Summary

• On Wednesday, Toronto’s air quality was the worst in the world, as wildfire smoke from northern Ontario blanketed the city. 
• Research suggests even moderate levels of wildfire smoke can pose significant health risks.
• The federal government uses the Air Quality Health Index to communicate the severity of air pollution. The higher the index score, the more precautions people — especially those with health conditions — should take to stay safe and comfortable.

On Tuesday, Sol Mamakwa was driving to Thunder Bay, Ont., sunshine behind him, darkness ahead. 

The Ontario NDP MPP represents the large, remote northwestern Ontario region that is currently burning at extreme rates. More than 100 active wildfires in his riding have displaced six communities so far, and put dozens more under threat as temperatures reached close to 40 C on July 15.”

Meanwhile, choking smoke from these fires has spread more than 1,000 kilometres away, making Toronto’s air quality one of the worst in the world. (On Wednesday, it was even the worst in the world and hospital visits are on the rise.) 

Ontario is not the only province burning. Per the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System, 858 active forest fires across the country have impacted 2.4 million hectares to date; 111 of these fires are considered out of control. Such wildfires are fuelled by warmer-than-average temperatures and drier conditions which make forests more prone to burning and lead to fires spreading faster and further. 

This year, there have already been 483 wildfires recorded inside Ontario’s fire region, compared to 351 last year and the 10-year average of 320. The number of fires has been climbing sharply, with 31 new fires discovered in a single day earlier this week.

“It’s eerie to be in my part of Ontario right now,” Mamakwa told The Narwhal. “The situation is unprecedented, and it’s getting worse.”

As the number of wildfires grows, so do the health risks of smoke, which is more toxic than normal pollution as it can linger in the air for weeks and travel thousands of kilometres. 

“Wildfires in my region have gotten worse and are getting worse,” Mamakwa said. “It needs to be treated like the emergency it is. Every possible measure needs to be taken to keep our communities safe.” 

Here are some things you need to know.

Wildfire smoke may increase health risks

Wildfire smoke continues to cloud much of Ontario, forcing people to stay inside as much as possible. 

This kind of smoke has three main ingredients. There are gases, such as carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide, and volatile organic compounds, like benzene, toluene and butene. There is also particulate matter, which can include soot, dust, pollen and spores, as well as chemical particles. The particles are classified according to size and fine particulates — the really tiny ones, less than 2.5 microns in diameter and typically referred to as PM2.5 — pose the greatest threats to human health because they can travel deeper into the lungs than larger ones.

The more particulates in the air, the hazier it becomes. Extremely poor air quality due to wildfire smoke is hard to ignore, often resulting in new reports and public health warnings to stay indoors and take precautions.

Research suggests even moderate levels of wildfire smoke can pose significant health risks, especially for people with chronic lung diseases like asthma or emphysema that make them more vulnerable to negative health impacts. Fine particulates found in smoke and other types of air pollution have been linked to damage in several organ systems, including the heart, brain and reproductive system.According to a study by the Canadian Climate Institute, long-term exposure to increased toxic wildfire smoke is associated with an estimated 2,500 premature deaths annually in Canada. The study found wildfire smoke caused an estimated total of $5.3 billion in acute health damages between 2014 and 2025.

Most air quality advisories in Canada are now the result of wildfires, not other pollution

Wildfires are now the most common reason for air quality advisories, which are issued when concentrations of particulate matter and hazardous gases rise to levels that can negatively impact human health.

To help Canadians understand the health risks stemming from current air conditions, authorities use the Air Quality Health Index (AQHI), a colour-coded scale of one to 10 (with a plus sign if it’s off the charts), based on concentrations of ozone, particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide — the pollutants found to have the greatest health impacts. 

The higher the health index score, the greater the risk and the more precautions people — especially those with health conditions that make them vulnerable to poor air quality — may need to take to stay safe and comfortable. Avoiding polluted air by staying inside and using air purifiers is the most effective protection but avoiding strenuous outdoor activity and wearing a respirator can also help.

Small amounts of wildfire smoke also come with long-term health risks

At the University of British Columbia, physician Chris Carlsten is leading an effort to shed light on how wildfire smoke affects human health over the short and long term. His team was recently awarded a federal grant to support its work.

Carlsten said the team is focusing on chronic exposure to any amount of wildfire smoke versus acute exposure to high levels, even though the short-term peaks are “problematic.” 

“There may be more health effects, ultimately, from the more common but lower-concentration exposures,” Carlsten said in an interview. The team will also explore how wildfire smoke affects people differently based on age, sex, genetics, exercise habits and socio-economic status.

Better data will help improve public health policy and planning when wildfires flare, allowing people to make more informed choices about how to reduce their risk.

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.

Table of Contents

• Fast-tracking development: how Ontario is changing the rules for development through Bill 5
• Climate action is no longer at the centre of Ontario’s environmental agenda
• Drivers continue to see cost reductions in Ford’s Ontario
• Water protections and wetlands face new pressures in Ontario
• Why Ontario municipalities are losing environmental powers
• The next chapter in Ontario’s battle over conservation and protected lands
• Ontario is betting big on critical minerals and energy growth
• Carbon capture and storage is also on Ontario’s agenda
• Transparency and public oversight are disappearing

In the summer of 2025, wildfires burned nearly 600,000 hectares across Ontario — an area more than twice the size of Ottawa. Thousands of people were displaced. This summer’s wildfire evacuations have already begun in the northern part of the province, while intense heat waves blanket southern Ontario, with temperatures reaching above 40 C at times. 

These extreme weather events are made more likely because of human influence on the climate, according to federal scientists. Yet as Ontario faces the growing effects of climate change, the Doug Ford government appears to be largely moving away from mitigation and adaptation in its most recent term, focusing on economic growth over environmental safeguards.

The Ford government expanded parks, invested in electricity generation, funded Indigenous participation in mining reviews and created Ontario’s first standalone Ministry of Emergency Preparedness and Response. 

But many critics, and lawsuits, still make the case that the environment is being sidelined in a bid to build.

Most notable was a proposal buried within the province’s 2025 fall economic statement to eliminate legal requirements for Ontario to maintain a climate plan and publicly report on its progress. Across Queen’s Park, ministers were advancing changes affecting everything from environmental assessments to municipal green building standards to conservation authorities. 

These changes followed Premier Ford’s third consecutive majority victory on Feb. 27, 2025, after a snap winter election dominated by concerns about affordability, economic uncertainty and the threat of U.S. tariffs. 

Since returning to office, Ford’s government has increasingly argued Ontario must move faster, building more homes, approving more mines, generating more electricity and cutting what it sees as unnecessary barriers to economic growth.

More than a year after Ford’s re-election and Bill 5’s march through the legislature, the question is no longer whether the province’s environmental agenda is changing. It is what the changes will mean for the land, water and communities.

Fast-tracking development: how Ontario is changing the rules for development through Bill 5

When the Ford government introduced Bill 5 in April 2025, it pitched the legislation as a way to speed up development, cut red tape and strengthen Ontario’s economy. Called the Protect Ontario by Unleashing our Economy Act, Bill 5 received royal assent in June 2025.

Changes under the bill affect everything from who signs off on major developments to how a habitat is defined for endangered species and when the public gets a chance to weigh in.

At the centre of that shift is a belief repeatedly expressed by the government: Ontario’s approval system takes too long.

The legislation created a new system, called One Project, One Process, designed to move projects through approvals faster. It gave cabinet new powers to designate special economic zones, where certain provincial and municipal rules won’t apply to projects deemed strategically important to Ontario’s economy.

Under the One Project, One Process framework, the Ministry of Energy and Mines became the central coordinator for designated mining projects. The province says the approach will cut review timelines in half by creating a single approval pathway and reducing duplication between ministries.

Several mining projects have already been designated under the system, including the Crawford Nickel project near Timmins and Frontier Lithium’s project near Red Lake.

For some First Nations leaders, however, the question is whether consultation can keep pace with faster approvals.

The Chiefs of Ontario has warned that speeding up development should not come at the expense of Treaty Rights and consent processes. Similar concerns have surfaced around the government’s special economic zone framework.

The Ford government’s 2025 budget included a commitment of $70 million over four years for an Indigenous Participation Fund, intended to help communities and organizations in areas of significant mineral development engage in regulatory processes related to mineral exploration and mine development.

But the debate has already moved into the courts.

Environmental groups have launched a constitutional challenge against Ontario’s Special Economic Zones Act, arguing the legislation is undemocratic, putting unchecked power in the hands of the cabinet. Several First Nations have also joined legal efforts challenging the law, arguing it threatens Indigenous Rights and weakens environmental protections.

There is no hearing scheduled yet but the law firm representing the case, Woodward & Company LLP, told The Narwhal it hopes for one to be scheduled in early 2027. 

One of the most consequential changes under Bill 5 involved Ontario’s approach to protecting species at risk.

For nearly two decades, the Endangered Species Act governed how threatened and endangered plants and animals were protected in the province. That changed with Bill 5, which proposed repealing and replacing the Endangered Species Act with the Species Conservation Act, a shift that happened on March 30, 2026, marking the most significant overhaul of Ontario’s species-at-risk framework in nearly two decades.

The new legislation narrows how a habitat is defined. Previously, habitat included the broader areas species relied on for feeding, migration and mating, among other things. The new definition focuses primarily on occupied dens, nests and similar dwelling places for animals, and immediately surroundings trees and plants. 

The government says the changes will create a more efficient and predictable system for project proponents, while continuing to protect species. But the narrower definition could leave important parts of ecosystems without protection, particularly for wide-ranging species-at-risk such as woodland caribou that depend on large connected landscapes to survive.

Climate action is no longer at the centre of Ontario’s environmental agenda

Climate policy has not disappeared altogether, but several decisions made since the Ford government’s re-election suggest it is not a driving force behind many of the province’s major policy choices.

One of the clearest examples arrived with the province’s 2025 fall economic statement.

Buried within the omnibus budget bill was a proposal to repeal portions of Ontario’s Cap and Trade Cancellation Act, legislation introduced by the Ford government in 2018 to eliminate the provincial carbon pricing system. The act had required the government to prepare a climate plan and publicly report on its progress — a law that, by the beginning of Ford’s third term, was one of the province’s few remaining climate accountability mechanisms.

The repeal came as Ontario and the rest of Canada continue to experience increasingly severe weather linked to climate change, including longer wildfire seasons, extreme heat and flooding. It also arrived at a time when national emissions reductions have largely stalled.

In its independent assessment released last year, the Canadian Climate Institute warned that Canada’s 2030 emissions-reduction target is now out of reach. While emissions have fallen since 2005, progress has slowed significantly in recent years. 

Ontario’s decision to repeal climate accountability legislation was part of a weakening of climate policies across the country, the institute noted, which is one factor making national targets more difficult to meet.

Ontario did elevate climate risk to cabinet level following the 2025 election, by creating a standalone Ministry of Emergency Preparedness and Response. It comes as Ontario experiences increasingly severe wildfire seasons linked to hotter and drier conditions. Last year, 643 fires burned nearly 600,000 hectares across the province, prompting evacuations in several northern and First Nations communities. 

It’s a necessary step, but questions remain about whether funding is keeping pace with growing climate risks. In March 2026, the government projected 2025 costs for the ministry to be $292 million, including emergency evacuations of Indigenous communities on behalf of Indigenous Services Canada. But the ministry’s operating budget was projected to rise to just $66.8 million in 2026, up $3.7 million from the previous year.

The Narwhal reached out to the Ministry of Emergency Preparedness and Response, but did not receive a response before publication.

