a substance, according to Lindsay Beck, a staff lawyer at Ecojustice, Canada’s largest environmental law charity, which is representing the coalition of environmental and health groups. Other substances on this list include lead, benzene and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). 

Adding plastic manufactured items to Schedule 1 allowed the government to roll out its ban on the manufacturing, import and sales of six types of plastic products: checkout bags, cutlery, takeout containers, ring carriers, stir sticks and straws. (There’s an exception for those who need plastic straws for accessibility purposes, and businesses can stock plastic straws as long as they aren’t on display and are only provided upon request). 

Big Plastic struck back fast: the coalition launched two challenges, one that targets the ban itself and a judicial review challenging the government’s listing of plastic manufactured items as “toxic.” The former case’s outcome will depend on the latter, since the listing is the legal basis for the ban.

The basis of the plastics coalition’s challenge to the listing is an argument plastics aren’t toxic and plastic pollution isn’t caused by plastics themselves but rather “human behaviour and systemic waste management and recycling shortfall,” The industry also argues the legislation is not within the federal government’s jurisdiction. And it won — in November 2023, the Federal Court sided with the Responsible Plastic Use Coalition, with the judge calling the “toxic” designation “unreasonable and unconstitutional.” 

But the feds appealed and filed for a motion to stay the decision until the appeal was heard. That request was granted, which means the single-use plastic ban remains in effect for now. The appeal was heard in summer 2024. A decision is still pending, but should be released in early 2025. 

Microplastics seen up close as scientists from the University of Toronto, Lakehead University and Queen’s University do research in Ontario’s Experimental Lakes Area. Photo: Katherine KY Cheng / The Narwhal

What is the plastics coalition arguing?

The plastics group did not respond to The Narwhal’s request for an interview. According to court documents, it argues adding plastic manufactured items to Schedule 1 “does not comply with the statutory scheme” under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. It contends the listing is too broad and there isn’t enough proof to demonstrate toxicity. 

But there are years of studies assessing plastic’s risks to human health and the environment: this 2023 UN report, for example, found petrochemicals in toys, food packaging, textiles, vehicles and more could cause lung and liver cancer, cardiovascular disease and negative fertility outcomes. Kids in particular are at risk, according to the report, as exposure to these chemicals can cause neurodevelopmental and neurobehavioural issues for fetuses and children. 

The provinces of Saskatchewan and Alberta are intervening in the case to argue the ban is unconstitutional because it’s outside the bounds of what the federal government has the authority to do, Dayna Scott, a professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, says. This is the argument the judge agreed with in the initial case.  

For the provinces, this case is yet another tussle over jurisdiction and responsibility, which has thwarted the Trudeau Liberals’ environmental moves before. “This case is playing into that larger fight about whether it really should be the provinces or the feds that have the authority to regulate in these areas,” Scott, whose speciality is environmental law, says. 

The plastics ban is another part of Trudeau’s environmental legacy, which seems at risk as Canada faces a contentious federal election. Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre, who is leading in the polls, has called the ban unconstitutional and said recycling is the “common sense” approach to reducing the risks posed by plastics.

A water bottle, bits of plastic and other garbage floats on the shoreline of Lake Ontario in Toronto. Photo: Christopher Katsarov Luna / The Narwhal

What is the federal government arguing? 

Ecojustice lawyer Beck says the government is arguing that adding plastic manufactured items to its list of banned substances is within its right. “The evidence is clear that plastic is one of the most persistent pollutants on Earth and that it’s accumulating in great numbers and not breaking down in the environment — that it just persists,” she says.

For her arguments, she referred to the science assessment of plastic pollution done by the federal government. The assessment documents the ubiquity and persistence of plastic pollution, especially in marine ecosystems, and was the government’s primary evidence in its defence of the listing. The assessment was published in 2020, and based on research done up to about 2018, so there has been new research published since then, particularly surrounding the effects of plastic pollution on human health. But, Beck says, new research isn’t included in appeal arguments, since the case is rooted in what evidence the feds were looking at when adding plastics to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act’s listing. 

“We tried to bring to the fore a lot of that evidence that had been before the government decision makers,” she says. Her goal is to show there is sufficient evidence of plastics’ harm to justify the ban, based on the pollution prevention provisions of the Environmental Protection Act. 

What’s at stake?

If all goes well for the feds, the government’s single-use plastic ban will continue as planned, which Beck says might empower the government to do more on plastic pollution, such as adding more items to the list. 

If the Responsible Use Plastics group wins again, the government can seek to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court. But another loss “will undermine the federal government’s regulatory and policy plans with respect to plastics,” Beck says. 

Even if the ban is ultimately struck down, it’s not the end of plastics regulation in Canada. Scott says if the feds lose, they can redo their legislation “so that it comes within the bounds that any court might set out.” That happened with the Impact Assessment Act, which the feds amended and re-submitted after the Albera government fought them on similar grounds. Or, since the courts pointed to a lack of evidence surrounding the risk of plastic manufactured items, the feds could re-do their risk assessment and try again, Scott says. 

Another option might be trying to create legislation that directly bans single-use plastics, rather than relying on their listing as a toxic substance. 

Whether Canada follows any of these paths will depend greatly on which party is in power when the appeal decision is handed down. “There are a number of different tactics they could take, even if they are ultimately unsuccessful under [the act],” Scott says. “Ultimately, it’s going to depend on what the federal government looks like when they get around to doing that.” 

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.