Drivers continue to see cost reductions in Ford’s Ontario

Throughout his time in government, Ford’s Conservatives have regularly worked to reduce costs for motorists, including for fossil fuels like gasoline that emit heat-trapping gasses into the atmosphere. Transportation is the largest contributor to the province’s overall emissions.

The 2025 provincial budget permanently cut Ontario’s gasoline and diesel taxes to nine cents per litre, a move the government said would save households an average of $115 annually. The move made permanent gas tax cuts first introduced in 2022, which were extended four times. The province also permanently removed tolls on the publicly owned portion of Highway 407 East and introduced legislation preventing municipalities from implementing programs that disincentivize driving, such as road tolls or congestion pricing.

Ford’s Progressive Conservatives have consistently framed the measures as affordability initiatives, arguing they put money back into drivers’ pockets at a time of economic uncertainty. 

All of this came after a previous term punctuated with battles over bike lanes.

Water protections and wetlands face new pressures in Ontario

Twenty-five years after a fatal tragedy in Walkerton, Ont., transformed how the province protects drinking water, the Ford government is once again rewriting some of the rules governing water oversight.

One of the most significant changes came through Bill 56, the Building a More Competitive Economy Act, which received royal assent in November 2025.

Among its many provisions are amendments to Ontario’s Clean Water Act, legislation introduced in response to the 2000 Walkerton tragedy, when E. coli contamination in a municipal water supply killed seven people and sickened more than 2,300 others. The public inquiry that followed led to a layered approach to drinking water protection, including locally developed source protection plans designed to identify and manage risks before they could affect municipal water supplies.

In amending the act, the Ford government said lengthy approval processes and overlapping consultations on development projects had become cumbersome.

Under the new framework, the province standardized some drinking water protection policies and introduced changes intended to speed up plan amendments to allow for development. Government documents say the reforms could shorten approval timelines by as much as six months while providing greater certainty for municipalities, regulators and project proponents. The province has also argued the changes would maintain key protections while making the system more efficient.

But some observers see the reforms differently.

Ontario Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner has argued the changes transfer authority away from independent experts and local source protection committees. Currently, there are 19 committees — made up of conservation authorities, municipal representatives, agricultural interests and community members — that oversee 38 drinking water protection plans across the province. Schreiner told The Narwhal the local knowledge embedded in those plans was one of the central lessons of Walkerton and worried greater ministerial control could weaken that approach.

The debate over water governance extends beyond drinking water protection.

Another source of controversy has been the Water and Wastewater Public Corporations Act, first introduced in late 2025.

The legislation would allow the province to restructure municipal water and wastewater services through newly created public corporations. The government has said the changes are intended to modernize service delivery and improve efficiency.

But the proposal has sparked concerns among environmental organizations, labour groups and some academics, who argue it could open the door to greater private-sector involvement in public water systems. 

Some critics, like advocacy group Environmental Defence, have pointed to provisions that would allow water and wastewater services to be moved out of direct municipal control and governed through corporate structures, raising questions about accountability, transparency and public oversight.

The Ford government has rejected suggestions it intends to privatize water systems. After pushback, it introduced amendments to the act limiting ownership of the corporations to governments and government agencies. It says there are no plans to privatize water systems and emphasized that ownership of the proposed corporations would remain in public hands.

For many critics, the debate is informed by Ontario’s own history.

In 1994, the City of Hamilton transferred operation of its water and wastewater system to a private company as part of an effort to create what city leaders hoped would become a model for private water management. 

Just over a year after the deal was signed, roughly 180 million litres of untreated sewage spilled into Hamilton Harbour and Lake Ontario. More than 100 homes and businesses were flooded. In the years that followed, experts pointed to staffing cuts, cost overruns and repeated changes in ownership as evidence that private management, with its focus on profit over service, had failed to deliver on its promises.

Why Ontario municipalities are losing environmental powers

For years, Ontario municipalities have tested environmental policies that go beyond provincial requirements. Cities encouraged electric vehicle infrastructure, required tree planting and experimented with ways to reduce emissions from new development, including through green building standards. 

In Toronto, green roofs became mandatory on many new buildings. Other municipalities began developing their own climate-focused standards as they prepared for rapid population growth.

Over the past year, however, the Ford government has increasingly moved to limit how far municipalities can go.

One of the first major changes came through Bill 17, the Protect Ontario by Building Faster and Smarter Act, which received royal assent in June 2025, days after the Ford government was re-elected.

The legislation targeted municipal green building standards that exceed the Ontario Building Code. In Toronto, that raised questions about the future of the Toronto Green Standard, a framework that has shaped development in Canada’s largest city for more than 15 years.

The standard required developers to incorporate features to reduce emissions and improve resilience to climate change. It included requirements for bicycle parking and electric vehicle charging stations in new buildings over four storeys. Developers also had to take steps to mitigate flooding and extreme heat, for instance, by building rooftop gardens and planting trees. 

There are also financial incentives to take on even more ambitious climate-friendly features. 

The province concluded Toronto’s mandatory requirements could exceed what municipalities are permitted to require under its new law. It also argued that creating a consistent set of provincial rules will help accelerate housing development and increase housing supply. 

The Toronto Environmental Alliance, a not-for-profit advocacy organization, countered that municipalities are often better positioned to understand local environmental challenges and should retain the flexibility to address them.

That debate intensified in 2026 with Bill 98, the Building Homes and Improving Transportation Infrastructure Act.

The legislation prevented municipalities from requiring a range of environmental features in new developments, including electric vehicle parking infrastructure, bird-friendly design standards and tree planting on residential properties. Provincial analysis of the legislation acknowledged the possibility of “unintended environmental impacts” and noted that the changes could shift sustainability-related costs from developers to municipalities.

The implications extend well beyond Toronto.

Municipalities including Hamilton, Ottawa, Waterloo Region, Oshawa, Clarington and Guelph have either implemented or begun developing their own green building standards. In Durham Region, local governments have been working toward a goal of net-zero emissions for new housing by 2030. Ottawa officials have warned the legislation could prevent them from requiring electric vehicle infrastructure in developments, even where local planning work has already been completed.

Some municipal officials worry the changes could create new costs in the future.

Buildings account for roughly one-quarter of Ontario’s greenhouse gas emissions, largely because of fossil fuels used for heating. If new developments are built to lower environmental standards today, municipalities may ultimately face higher costs retrofitting those buildings in the decades ahead.

The next chapter in Ontario’s battle over conservation and protected lands

Over the past year, the Ford government has expanded park access, announced new protected lands and invested millions in outdoor recreation. In May 2026, Ontario announced plans to expand Uxbridge Urban Provincial Park by 23 acres, adding ecologically significant lands within the Oak Ridges Moraine. The government has also committed nearly $60 million toward what it describes as the largest expansion of Ontario Parks campgrounds in more than 50 years, including dozens of new campsites at MacGregor Point, Killarney and Driftwood provincial parks.

But the Ford government has also moved ahead with major development projects that cut through environmentally sensitive areas and launched the most significant restructuring of Ontario’s conservation authorities in their 80-year history.

Perhaps no project better illustrates that tension than Highway 413.

A cornerstone of Doug Ford’s re-election campaigns, the proposed highway would connect York, Peel and Halton regions and, according to the province, reduce travel times — by 30 minutes for those driving the entire stretch.

Critics have long argued the slight time savings come at a significant environmental cost.

Environmental assessments have identified impacts on Greenbelt lands, prime farmland, waterways and habitat used by species at risk, while environmental groups argue mitigation measures remain insufficient for several threatened species.

In August 2025, Ontario awarded its first construction contracts for the project, marking the beginning of a development the government says would contribute more than $1 billion annually to the provincial economy.

In Wasaga Beach, the province has removed roughly 60 hectares of Wasaga Beach Provincial Park, handing the land over to the municipality, which is making an effort to redevelop the waterfront and boost tourism. The government says the project would improve public access and support economic activity while maintaining public use of the beach.

Conservation groups and local residents have questioned whether lifting these protections sets a precedent for future development on provincially protected lands. Some have also raised concerns about piping plovers, as Wasaga Beach is one of the most important nesting sites for the endangered bird.

Similar concerns surfaced in Port Hope.

In 2025, the Ministry of Natural Resources altered the boundary of the Garden Hill Area of Natural and Scientific Interest, a designation that recognizes the unique qualities of an area, removing land that had previously been protected. The boundary change meant a planned subdivision could move ahead.

The biggest change, however, may be taking place behind the scenes.

In 2026, the Ford government formally launched plans to consolidate Ontario’s 36 conservation authorities into nine larger organizations overseen by a new provincial agency. Conservation authorities were created over 50 years ago in response to flooding disasters and the environmental impacts of a growing population.

Officials say consolidation would improve efficiency and ensure resources are distributed more evenly across the province. 

Jonathan Scott, a councillor for the town of Bradford West Gwillimbury and chair of the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority board, previously told The Narwhal the local environmental expertise in each individual authority is essential. “Merger of that scale could create a larger, more distant bureaucracy that is less responsive to local municipalities, developers and farmers,” he said about the move to consolidate. 

The province has already directed conservation authorities to pause major staffing, land acquisition and governance decisions while the transition unfolds. The restrictions are expected to remain in place until at least early 2027.

Ontario is betting big on critical minerals and energy growth

If the Ford government’s environmental agenda has one clear area of investment, it is energy and resource development.

In December 2025, the province officially launched its $500-million Critical Minerals Processing Fund. The fund is designed to help expand mineral processing capacity in Ontario, so that what’s mined here is also refined and processed within the province, rather than shipped elsewhere.

The government has described critical minerals as essential to Ontario’s economic future, pointing to growing demand from electric vehicle manufacturing, battery production, aerospace and defence.

At the same time, Ontario is preparing for a dramatic increase in electricity demand.

The province estimates electricity consumption could rise by as much as 90 per cent by 2050 as new homes, manufacturing facilities, electric vehicles and data centres place greater pressure on the grid. In response, the government has launched some of the largest electricity procurements in Ontario’s history.

Over the past year, the Independent Electricity System Operator, the Crown agency charged with balancing supply on the grid, has approved more than a dozen new energy projects, securing massive amounts of additional supply and storage capacity. The province says the projects would provide enough electricity to power hundreds of thousands of homes while helping maintain reliability as demand grows. Many of the projects also include First Nations partners that hold more than 50 per cent ownership stakes.

The government continues to pursue new nuclear generation, including small modular reactors and potential large-scale nuclear generation facilities. In April, the operator awarded contracts to a dozen wind and solar power generating projects, a major departure from the Ford government’s 2018 move to cancel a slew of renewables projects.

At the same time, officials have repeatedly emphasized the role natural gas will continue to play in maintaining reliability and cost efficiency as electricity demand increases.

Carbon capture and storage is also on Ontario’s agenda

The government has opened the door to commercial-scale carbon storage through Bill 27, legislation that allows companies to pursue projects that capture carbon dioxide emissions from industrial facilities and store them underground. The Ford government argues the technology could help reduce emissions from sectors such as cement manufacturing, steel production and power generation. 

But critics argue carbon storage allows for the continued burning of fossil fuels, rather than transitioning away from them. 

There are other pressing concerns — carbon storage is proposed for southwestern Ontario, where there are an unknown number of old gas wells that Ontario can’t afford to properly plug. As The Narwhal reporter in September, some worry carbon storage could heighten the risk of leaks from these wells of poisonous hydrogen sulfide and planet-warming methane.

In June 2026, the province announced additional funding to help municipalities address abandoned oil and gas wells scattered across southwestern Ontario. 

Transparency and public oversight are disappearing

Alongside environmental changes at Queen’s Park, another debate has emerged — one focused not on what decisions are being made, but how they are being made, who gets to know about it and who gets a say.

In 2025, the Ford government exempted aspects of the redevelopment of Ontario Place from consultation requirements under Ontario’s Environmental Bill of Rights, a move that reduced opportunities for public input on one of the province’s most controversial redevelopment projects. Similarly, the Species Conservation Act eliminated the requirement that property owners, developers or industry whose actions could harm threatened species make a posting on the public environmental registry, as was previously required under the Environmental Bill of Rights.

The most recent flashpoint came in April 2026, when the province passed Bill 97.

Among its many provisions were significant changes to Ontario’s freedom of information laws. Now, records held by cabinet ministers, parliamentary assistants and the premier’s office are exempt from public access requests. The changes were made retroactively, applying to records dating back decades.

The Canadian Association of Journalists and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression warned the amendments could significantly reduce the public’s ability to understand how government decisions are made. They argued the changes would shield records such as emails, phone logs and other communications that have historically been used to uncover information about government decision-making and public spending.

For environmental reporting, freedom of information requests have often provided a rare window into internal government discussions.

The Narwhal’s investigations into the Greenbelt scandal and Ontario’s relationship with Enbridge Gas relied, at least in part, on records obtained through freedom of information laws. 

As opportunities for public participation and access to government decisions degrade, it limits who gets a hand in shaping the future of Ontario’s environment and the people who depend on it.

Rajpreet Sahota is a community and policy reporting fellow. Her position is generously funded by the Canadian Race Relations Foundation. As per The Narwhal’s editorial independence policy, the foundation has no editorial input.

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.

Summary

• The Department of National Defence and City of North Bay have been working to clean up decades-old per- and polyfluoroalkyl, or PFAS, contamination, first announced to the public in 2017. 
• Residents have proposed a class-action lawsuit over the contamination and consequent loss of property value — though environmental and health hazards of the contamination aren’t a part of the case.
• An international company called Industrial Plastics Canada is among the 10 major importers of a Teflon-like subgroup of PFAS to Canada, and they opened a factory in North Bay in 2023.

Gathered in an arena in North Bay, Ont., in summer 2024, federal officials told hundreds of concerned citizens how they planned to remediate longstanding contamination of the city’s waterways left behind by the Department of National Defence. A few months later, officials gave a similar presentation to a packed hotel conference room.

For nearly a decade now, residents have known about the contamination. Some have been told not to drink the water from their own wells, and everyone in the city has been warned not to drink water or eat fish from a creek outside town.

The creek is part of a system of waterways where carcinogenic “forever chemicals” run downstream from a military base, emptying into Trout Lake, the source of the city’s drinking water. It sits at nearly double Health Canada’s guideline for PFAS in drinking water, measured in nanograms per litre. 

Health Canada published an “objective” level of 30 nanograms per litre in August 2024 for 25 chemicals in the PFAS family. That’s less than half of what Ontario currently recommends: 70 nanograms per litre, pertaining to just 11 PFAS chemicals. And that’s just a suggestion, not a binding regulation. 

The city did not reply to The Narwhal’s detailed questions regarding the current state of the drinking water supply, but CBC reported in February 2026 that Trout Lake contained around 58 nanograms of PFAS per litre of water.  

Thousands of substances classified as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, known as PFAS, are used to make everything from medical equipment to waterproof clothing. They can generate hazardous waste which, if not disposed of carefully, contaminates air, water and soil — where it can remain for 1,000 years, hence their other nickname, “forever chemicals.”

Statistics Canada reports almost all Canadians already have PFAS in their bodies, including in remote regions such as the Arctic and subarctic. 

In North Bay, the issue is top of mind, with a class-action lawsuit, a lengthy and expensive remediation plan and a new factory importing chemicals from the Teflon-like subgroup of PFAS, called PTFE. And the company behind that factory, Industrial Plastics Canada, is one of the 10 major importers of PTFE in Canada.

While PFAS have been making global headlines for years as an emerging threat to the environment and our bodies, North Bay knows the issue intimately; citizens fear for their water as politicians try to clean up the mess.

Here’s everything you need to know about PFAS in North Bay.

1. North Bay’s PFAS contamination comes from firefighting foam 

From the early 1970s to the mid-1990s, the Department of National Defence used a fire suppression foam containing PFAS to train firefighters across Canada, including near the North Bay Jack Garland Airport. In 2016, after the North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit learned PFAS had been identified by the Department of National Defence in waterways around the city, it commissioned consulting firm Stantec to assess the impacts on soil and groundwater.

It’s the invisible nature of these chemicals that are part of what makes them so insidious; you can’t see them or smell them, so you don’t know they’re there without testing. 

“When you look at a mine, for example, you can see it and say, ‘That’s obviously disruptive to our ecosystem.’” North Bay-based environmental anthropologist Carly Dokis previously told The Narwhal. “But these things are invisible pollutants, which then tend to attract less public awareness.”

Stantec found PFAS from the foam had contaminated soil, bedrock, groundwater, private wells and several waterways in the region including Trout Lake, Lake Nipissing and Lees, Dorlan, Chippewa and La Vase creeks and surrounding areas.

In 2025, reporting by the Investigative Journalism Bureau surfaced a report by the Royal Military College showing the Department of National Defence found elevated PFAS levels around the base as far back as 2012. That means the department knew about the contamination for five years before revealing it to the City of North Bay in 2016, and the public in 2017.

2.  PFAS impacts health, environment and property values. Residents are seeking recompense

In late 2025, North Bay citizens filed a proposed class-action lawsuit asking for remediation, safe drinking water and $105 million in damages for residents living within a three-kilometre radius of the 22 Wing Canadian Forces Base and Jack Garland Airport. Some of the people who live closest to the contamination have been receiving bottled water from the government for years, but have had no other opportunity for recourse.

The proposed lawsuit, if certified by the court, would be against the City of North Bay and the Attorney General of Canada, on behalf of the Department of National Defence, focusing on the loss of property value and remediation costs. The case is also seeking punitive damages, contending that National Defence was aware of the contamination long before warning residents.

Not mentioned in the suit is the long list of health concerns associated with “forever chemicals.”

The United States Environmental Protection Agency lists potential health risks of exposure to PFAS, including reproductive problems like infertility, developmental effects in children, increased risk of certain cancers and weakening of the body’s immune system, including reduced vaccine response. The Canadian government says PFAS can be transferred through the placenta during pregnancy, and infants can be exposed through human milk. 

Ecosystems are affected, too. Studies have shown exposure to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances can stunt plant growth and cause reduced seed germination and ability to photosynthesize. The chemicals can build up in the organs of living creatures throughout the food chain. In the district of Nipissing, that poses a risk to people who hunt, fish and harvest from the land.

“These industrial areas are often surrounded by lower-income buildings and peoples and communities,” Curtis Avery, environment department manager with Nipissing First Nation, told The Narwhal in summer 2023. “We’re the most vulnerable group of people that utilize our lands — the lands are our grocery stores. … If these are being impacted, we need to know.”

3. Cost of North Bay clean-up grew five-fold, to more than $100 million

In 2021, the City of North Bay announced plans to begin remediation under a “shared responsibility” agreement between the Department of National Defence and the city. The federal department would cover 97 per cent of the costs, or $19.4 million, and the city would cover the remaining three per cent, at $600,000. But costs have ballooned since then; in December 2025, National Defence announced it would contribute another nearly $100 million to the remediation, with the city’s share rising to more than $3.6 million. The total for the cleanup project has risen to more than $122 million.

The remediation, which began on the ground in 2024, includes excavating and disposing of about 26,000 tonnes of PFAS-impacted soil; injecting activated carbon material into particularly dense patches of PFAS to stop the underground plume from spreading; and installing a filtration system to treat water leaving the site.

“We remain committed to addressing and managing the operational legacy of the Canadian Armed Forces responsibly,” Minister of National Defence David J. McGuinty said in a news release.

As part of the process, a notice went up on the federal Impact Assessment Agency registry on April 28, inviting the public to comment up until June 5 on a proposal to install a 250-metre permeable barrier in the ground to help filter impacted groundwater. A spokesperson for the agency said its role in the project is to offer advice on determining its environmental effects, as well as providing the opportunity to post the project on the registry.

Local organizations, including the environmental group Northwatch, said in a press release that they were concerned about “very limited public engagement over the last ten years since the public disclosure of the contamination,” counting only the two forums in 2024 and 2025, where there was “limited opportunities for the public to ask questions.” 

Northwatch’s project coordinator Brennain Lloyd told The Narwhal about the public notice period, which she said her organization only learned of in a daily bulletin from the Impact Assessment Agency listing multiple assessment notices from across the country.

“To the best of our knowledge there were no local announcements or invitations to comment issued to the many residents and organizations who have identified their interest in this program,” a release from Northwatch reads.

The Department of National Defence did not respond to questions from The Narwhal. 

4. North Bay’s not alone: contaminated military bases affect communities across Canada

Contamination on federal sites is an issue across Canada. There are thousands of contaminated sites listed on the federal contaminated sites inventory, and PFAS are found on more than 100 of them. These include at least 26 National Defence sites including bases in Trenton, Ont., Gagetown, N.B., and Moose Jaw, Sask.

And contaminants don’t stop at the fenceline. Health Canada says some contaminants can travel long distances through soil, water and air: “PFAS can be found in fresh water and drinking water in areas that are far away from where they entered the environment,” according to the department’s website.

5. Industry is still importing PFAS-class chemicals into North Bay

While the Canadian government no longer uses firefighting foam that contains PFAS, industry continues to bring these substances into the country. In 2023, The Narwhal reported on an international plastics conglomerate that opened its first Canadian location, Industrial Plastics Canada, in North Bay. The company has a presence across Europe as well as in India and China, billing itself as one of the “largest worldwide manufacturers of PTFE products.” 

PTFE, or polytetrafluoroethylene, is a Teflon-like product in a subgroup of PFAS known as fluoropolymers, or fluoroplastics. A company spokesperson previously told The Narwhal the use of PTFE at the factory will not produce waste and poses “no risk.” The company also says fluoropolymers aren’t as dangerous as other PFAS and are “considered safe, non-bioaccumulative and non-toxic.” 

But fluoropolymers have been found to be dangerous to human health, according to research published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science & Technology and others.

In 2023, Health Canada released a draft assessment of the state of PFAS in Canada to help decide how to regulate the class of chemicals. In it, the agency cited an industry-funded study that said fluoropolymers should be considered separately from other PFAS as “polymers of low concern.” A Health Canada spokesperson said the agency, along with Environment and Climate Change Canada, “examined information from a wide range of sources,” including scientific journals and reports while preparing the state of PFAS report.

The substances were ultimately excluded from the final report, released in March 2025, in which Health Canada proposed classifying the remaining PFAS chemicals as toxic substances under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.

The Health Canada spokesperson said in an email that fluoropolymers “have specific properties that differentiates them from other PFAS,” which led to their exclusion from the final report. They added that the exclusion “should not be interpreted as meaning they are or are not of concern,” and that a separate fluoropolymer assessment is currently underway.

The exclusion of PTFE from that classification was a major priority for industry, Rémy Alexandre, toxics project lead at environmental law non-profit EcoJustice, told The Narwhal.

According to data collected by Alexandre, who studied Industrial Plastics Canada’s imports to North Bay, the company brought in almost 207,000 kilograms of PTFE from India and China from July 2025 to May 2026.

This puts the facility on the list of the 10 major importers of PTFE in Canada, alongside U.S.-based chemicals company Chemours, a spinoff of Dupont that has been arguing that the European Union should exempt fluoropolymers from their regulations, too. 

“The decision to site this plant in a community that is an existing hotspot for PFAS raises concerns,” Alexandre told The Narwhal. “And so does the selection of a jurisdiction that isn’t regulating fluoropolymers.”

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Summary

• The Alberta government has gone back and forth on coal mining in the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, with major decisions followed by major reversals.
• There are three main coal mines currently active in Alberta, with at least three more projects in earlier stages of development. The majority of these produce coal used to make steel.
• Country musician Corb Lund says his petition for a referendum question about coal mining in the Rockies has enough signatures to move ahead, but the government says it can’t be included on the October ballot.

Ever since the Alberta government surprised everyone by suddenly changing the rules around coal mining in the Rocky Mountains six years ago, the province has been on a rollercoaster of regulatory changes. 

First there was the lifting of the old coal policy, followed by its reinstatement after public outrage — but not before some projects were approved. Then there was a suspension of those approvals, followed by a government review. Confused yet?

As it stands now, the government says a new coal policy to govern mining and exploration will be unveiled this year. But the last several years of back and forth have resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars (so far) in government payments to coal companies that were burned by the on-again/off-again regulatory seesawing. 

And that’s not all. There’s also recent controversy over a petition led by country musician Corb Lund to block coal exploration in the Rockies, which the government says it won’t allow on the October ballot despite Lund claiming to have enough signatures (more on that below). 

So what’s going on with coal mining in Alberta, exactly? Are there any projects operating or exploring? Will we ever have regulatory clarity from the government? 

Let’s dive in.

Quick recap of the Alberta coal mining regulatory merry-go-round, please?

As noted above, the United Conservative Party government under former premier Jason Kenney suddenly killed a long-standing coal policy in Alberta, dating back to 1976. It did so on the Friday before a long weekend in 2020, but it failed to fly under the radar. The change made it easier to mine on the eastern slopes of the Rockies — a key fresh water source for much of the country. 

The ensuing outcry forced the government to backtrack on the change in 2021, but that was far from the end of it.

A year later, the government ordered a pause on new exploration in some areas and a government committee hit the road to gather input from Albertans.

The government then instituted a moratorium on exploration and development on the eastern slopes in 2022.

That new moratorium was lifted in 2025, allowing suspended projects to move forward and new applications to be filed as the government works on a new coal policy. The policy will govern where and when a company can mine for coal on the eastern slopes; the government is currently only consulting about it with industry. 

The province also says mountaintop removal mining won’t be allowed under its new policy, but there are serious questions about what that means, and how much of a mountain can still be removed.

Along the convoluted way, companies caught up in these changes sued the province for upwards of $12 billion, although the final figure will likely be lower based on settlements to date. The province has finalized agreements with two companies for a total of $238 million, leaving three lawsuits outstanding.

Those lawsuits were a primary consideration for the government when it decided to lift the moratorium last year, according to Premier Danielle Smith.

Also worth noting is the government’s own coal policy committee, which issued a report in 2021 arguing regional and subregional land-use plans — broad rules that seek to balance multiple uses, essentially what should and should not be allowed in designated areas of the province — need to be completed before “any major coal project approvals are considered.” 

Still with us?

Are there currently coal mines in Alberta? What’s happening now?

It’s hard to keep track of it all, and to remember which mines are still moving ahead and which have decided to head for more stable (regulatory) ground. There are currently three active coal mines in Alberta, with a handful in earlier stages of development.

But it’s important to make clear that we’re mostly talking about metallurgical coal here, which is a higher-grade product used in steel production. It’s different from coal burned to create electricity.

Most of the thermal coal mines, used to provide power, have shuttered with the end of coal-fired power in the province. But not all. 

Let’s break it down by region. In the central Rockies — the area roughly west of Edmonton and adjacent to Jasper National Park — there are currently two operating thermal mines; one thermal mine expansion, Vista; and one metallurgical mine proposal, Mine 14, which was controversially approved by the Alberta Energy Regulator (appeals to come). 

A little farther south, near the town of Nordegg, another metallurgical mine is in the exploration phase. 

In the southern region, there is a metallurgical mine, also in the exploration phase. 

There’s one more mine, east of Edmonton, that sells small quantities of thermal coal directly to the public.

Which Alberta mines are the most hotly debated?

Two of the mines that have generated the most controversy are actually not currently operating.

Mine 14, in west-central Alberta, along the Rockies near Grande Cache, was scheduled to have a public hearing after the regulator gave its nod of approval to the project. That hearing was cancelled, however, after conversations between the company and the CEO of the Alberta Energy Regulator, Rob Morgan, raised questions over the independence of the energy regulator, preventing opponents from airing their concerns about the project.

A coalition of environmental organizations is appealing that cancellation in the courts.

Then, farther south, there’s the Grassy Mountain mine proposed north of the Crowsnest Pass, a traditional coal region that hasn’t seen an active mine for decades. Grassy Mountain has generated the most opposition from ranchers, environmentalists and some First Nations. It was also the subject of controversy due to conversations between Morgan, the regulator CEO, and the company behind the project, Northback. The regulator refused to disclose to The Tyee, which broke the story, what was discussed at that meeting.

Grassy Mountain was rejected in 2021 by the Alberta Energy Regulator and the federal government. The regulator said the project was not in the public interest, while the federal review said the economic benefits of the project did not outweigh the significant environmental risks. That rejection was upheld in multiple court cases, but the mine was included on a provincial government list of approved projects that were not impacted by its moratorium.

In 2024, Energy Minister Brian Jean wrote a letter to the Alberta Energy Regulator saying the project could be considered.  

“Once a project is considered an advanced project it remains as one regardless of the outcome of regulatory applications submitted before it was declared an advanced project,” Jean wrote in his letter to the regulator.

He went on to say he expected the regulator would review any applications for advanced projects. The regulator dutifully did so and the project is moving through the regulatory process.

What’s up with Corb Lund’s petition about Alberta coal mining?

There is local support for Grassy Mountain in Crowsnest Pass, which held a non-binding referendum that showed majority support for the project (even though it’s located in the neighbouring Municipal District of Ranchlands).

The Piikani First Nation, on whose traditional territory the mine would sit, says it supports exploratory drilling, but is reserving judgement on the mine itself.

But there has been significant opposition across Alberta, not only to Grassy Mountain, but to coal mining on the eastern slopes in general. 

A recent petition asking the government to either ban coal mining on the Rockies, or to ask Albertans whether they want a ban in a referendum, claims to have more than 200,000 signatures, more than enough to get the issue on the ballot in October. However, Premier Smith said it’s too late for the topic to be included amongst a long list of referendum questions being put to Albertans — all of which deal with increased provincial sovereignty or separation.

The creator of that petition, country musician Corb Lund, said the petition is being tossed aside based on a missed deadline that didn’t exist. 

“I personally met with the premier in her office on May 11. We were literally discussing the wording of my question as it should appear on the ballot, face-to-face. And at no point was any June 1 deadline mentioned,” Lund said in a statement emailed to media. 

He said the premier has the authority to put something on the ballot and that she has done so multiple times, with nine of her government’s own questions on topics ranging from more control over immigration to constitutional amendments, as well as a question on holding a separation referendum.

If the question isn’t put to Albertans in October, it will have to wait until 2027.

In addition to the petition, the government’s own survey of Albertans, conducted in 2021, showed overwhelming concern about coal development in the province. More than 85 per cent of respondents didn’t think coal development or exploration was adequately regulated, and more than 90 per cent thought it should be barred from certain areas, including the Rockies, foothills, areas near watersheds and more.

What’s next with coal mining in Alberta

The government has promised a revamped coal policy for the province this year, but there is no date and no details. It is currently consulting industry, and only industry, on the policy.The Alberta government did not respond to an email asking when the new policy will be unveiled.

In the meantime, it has approved Mine 14, the Vista thermal coal mine expansion and allowed for Grassy Mountain to conduct exploratory drilling. Valory, the company behind Mine 14, is also pushing for a new metallurgical coal mine along the Rockies called Blackstone.

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.

Summary

• Tick populations are spreading in Ontario, increasing the risk of Lyme disease.
• Of the 44 varieties of ticks found in the province, only one — blacklegged ticks — carry Lyme, but they make up more than half of all ticks here.
• Experts say people need to recognize the risk of ticks and Lyme in the outdoors, and check themselves and others.

With the kids in bed and the movie credits rolling, I turned to my partner and asked the question no man can resist: would you check me for ticks? We’d been out in the backyard most of the day, among a not-so-recently mowed lawn, shrubs and tall native grasses. They all could be harbouring any number of pests — including the one adding an extra element of terror to southern Ontario summers. Wildfire smoke? Check. Extreme heat? Check. Ticks? Check — no, really: check yourself for ticks.

The insects have been spreading across Canada as the climate changes, and southern Ontario has seen a dramatic increase among several species of ticks. Unfun fact: our province has 44 species in total, according to Public Health Ontario. But only one, the blacklegged tick, carries Lyme disease (we’ll get to that in a minute).

Ticks have been on the rise in Canada for the better part of the last decade, Manisha Kulkarni, a professor in University of Ottawa’s School of Epidemiology and Public Health, says.

“What we’re really seeing is the result of this multi-year trend of tick population expansion in North America,” she says. “And now we’re really seeing those populations establishing in more regions in southern parts of Canada, including in Ontario.”

With warmer weather, ticks in Ontario are spreading

There are a few factors encouraging the tick’s northward march, Kulkarni says, but “one of the main drivers is climate change.”

“We’re not seeing as cold winters that would normally prevent them from surviving and reproducing, so they’re able to survive in more regions,” she adds. 

That longer warm season allows more time for ticks to find hosts — like us — to feed on, and to reproduce. As a result, every year we’re seeing populations establish in new areas that now have desirable conditions for ticks.

So while my family in the Niagara region has been dealing with ticks every spring and summer for years, this summer they’ve become a shared foe within the family chat. The latest map from Ontario Public Health shows populations of blacklegged ticks as far north as Thunder Bay and Kenora, throughout the Ottawa Valley and in Owen Sound, on Lake Huron.

I’ve heard a few people seek a silver lining on the coldest days of winter, saying that at least long stretches of deep freeze will decrease the risks of ticks. They were — officially — wrong.

While we did have some bitingly cold temperatures in Ontario this winter, Kulkarni says, “We also had lots of snow, which is a great insulator.” Ticks burrow down in the leaf litter, blanketed by snow, and stay cozy even when we’re complaining about a stretch of -30 C days.

So depending on where you live, it might be time to draw the blinds, strip down … and turn on the lights.

How to check for ticks (or stop them before they get to you)

How exactly should you check yourself and loved ones for ticks? Cover as much surface area as possible, according to Health Canada. Check your chest and back, and in your hair — and don’t forget the crevices: armpits (and kneepits!), belly button and between your toes. Ticks also have a habit of going for the groin so … yeah.

To prevent ticks from reaching your skin in the first place, Health Canada suggests closed-toed shoes, long sleeves and pants — with your shirt tucked into your pants and your pants tucked into your socks. Ten minutes in a hot dryer will take care of any that hitched a ride on your clothes. 

Sticking to cleared paths and trails helps, too. 

And there may be ways to keep ticks away, more broadly, from outdoor spaces humans like to frequent. Kulkarni’s team at University of Ottawa recently released a study that found spreading wood chips at the edges of gardens and trails where ticks are prevalent effectively reduced the number that came looking for blood. 

How did they test that? Dragging a piece of flannel material across the ground before and after wood chips were laid to see how many latched on. It really tells you something about how easily ticks attach, doesn’t it?

Why do so many Canadian musicians have Lyme disease? Blame the deer

As ticks take on new territory, their presence isn’t just creepy and unwelcome, it’s actually a public health risk: ask Justin Bieber, Avril Lavigne or Shania Twain.

They’ve all publicly announced their diagnoses of the disease that, if left untreated, can cause neurological and cardiac issues, as well as arthritis.

Some areas of the country and our province, particularly around Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, have a higher concentration of ticks carrying bacteria that cause Lyme disease. Though it’s the most common disease people get from ticks, Lyme isn’t the only one they carry. And while not all types of ticks can pass on Lyme disease, more than half of the ticks found in Ontario are of the blacklegged variety that can, according to Public Health Ontario’s recent report. 

How does it happen, you ask? After mating on the backs of deer, the female blacklegged tick drops to the ground and, in the spring, lays eggs among the leaf litter, Kulkarni explains. Those eggs hatch into larvae, which quickly go looking for their first drink of blood. Down among the leaves, that’s usually from a small animal like a mouse or bird. If that animal is infected with the bacteria that causes Lyme, the tick takes on the infection. When it’s larger and more active, in the nymphal stage, the tick will find a bigger animal or human to feed on, and pass that infection on to them. As they mature into adults, white-tailed deer, dogs and humans are all on the menu.

“There’s several points in the cycle where humans are susceptible, but that tends to be during the nymphal peak of activity, in kind of the late spring and summer months, and then the adults, which are in the early spring and in the fall,” Kulkarni says.

For a general rule of where there might be a risk of ticks, consider if it’s a place populated by white-tailed deer, Kulkarni says.

Lyme disease diagnosis is up, so pull your pants down. But what do you do if you find one?

Across Canada, diagnoses of Lyme disease have skyrocketed from 104 cases in 2009 to a preliminary count of 7,105 cases in 2025, though the increase is likely due to awareness and increased testing, as well as a rise in cases. So far this year in Ontario, 236 cases have been identified by Public Health Ontario.

If you can remove the tick within a day, you can spare yourself a lot of trouble — it typically takes more than 24 hours after it attaches for the tick to pass on the bacteria that causes Lyme disease. Properly removing it means pulling the tick out straight, rather than twisting or bending, which risks leaving some of its mouthparts (unfortunately, that is the proper anatomical term) embedded. 

Next up? Keep the tick. Put that little sucker into a sealed container and take it to your doctor for testing (they’ll be thrilled). And if you can’t wait to know whether you’re holding a little blacklegged tick hostage — the kind that carries Lyme — you can also submit photos of the little offender online, where it will be quickly identified by kind-hearted insect enthusiasts.

If you have been bit, or even suspect you may have been, look out for Lyme symptoms like a rash or fever, headache or joint pain, Kulkarni says. These can occur even without the most famous Lyme symptom: a bullseye rash around the bite. “Not everybody actually gets the rash, so it’s important to look out for those other symptoms,” she says. If you have a summer fever, she adds, “that’s a good indication you should get checked out for Lyme, especially if you’ve been in an area where ticks are present.”

It’s not about being afraid to go outside, she adds, but equipping yourself with knowledge: both of the level of risk for ticks and Lyme wherever you’re going (there’s a map for that!) and how to properly remove one of it digs in (there are kits for that — and tweezers work, too!).

Kulkarni likens the threat of ticks to another unpleasant natural hazard. “There are settings where we know there’s poison ivy. People don’t go off the trail because they might brush along it, and if they do get a rash, they know what to do, right?,” she says. “Tick bites can be a bit more serious than that, but it’s the same concept: that being out in nature isn’t without risks, but by knowing what the risks are and how to manage them, you can really reduce any potential impacts.”

So check yourself, your kids, your pets — and your friends, if they need it. And if you’ve got a special someone at home, why not make 2026 the summer of sexy tick checks?

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.

“There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold,” penned the poet Robert Service about the Klondike Gold Rush. Between 1897 and 1899, around 100,000 people voyaged to the Yukon with the dream of striking it rich.

But perhaps the strangest thing yet: 127 years later, Yukon mining is still governed by laws drafted for the Gold Rush era. 

In 2025, placer miners — like that gold-panner you’re probably already picturing — harvested $449 million in gold revenue from the territory while the Yukon government took home $33,000 in royalties — taxes earned from said mining.

Yes, you read that correctly: $33,000. Another way, perhaps, to say “fool’s gold.”

The Placer Mining Act was created in 1906 when gold was worth $15 an ounce. It requires placer miners, who extract heavy minerals from loose sediment — typically in rivers or streambeds — rather than digging them out of solid rock, to pay the government 37.5 cents for every ounce of gold they get. Today, the price of gold ranges from $6,150 to $6,500 an ounce.

And antiquated royalty laws are just the tip of the iceberg.

The Yukon’s mining legislation is “grossly outdated,” Sebastian Jones says. A fish and wildlife habitat analyst at the Yukon Conservation Society, Jones says the Yukon’s mining legislation should be “top of mind” for Canadians to understand at a time when all eyes are fixed on critical minerals in the North — and when new mines are being approved by the Yukon and federal governments.

Up here, the habitat of threatened Woodland caribou is already under pressure, while First Nations are dealing with the environmental damage of legacy mines and determined to enforce their territorial rights.

More than one Yukoner warned me that writing about mining in the Yukon is like opening a can of worms. Or a whole barrel, for that matter.

How is mining regulated in the Yukon, which mines are being approved and what’s really at stake?

Grab a can opener, folks.

Let’s get into it.

Two acts govern mining activities in the Yukon — both fundamentally fail to address First Nations land treaties

The rules that govern mining in the territory are divided into two documents: the Placer Mining Act, which governs those surface miners, and the Quartz Mining Act, which governs the extraction of minerals from within rocks by blasting, drilling or heap leaching. (We’ll get into heap leaching in a bit.)

A major gap in the Yukon’s outdated mining acts is any mention of the modern-day context of First Nations self-governance and rights. 

Eleven of the 14 First Nations in the Yukon have signed land-claim agreements under the Umbrella Final Agreement, one of the most important political and legal frameworks in the territory, which came into effect in 1993. The agreement recognizes seven regions and recommends land-use planning within those regions — legal agreements with First Nations governments and the Yukon government to define what activities, mining included, will be allowed where and by whom.

Since 1993, only two land-use plans have been completed in the Yukon, with a third currently in review.

What does this have to do with mining and outdated mining legislation? Well, pretty much everything.

What is free-entry staking and why does it matter?

Free-entry staking, yet another colonial holdover from the Gold Rush, allows anyone — literally anyone over the age of 18; you don’t have to be a Yukoner or even a Canadian — to stake and record a mineral claim that gives them the right to explore for minerals in the area.

Mining claims staked during the Klondike Gold Rush, for example, still have legal jurisdiction, even if they aren’t being actively developed or exploited.

These staked claims are creating enormous legal complexity. And it’s a big part of the reason why land-use planning has been delayed.

First Nations governments, including the Na-Cho Nyäk Dun, have called for a cessation of all mining activities on their traditional territory, including the exploration and development of existing and proposed claims, until their land-use plan is completed.

Meanwhile, the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in First Nation has taken it one step further. They’re suing the Yukon government for the mismanagement of hundreds of idle mineral claims that were staked before their land-claim agreement was signed in 1998. The First Nation argues the idle claims weren’t properly cleared out or cancelled, and have since caused environmental damages on their traditional territory.

Is change on the horizon?

In 2021, the Yukon government, led by the Liberal party, began meeting with First Nations, industry and other stakeholders. The goal? Develop new legislation to replace both the Placer Mining Act and Quartz Mining Act.

In September 2025, CBC North got its hands on a 30-page draft document using the territory’s access to information laws. The plan was to make major changes to the free-entry system. Staking a claim would no longer automatically grant mineral rights. Only after a certain amount of exploration was done could prospectors apply for mineral rights, and if they wanted to go ahead they’d need authorization from the Yukon government and First Nations.

But then came an election. In November 2025, the Liberals lost power after three successive terms. The conservative-leaning Yukon Party took the reins, winning the largest majority in the territory’s history. It’s unclear if any parts of the draft document are still being considered.

Premier Currie Dixon, leader of the Yukon Party, campaigned on bolstering the mining industry and tells me modernizing the Yukon’s outdated laws is a priority for his government. He cites a long list of issues from the way mines are assessed, regulated and monitored, along with processes for ensuring that companies adhere to regulations. “We’re hopeful that we’ll be able to find a way to engage with First Nations through a process that will lead us to a new mineral legislation sometime in 2028,” he says.

What projects are being approved?

For those concerned with Indigenous Rights and environmental issues, the new legislation can’t come soon enough — particularly as the Yukon government approves new mines.

In mid-April, the Yukon and federal governments approved the Kudz Ze Kayah mine, a proposed zinc, copper and lead mine, owned by Vancouver-based BMC Minerals. 

The proposed mine is located 115 kilometres south-east of the community of Ross River on the traditional territories of the Kaska First Nations. The Ross River Dena Council has expressed fierce opposition to the project.

The Kudz Ze Kayah mine, Jones says, would be “right slap in the middle” of a threatened caribou herd’s range. The Finlayson caribou, a woodland caribou herd, was recently declared a “living ecological person” by the Ross River Dena Council, which grants caribou the inherent rights to thrive in their natural range and be legally protected from industrial harms. 

Yukoners are also paying close attention to the Coffee Gold Mine, located 130 kilometres south of Dawson City on the traditional territory of the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in and Selkirk First Nation and on the claimed traditional territory of White River First Nation. It’s getting closer to obtaining the necessary permits to start building.

Who is going to clean up the mess?

While past and present Yukon governments continue to tout the economic development benefits of mines, the territory is paying millions of dollars to clean up a long list of failed and abandoned mines. 

In 2024, the Yukon government paid nearly $190 million for mine remediation. That didn’t include the cost of the Eagle Mine disaster, one of the biggest mine failures in the territory’s history, which occurred on June 24, 2024.

The Eagle Mine, formerly owned by Victoria Gold, is located near the community of Mayo in north-central Yukon on the territory of the Na-Cho Nyäk Dun First Nation. It’s a gold mining operation that uses a technique called “heap leaching.” 

To understand what that looks like, think of a pour-over coffee. Heap leaching involves crushing rock, piling it on top of an impervious liner pad and then pouring a cyanide-liquid over the heap that selectively targets the gold, dissolving it into a liquid that pools in the pad. It’s relatively common in the Yukon because it’s cheaper than drilling or blasting. Companies extract the ‘liquid gold’ from beneath the pile and pump it out to be processed. The remaining ore stays piled and enclosed by containment berms.

The Eagle Mine disaster happened when one of those protective berms suddenly collapsed, causing a massive landslide of cyanide-contaminated ore. An independent review found that 1.8 million tonnes of contaminated material spilled into nearby Haggart Creek and the surrounding groundwater.

All operations were immediately halted, while Victoria Gold, unable to afford environmental clean-up, entered into a court-ordered receivership and filed for bankruptcy. It took a full month after the initial failure for the government to begin groundwater remediation. 

Kate White, leader of the NDP, the official opposition party in the Yukon, describes the events of the Eagle Mine failure as “the biggest environmental disaster” the territory has seen. “No one knows the full cost … no one will know what has leached into the water,” White says.

The costs to clean up the mess are projected to reach upwards of $377.5 million by this fall, with a $220-million payout from the Yukon government. 

In December 2025, the Na-Cho Nyäk Dun filed a $150-million lawsuit against the Yukon and federal governments, claiming treaty obligations were not upheld and the Eagle Mine was not adequately regulated. In a letter penned to the Auditor General of Canada, the Nah-Cho Nyäk Dun blamed the Yukon government’s “lax approach to permitting, compliance, monitoring and enforcement of mineral activity in the Yukon.” The First Nation is also calling for a public inquiry.

Yukon’s modern-day ‘mineral rush’ despite century-old legislation

It’s hard to keep up with the number of mines currently being advanced in the Yukon. The list is long and projects are at various stages of development.

In Whitehorse, residents don’t have to look beyond the city limits to encounter drilling sites. Gladiator Metals, a B.C.-based company, has been looking for copper, silver and gold in Whitehorse since 2023. In April, the Yukon government approved the company to expand exploration, with some drilling sites located only 800 metres away from residential areas.

The Casino Mine — what would be one of the biggest open-pit copper, silver, and gold mines in the Yukon’s history — is currently under review by the Yukon’s environmental and socio-economic assessment board. The mine is owned by Western Copper and Gold Corporation, a Vancouver-based company.

And then there’s the Mactung mine, owned by Fireweed Metals, which is one of the world’s largest-known deposits of high-grade tungsten. 

What is tungsten? It’s an exceptionally hard, heat-resistant metal that’s sought after for industrial and military manufacturing. Tungsten replaces lead in ammunition. It’s used to make rocket engine nozzles and aircraft parts.

The Mactung mine, located at the end of the North Canol road near the Yukon-Northwest Territories border, is drawing major investment from the Canadian and U.S. governments.

In 2024, Canada and the U.S. Department of Defense announced they’d be investing a combined $35 million toward studies and designs for improving the North Canol road and connecting the electrical transmission line to power operations.

Over a century may have passed since the Klondike Gold Rush, but perhaps it’s never really ended in the Yukon — it’s just traded gold pans for open-pit mines. Today’s national agenda is resulting in a new rush for critical minerals yet the Yukon’s mining legislation remains a century behind.

Updated June 9, 2026 at 9:35 a.m. PT: A previous version of this story stated that in 2025, placer miners harvested $449,000 million in gold revenue from the Yukon. The correct figure is $449 million.

Updated June 11, 2026 at 4:25 p.m. PT: The Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board was previously misidentified as “the Yukon environmental and social assessment board.”

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.

Summary

• The federal government will offer tax credits to companies that capture carbon pollution and use it to extract more oil.
• That process is called enhanced oil recovery, and it involves injecting carbon dioxide deep underground to push more oil to the surface.
• Critics say subsidizing enhanced oil recovery operations is counterproductive. It does stop some carbon dioxide from escaping into the atmosphere, but it also enables the production of more carbon-emitting fossil fuels.

Canada is planning to give financial incentives to companies that capture carbon dioxide and use it to produce more oil. The technique, called enhanced oil recovery, was formerly barred from receiving federal tax credits. 

Huh? Enhanced oil recovery? You’d be excused for scratching your head.

The technique uses carbon dioxide to pump more oil (we’ll get into it below) — and is controversial. Can you reduce emissions by pumping more oil? 

But the government’s ban on subsidies for enhanced oil recovery projects was reversed in dramatic fashion last year, first in a deal with Alberta that resulted in cabinet minister Steven Guilbeault resigning.

The government then solidified the change across the country in its latest economic update.

So what is enhanced oil recovery and what are its impacts on emissions and on government finances?

Here’s a primer.

Back up, what’s carbon capture, utilization and storage?

Industries emit a lot of carbon dioxide. Too much. Governments have tried to incentivize companies to reduce the amount of carbon pollution they release into the atmosphere — where it traps heat and contributes to climate-driven problems like increased wildfire, hurricanes, droughts and more.

One strategy is to capture the carbon pollution rather than release it up into the sky, then either store it (storage) or use it to make other things (utilization). When it’s stored, it’s most often injected deep underground.

There are two options in this scenario: one, it can be stored underground, plain and simple. Buried and forgotten.

The second is that you use the carbon dioxide to get more oil out of the ground, then store it. That’s what’s known as enhanced oil recovery — in essence, injecting carbon dioxide into a well so you can get more oil. Globally, it’s by far the most common of the two.

A 2022 report found nearly three-quarters of captured carbon pollution around the world is used to extract more oil.

How does enhanced oil recovery work?

Enhanced oil recovery can involve pumping anything from water to steam to gas deep into the ground to increase pressure in an underground oil reservoir. The goal? To force more oil out of a well. 

But in this instance, we’re talking specifically about using captured carbon dioxide as the pressure builder, often alongside water.

A company will either capture carbon pollution, or purchase it from another source, and then inject it deep underground to push more oil to the surface. Most of that carbon pollution will then remain trapped underground.

A well-designed system will capture emissions from the enhanced oil recovery operation and reinject them back into the reservoir, creating a closed loop, but not all systems will capture all emissions.

Sounds smart, what’s up?

The process can significantly prolong the lifespan of a fossil fuel reservoir, so it makes sense if the goal is to increase or extend production. 

It also creates a bigger market for captured emissions, further incentivizing companies to capture carbon pollution rather than release it into the atmosphere. 

But the issue is that enhanced oil recovery takes carbon dioxide, ostensibly captured to reduce emissions, and uses it to pull more carbon-emitting fossil fuels from the ground.

Determining whether there is a net reduction in emissions from this process is complicated and depends on a lot of factors — including how much traditional production is displaced by enhanced oil recovery, how much carbon is actually stored underground, the impact on prices and demand, how much carbon is produced while recovering oil, the type of oil produced and the lifecycle of the fuel that is produced.

Sound complicated? It is.

Research suggests the process can achieve reductions in per-barrel emissions, commonly referred to as emissions intensity.

On the other hand, enhanced oil recovery produces more carbon pollution than simply capturing and storing emissions permanently underground.

Traditionally, enhanced oil recovery used carbon dioxide that was naturally occurring and already stored underground, but newer methods involve using captured emissions — a critical distinction when discussing the potential of any emissions reductions. 

As one 2025 peer-reviewed meta-analysis of enhanced oil recovery research dryly suggested, “the extent to which [carbon capture and utilization] projects that store captured [carbon dioxide] in oil reservoirs support achieving [greenhouse gas] emissions targets is debated.” 

That study found analyses of the life-cycle emissions of enhanced oil recovery vary greatly — all the way from increasing emissions to reducing them.

So, why are we talking about this?

The previous Liberal government announced tax credits for carbon capture and utilization projects, significantly reducing costs for the companies building them. Projects are typically expensive to build and the government wanted any and all emissions reductions to move ahead. 

It excluded enhanced oil recovery, arguing it was counterproductive to reducing overall emissions and the government’s goal to move toward a net-zero economy.

The Liberals under Prime Minister Mark Carney, however, reversed that decision and announced enhanced oil recovery could receive tax credits, first in a November memorandum of understanding with Alberta regarding a new pipeline, and then again in its latest economic update. Industry cheered the decision, while those concerned with emissions cried foul.

Under Carney’s new rules, a project will have to permanently store 95 per cent of the carbon dioxide used to pump more oil be eligible for tax credits. 

In Alberta, the government already provides tax credits for enhanced oil recovery operations. That program does not include the need to capture a minimum amount of carbon in order to qualify.

Critics call these credits a fossil fuel subsidy. Companies who receive the money from the federal and provincial governments do not. Therein lies the debate.

What will this cost taxpayers?

That will depend on how many producers meet the criteria set by the government.

In 2024, the Parliamentary Budget Office estimated the tax credit would cost the government $5.7 billion between 2022 and 2028 — but that was before enhanced oil recovery was added to the list of eligible projects. It’s unclear what the impact of that addition will be. 

There is one important distinction: the tax credits for enhanced oil recovery aren’t as lucrative as those for storage alone: the amount of money an oil project can recoup is half of what a company that simply stores carbon permanently underground can receive. 

For that reason, the federal government estimates credits for enhanced oil recovery might actually save some taxpayer dollars — $395 million over four years, starting in 2027, according to a federal Department of Finance official responding to questions from The Narwhal.

The official said the savings would come from companies deciding to store carbon for enhanced oil recovery rather than dedicated storage, and receive less public money for doing so.

While incentivizing enhanced oil recovery may represent a savings in terms of tax credits, the costs come from increased emissions and long-term impacts.

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Summary

• As other provinces move to restrict access to public records, B.C. insists its proposed changes are about efficiency.
• Critics say these changes could make it harder for British Columbians to access public records.
• B.C.’s citizens services ministry is receiving fewer FOI requests now than it was in 2020, but those requests are producing more pages than ever before.

Maybe you’ve heard the famous lyric from Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi”: “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone?”

That wistful lament about the environmental impacts of development seems unfortunately applicable to freedom of information systems across Canada these days.

The federal government is mulling shielding some forms of government communications from the public. Ontario’s government recently passed a law that exempts documents created by the premier’s office, cabinet ministers and parliamentary secretaries from freedom of information requests. The changes are part of the government’s omnibus bill and are retroactive, potentially stopping hundreds of active requests in their tracks. Meanwhile, Alberta enacted a new freedom of information regime last year, one that significantly restricts access rights and gives the government sweeping powers to withhold requested information or reject requests entirely.

The B.C. government’s freedom of information — known as FOI — legislation is different, at least according to Citizens Services Minister Diana Gibson. Since introducing Bill 9, Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, Gibson has repeatedly talked about other Canadian governments “pulling back” on access to information.

“We are not,” Gibson told reporters. “That’s why these amendments are here, to clarify that we are maintaining oversight and access and one of the strongest FOI acts in Canada.”

Broadly, Bill 9 has two areas of focus. Parts of the bill aim to make it easier for public bodies to share information in response to requests, cutting down on the need for people to contact multiple agencies to get the information they seek. 

Other changes seem geared toward getting more FOI requests rejected, critics say. Currently, the law says an FOI request must give “enough detail to enable an experienced employee of the public body, with a reasonable effort, to identify the record sought.” Bill 9 adds that an experienced employee must be able to identify requested records in “a reasonable amount of time” in “the opinion of the head of the public body.” That potentially gives public sector executives a lot of power to refuse to fulfill requests.

“It degrades freedom of information under the guise of administrative convenience, making the government both judge and juror over what the public can access,” Green Party MLA Rob Botterell said in a statement about the changes. Botterell, who helped draft the original law, which passed in 1992, called Bill 9 an “evisceration of this cornerstone legislation.”

Gibson has accused critics of spreading misinformation and cherry-picking data about B.C.’s FOI system to suit their own narratives.

Let’s unpack the politics and posturing and dig into the current state of B.C.’s freedom of information system and the changes the government is proposing.

What is freedom of information?

Freedom of information is the idea that citizens have the right to access documents and records held by public entities, such as school districts, police forces and government ministries. In Canada, freedom of information rights are laid out in federal and provincial laws. Members of the public can request a range of information from various public entities, from meeting notes and staff communications to databases and documentation about new policies.

Journalists like me can request information to better understand the impact train collisions have on wildlife or uncover a significant equipment malfunction at B.C.’s first liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility.

Most Canadian jurisdictions introduced freedom of information laws around 40 years ago, before the digital revolution. In the years since, the amount of documents public bodies create has grown significantly and many of those documents are subject to freedom of information laws.

How many people actually file freedom of information requests?

B.C. is fielding fewer FOI requests than it once did. In 2020, the citizens services ministry logged a total of 8,347 general requests compared to 4,691 in 2025 — a 44 per cent drop that can likely be at least partly attributed to the creation of a $10 fee for requests implemented by the provincial government in 2021.

But the number of pages generated in response to the average request has increased. The Ministry of Citizens Services says its FOI operations office processed 1.64 million pages in 2020 compared to 2.18 million pages in 2025 — a 33 per cent increase. The average general FOI request filed in 2025 in B.C. yielded 366 pages.

That suggests the public bodies may not be managing information as efficiently as they could be, Mike Larsen, president of the BC Freedom of Information Association, said.

“If we have better ways for people to organize information and if that’s followed consistently, then it shouldn’t be a problem to provide efficient and effective access,” he said. “I think that the minister is not wrong to say that there’s been a shift in the terrain here, but to respond to this with the idea of needing to perhaps curtail access rights in some way, I think, is a step in the wrong direction.”

Larsen also points out that focusing on the quantitative aspects of the FOI system — number of requests filed and pages processed — doesn’t give a complete picture of how well the system is functioning.

An FOI request could, for instance, yield 300 pages, but hundreds of those pages could be redacted, offering no useful information to the requester. In cases like that, knowing the number of pages a public body produced but not how many of those pages contained useful information gives a “totally skewed” impression of the system, Larsen added.

The minister takes issue with the idea that FOI requests are down overall.

“Personal requests are up and those are bigger and more complex,” Gibson told reporters. “Overall, the issue is about sensitive Ministry of Children and Family Development files, where there are multiple parties involved and a lot of sensitive information, thousands of pages. So it isn’t just about numbers being down. Actually, that’s not accurate.”

Gibson is partly right. FOI requests to the Ministry of Children and Family Development — which is responsible for sensitive personal information about adoption, child protection and foster care — have increased. In 2025, the ministry received 2,372 requests, up from 1,858 in 2020.

However, overall requests are still down significantly, from 10,205 in 2020 to 7,063 last year. Citizens Services declined to provide data for the most recent fiscal year, telling The Narwhal those figures are still being reviewed.

How is the government proposing to change B.C.’s FOI law?

Gibson introduced Bill 9 on Feb. 26.

“Taken together, these amendments strengthen [the law] for the future,” she said during her second reading speech. “They protect privacy. They uphold access to information. They enable better services for British Columbians, and they support a more transparent, efficient and people-centred public sector.”

But in addition to the changes aimed at improving information sharing between public bodies, some parts of the legislation broadens the grounds on which public bodies can refuse to respond to requests. That includes allowing a public body to reject requests that “would unreasonably interfere” with its operations or the government’s more broadly. “Abusive” or “malicious” requests could also be thrown out.

Larsen worries public bodies operating with reduced budgets or poor information management policies could use the unreasonable interference language to reject requests “simply because they’re overwhelmed — for reasons that aren’t due to the requester’s actions or the nature of the request in question.”

“If you’re unreasonably resourced, then a reasonable request can look unreasonable,” he said.

If your FOI request is rejected, you can appeal to the FOI and privacy commissioner, Gibson points out.

“The independent office of the privacy commissioner oversees any requests that would be denied,” she said. “What we’re talking about here is things like … death threats or white powder in envelopes. This is about being able to manage that kind of behavior, so that citizens with requests that we want to serve can get served quickly.”

Relying on complaints to ensure good requests still make it through the system doesn’t sit well with Larsen.

“That really worries me when people say, ‘We’re changing things in a way that may make it likely that people are dissatisfied, but don’t worry, there’s an appeals process!” he said.

“Going through a review as a way of trying to manage the scope of requests, that’s just completely inefficient.”

The minister did not directly answer questions about whether the commissioner will get a funding increase to deal with the additional stream of complaints Bill 9 could create. Instead, she touted the government’s proactive disclosure policies and promised Bill 9 will result in the release of more information without FOI request.

“This isn’t about making the situation worse,” Gibson told reporters. “This is about making it better.”

So what is proactive disclosure? And how will Bill 9 expand it?

One way governments can reduce the need for members of the public to file requests is to release documents without being asked, a practice known as proactive disclosure. The B.C. government proactively releases 17 types of records, including binders for new cabinet ministers, lists of briefing notes and expense claims and records requested via freedom of information request.

Typically, these records are kept confidential for months before being published, although the timeline can vary. However, as of the publication of this story, the B.C. government has “temporarily paused” proactive disclosures while it develops and launches a new system to publish these records. (The pause has lasted more than a month so far.)

Gibson did not mention the suspension and, when asked about it directly, did not explain why the old publication platform could not continue until the new one was ready to launch.

“We haven’t stopped doing proactive disclosures. What we’ve got is a new and more modernized system that’s going to deliver better on proactive disclosure and also a new proactive disclosure coming in Bill 9,” she told reporters. “But there’s a temporary gap while we move to the new, more modern system, and we’re hoping to have that online as soon as possible.”

The Citizens Services Ministry said the “pause is temporary and technical in nature,” and that the new system is expected to be operational any day.

How many new types of documents will Bill 9 add to the proactive disclosure schedule? Many or none, depending on how you look at it. The new proactive disclosure provisions in the bill apply only to personal information, not records created by the government.

The changes will give government ministries the ability “to disclose personal information back to the individual the information is about, without going through an FOI request,” according to Citizens Services.

Larsen sees value in making it easier for people to access personal information from public bodies, especially with proper privacy protections in place.

“That’s not the same thing as proactive disclosure of public records, though,” he added. “It’s a very different and meritorious thing to do, but it’s important not to conflate those things.”

If — when? — Bill 9 passes, when will these changes take effect?

The B.C. legislature has just nine sitting days left before the summer break. If Bill 9 doesn’t pass by May 28, it will be October before it passes.

The bill is just about to begin committee stage, the point at which opposition MLAs can ask the minister responsible questions about the effect of the changes proposed and put forward changes of their own, though these don’t often end up in the final version.

Gibson has already tabled amendments to Bill 9, ones she says clarify the powers of the information and privacy commissioner.

“I’m really looking forward to committee [stage] where we actually get to speak to the merits of the legislation and have a real debate about the content,” Gibson said. “It’s also a good opportunity to correct some real misinformation and misunderstandings about the bill.”

The B.C. Green and B.C. Conservative caucuses oppose Bill 9 in its current form. Interim Conservative Leader Trevor Halford even tried to have debate on the bill suspended for six months to allow for further consultation, a move that led to hours of late-night debate before the motion was defeated with the support of the NDP caucus and a pair of independent MLAs.

Odds are good Bill 9 will pass this spring, even if the government has to cut debate short to make it happen. Some of its changes will take effect immediately, including the requirement that requests provide enough detail to be located in a “reasonable amount of time.” Most of the others won’t take effect until the ministry has developed regulations to provide more detail about their function.

That process could take weeks, months or more. At least one piece of legislation that passed last spring has yet to take full effect because the regulations are still being developed.

It will likely be a year or more before we know if the changes really will improve B.C.’s FOI system, as Gibson claims. One of her predecessors made similar comments about the bill that created the $10 FOI filing fee, claiming those changes would help unclog the FOI system and result in faster responses to FOI requests. Five years later, we know she was wrong. 

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.

Summary

• Last week, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government proposed major changes to the federal assessment process for mining, oil and gas and other infrastructure projects.
• The proposed changes include shifting assessments from an agency under the federal environment minister to regulators that report to the natural resources minister.
• Former ministers, First Nations and environmental advocates are criticizing the proposal, some calling it a more significant rollback of environmental law than was seen under former prime minister Stephen Harper.

Last year, Prime Minister Mark Carney established an office tasked with fast-tracking handpicked major industrial projects. Now, he says that’s not enough. He has a new proposal on the table meant to roll out the red carpet for all projects requiring federal approval, including pipelines, mines, transmission lines and other infrastructure.

The proposal, unveiled last week, would create “federal economic zones” where certain developments can be “pre-approved,” and provide exceptions to several rules governing fossil fuel and nuclear oversight, habitat preservation, species at risk protection and major project reviews.

It would fundamentally change the way the country scrutinizes industrial development and consults with Indigenous Peoples, in some cases shifting reviews at an agency under the purview of the environment minister over to federal bodies that report to the natural resources minister.

The government outlined its plan in two discussion papers, but it will need to flesh out the details and formally introduce them as part of new legislation, before they can be implemented in law. The Liberals are now able to pass legislation much easier, after they secured a Parliamentary majority following April’s byelections and the addition of five floor-crossing MPs to their caucus.

The House of Commons is on a two-week break, scheduled to return May 25. Meanwhile, the proposal is open for public comment through June 7. 

Here’s what you need to know.

Who wanted this change? Who didn’t?

The government says the alterations are necessary so Canada can better compete with other countries for investment dollars, and strengthen the Indigenous consultation process. It said the process to build things is “often slow, expensive and confusing” and the government must “go further to streamline review and approvals processes.”

The Canadian Chamber of Commerce, which represents businesses across the country, also believes the government’s fast-tracking regime has “not gone far enough” and is hoping Carney continues to “peel back some of the red tape layers that have been holding back business success.”

Canada’s oil and gas industry has consistently advocated since Carney took office for his government to overhaul environmental assessments to turbocharge fossil fuel growth. Industry executives have personally pushed this position despite the industry enjoying big profits off the war in Iran, and despite the scientific conclusion that carbon pollution, of which the oil and gas industry is the largest contributor in Canada, is furthering destructive climate change that is leading to myriad health problems and premature death for Canadians.

Two former Liberal environment ministers have harshly criticized Carney’s proposal. Liberal MP Steven Guilbeault, who was the federal environment minister from 2021 to 2025, told the Toronto Star Carney’s plan is “worse” than the changes under former Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper, which resulted in some high-profile legal challenges. Former Liberal MP Catherine McKenna, who held the same post from 2015 to 2019, told the Canadian Press Carney’s proposal will lead to a “lack of trust” and lawsuits, ultimately making the project approval process slower, not faster.

Ecojustice, an environmental law charity, has described the changes as potentially ushering in “the biggest rollback of environmental protections in a generation.” The Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs, which represents 63 First Nations in that province, said it raises “serious concerns that Canada is moving toward a system where speed takes precedence over Treaty obligations, environmental stewardship and First Nations consent.”

The government wants to create ‘federal economic zones’ where developments are ‘pre-approved’

Carney’s government wants to legalize “federal economic zones” which it says could include areas designated for energy production and transmission, industrial regions, transportation and telecommunications. 

Inside these zones, the government would “pre-approve” certain developments, subject to conditions, and exempt projects from requiring individual environmental reviews — instead just requiring one overarching assessment.

It said the zones, and the activities allowed in them, would be “clearly defined.” Consultation with Indigenous Peoples would be a “key part” of the process, it added, including on determining the conditions for development inside the zones. The agreement of provinces is also “essential,” it said.

“This co-operation between federal and provincial governments would allow projects to be fast-tracked under both federal and provincial regimes,” reads the discussion paper. 

Sound familiar? Ontario passed similar legislation last year

A provincial regime is already in place in Ontario, after Premier Doug Ford’s government passed Bill 5 last year. The bill established the similar-sounding Special Economic Zones Act. Inside Ontario’s economic zones, the government can select certain proponents and projects, and exempt them from some municipal by-laws and provincial laws, including environmental protections. 

Critics have said Ontario’s law threatens wetlands, watersheds, peatlands and endangered species, and the Indigenous communities who rely on them. It’s subject to a court challenge from First Nations, asking for the law to be found unconstitutional.

The federal economic zones would be enabled through regional assessments, which are already an approach used by the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada to examine the cumulative effects of development in a given area. 

There is currently an ongoing federal regional assessment in the Ring of Fire, the mineral-rich area in the James Bay Lowlands known as Bakitanaamowin Aki, or “the Breathing Lands,” and Mammamattawa, or “many rivers coming together,” by the First Nations that call it home. 

Days after passing Bill 5, Ford said he would designate the Ring of Fire a special economic zone under Ontario law “as quickly as possible.” But in March this year, in a sudden shift in tone, Ford said he didn’t “need” to use these powers anymore to develop the area due to partnerships with several, but not all, First Nations communities in the region.

The Ontario government has long spoken about the region becoming a major mining hub. But an interim Ring of Fire regional assessment report has pointed to the need for environmental monitoring in the area’s boreal forest and peatlands, and the need for communities to urgently access health care. 

The provincial government, meanwhile, has been withholding scientific data and funding as part of the assessment process, and is not at the table with the First Nations and federal government representatives seeing it through, The Narwhal has reported.

New rules would change the role of the federal environmental review agency

Carney’s proposal would remove the ability of the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada to examine any pipeline projects that cross provincial or national borders, as well as any transmission lines or “offshore renewable energy projects.”

The agency, accountable to Environment, Climate Change and Nature Minister Julie Dabrusin, examines projects for sustainability, environmental protection and Indigenous Rights. It carries out its assessments “grounded in sound science, rigorous process and due diligence,” according to its website.

“Does Canada need to weaken its environmental laws to allow projects to proceed? No,” the agency declares on a frequently asked questions page. “Do federal policies prevent LNG, oil or pipeline projects from moving forward in Canada? No.”

Carney’s government is now of the opinion that issues like “poor coordination between government departments” are slowing down projects like pipelines. The government is proposing to shift assessments of certain projects away from the agency and over to two regulators that report to Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson. 

The job of reviewing all cross-border pipelines, transmission lines and offshore renewables would go to the Canada Energy Regulator, while the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission would handle project reviews related to nuclear and uranium projects.

The government would also have the power to declare major pipelines “in the public interest,” before the energy regulator is required to complete its review of the project’s conditions or where the pipe would actually be laid.

At the same time, the government is proposing that the Impact Assessment Agency become the home of a new “Crown consultation hub” that would “ensure that each Indigenous group affected by a major project goes through one clear and coordinated consultation process for each project.” 

It is also proposing to assign the federal review coordinator at the agency the job of ensuring project assessments and federal permits “stay on track.” The government said it would change the law to ensure project reviews and permit reviews “happen at the same time” and that a federal decision would take no longer than one year.

Sound familiar again? Carney isn’t the first leader to try to fast-track industrial projects

Carney’s proposal is reminiscent of a shift that happened under Harper’s government, which tried to accelerate environmental assessments by moving more oil and gas oversight to the energy regulator’s predecessor, the National Energy Board, in 2012.

Years later, the National Energy Board came under scrutiny after the Federal Court of Appeal quashed the government’s approval of the Trans Mountain oil pipeline expansion project, saying the board’s review of the project was flawed. The former Northern Gateway pipeline proposal also had its federal permits overturned by the Federal Court.

Former prime minister Justin Trudeau’s government passed the Impact Assessment Act and Canadian Energy Regulator Act, collectively through Bill C-69, allowing the government to consider the impact of natural resource projects on issues like climate change. But a Supreme Court of Canada decision in 2023 found the assessment scheme “largely unconstitutional,” forcing Trudeau’s government to introduce a revised version of the law in 2024.

There will be new exemptions to Canada’s species at risk law and fish permits

Carney’s government wants to change “some federal laws” that it argued can make the regulatory process “slow, repetitive and less flexible.” One of these appears to be the Species At Risk Act, a federal law passed in 2002 that is meant to prevent species extinction and help with population recovery. 

The law has a clause known as the “jeopardy test,” that restricts permits for an activity affecting a species or its critical habitat, unless the government believes the activity “will not jeopardize the survival or recovery of the species.”

Carney’s proposal would give the government the power to exempt projects from the application of this test. It said the power would be “limited” and have a “high threshold to be met,” would have to be in the “public interest” and would have to come after the proponent has made “all reasonable efforts” to avoid impacts.

The government also wants to offer more flexibility for permits that impact fish and fish habitat, when it comes to compensating for environmental harm. And it would allow “some early construction activities to start” before the government decides on the merits of a project, “if necessary permits are approved.”

Carney’s proposal also allows ministers to adjust certain conditions of a project assessment “in exceptional circumstances” and “adjust environmental conditions for projects of national interest, when needed.”

And it would hand the environment minister the power to issue a single federal document for certain projects that would include all federal decisions “required for a project to move forward.” It said experts in different departments would still review the project and provide advice, and enforcement would still be handled by the departments responsible. 

The changes come after Ford’s government in Ontario also removed the province’s Endangered Species Act and replaced it with the Species Conservation Act this year. That has had the effect of removing protection from many species.

After Ontario’s change, some threatened fish and birds are now only protected by federal laws. 

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.

Summary

• Canadian law requires provinces to implement a carbon pricing system for major industrial polluters as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
• But Alberta’s carbon pricing system isn’t producing the intended results, in part because its effective carbon price is too low to incentivise companies to reduce their emissions.
• It’s a sticking point in Alberta’s and Canada’s negotiations over whether and how to build a new pipeline to the West Coast. The two jurisdictions missed an April 1, 2026, deadline they set for themselves for agreeing on a new carbon pricing framework in Alberta.

Alberta and the federal government have been negotiating for months in an attempt to finalize a memorandum of understanding meant to pave the way for two key projects: a new pipeline to the West Coast and a massive carbon capture and utilization project in the oilsands.

Some elements of that deal have been hammered out, but one issue has proven tricky — an agreement on the industrial carbon price (once again, it’s not a tax).

The deal signed by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney last year called for a new framework on industrial carbon pricing by April 1, a deadline that came and went. 

So what exactly are they talking about and what could we expect to see?Here’s a primer on what it all means, from who pays for what to why oil companies really don’t want to spend their own piles of cash.

What is the industrial carbon price?

The consumer carbon price (RIP) is what most people think about when they hear about a carbon tax or a carbon price (it’s truly not a tax, but we’ll call it that, if you insist). That since-deceased mechanism was designed to impose a cost on people to incentivize change. Think about “sin taxes” on cigarettes as one example. Make a tank of gas more expensive and maybe people will drive less.

The industrial price, snappily named the “output-based pricing system” in federal lingo, targets large industrial emitters. Like the consumer version, the price is meant to incentivize emissions reductions. The more efficient a company, the bigger the savings. 

Each province manages its own industrial carbon price scheme. They can design their own, as long as its reduction potential is considered equivalent to the federal version, or they can simply use the federal system.In Alberta, it’s known as the Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction Regulation, but everyone just calls it TIER.

Okay, but how does the industrial carbon price work, exactly?

This stuff can get tricky, but let’s start easy.The premise is simple: large-scale industrial emitters (think steel, oil and gas and concrete) create the highest amounts of emissions. To reduce this, the government has put a price per tonne of carbon pollution on a small percentage of emissions these companies produce to incentivize them to adopt cleaner processes that emit less carbon. The money collected from these charges is pooled and distributed back to companies for investments that support this shift in emissions-reduction technologies, like carbon capture and storage.

The government sets a specific price for a tonne of emissions from a company. It also sets a threshold — if you pollute under that threshold, you don’t pay the carbon price, but if you pollute more than that threshold, each extra tonne is priced.

Companies, especially ones with a lot of emissions such as oilsands mines or concrete plants, want to reduce emissions as much as possible to avoid paying too much.

It’s also important to note the price applies to large emitters, with more than 100,000 tonnes of emissions in a year (equivalent to the annual emissions from approximately 22,000 cars).

The federal rules also call for incremental increases to the price to add an extra nudge. Over time, that makes the price of pollution more and more expensive, which is the entire point.

This is a policy designed to reduce pollution. Without it, pollution is free for the polluter, despite its costs to society and the environment. 

Carbon pricing is considered by many experts to be the most efficient and least disruptive way to reduce emissions. It’s a conclusion Carney himself came to both in 2015 and 2021.

Recent estimates from the Canadian Climate Institute peg the cost of the carbon price on oil and gas producers at 50 cents per barrel, with low, or non-existent, impacts for consumers across a range of products. 

Is carbon pricing all stick? Where’s the carrot?

Glad you asked.

While the carbon price encourages companies to strive to be more efficient to avoid the cost of pollution, they can also reap benefits from going that extra mile.

If a company reduces its emissions below the threshold set by the government, it earns credits. Those credits can then be sold to other companies to bring in real-world revenue.

Specifically, say one company reduces its emissions below the threshold and gathers credits. Another company that is still exceeding the threshold can come along and buy those credits and use them to cover its carbon pricing costs.

Money generated from the carbon price is also reinvested back into research and new technology development.

Win win, right?

Well, this is where things get messy. Especially in Alberta. Because the price is not really the price. 

Sorry, the price is not actually the price? What?

The memorandum of understanding between Alberta and Ottawa explicitly calls for an “effective price” of $130 per tonne of emissions. That’s because the price most people know, known as the headline price, isn’t necessarily what a credit will trade for between those two companies we imagined earlier.

The issue is that the Alberta government made changes to its industrial carbon pricing system one week after signing the memorandum that, when announced, flooded the market with credits and undermined their value. It also now allows companies to invest directly in technologies at their facilities instead of paying the carbon price. Those technologies may or may not actually reduce emissions.

Those changes could allow companies to essentially double dip — avoiding the carbon price by investing in technologies directly, and then collecting credits if their emissions drop.

Alberta also froze its headline price at $95 per tonne last year, rather than increasing the price as dictated by the federal equivalency rules. Not only is that a violation, it undermines the stability of the credit market and reduces confidence in the system for companies making decisions based on projected costs and benefits.

There was also a flood of credits from the rapid expansion of renewable power generation.

The end result is that carbon credits were trading as low as $17 per tonne last year. So while the headline price, which everyone understands as the price of carbon per tonne, might be $95, the effective price was, and is, well below. It’s currently trading between $20 and $40 per tonne.

As it stands, it’s very cheap for a facility to buy $20 or $40 credits compared to paying $95, but that’s less good for the efficient facilities selling the credits. And removes the whole point of the carbon price — making it expensive to pollute.

So what’s the plan for the carbon tax?

The agreement between Alberta and Ottawa signed last November called for a framework to increase the effective price to $130 per tonne by 2030 to be finalized on April 1. That didn’t happen.

Both governments say they continue to negotiate a plan, and rumours suggest something coming soon, but there are still no details. Last week, The Globe and Mail reported the speed at which the price will climb is the main sticking point.

One interesting aspect of the memorandum calls for “a financial mechanism to ensure both parties maintain their respective commitments over the long term to provide certainty to industry, and to achieve the intended emissions reductions.”

Translation: that means the agreement could include some sort of financial backstop for the credit market. That could mean the province would guarantee a credit price by offering to buy credits at, say, $130 per tonne.

That would help to stabilize the price and, hopefully, discourage the province from eroding the carbon pricing scheme (again). 

So we’re cool then?

The memorandum was framed around building both a new pipeline to the West Coast and the giant carbon capture and utilization project tied to the oilsands, known as the Pathways project.

The Pathways project would get carbon credits, which in turn would make that project more viable and could reduce the amount of public dollars used to build it.

However, the five largest oilsands producers behind the plan have dramatically walked back some of their enthusiasm for investing in emissions reductions.

On May 4, the group, which recently changed its name from the Pathways Alliance to the Oilsands Alliance, said it was still interested in carbon capture and storage.

“However, a project of this size requires supportive regulatory and fiscal frameworks, not an uncompetitive industrial carbon tax that no other major heavy oil producing jurisdiction faces, which would limit our industry’s ability to attract investment and grow,” reads the statement.

Jon McKenzie, the CEO of Cenovus, told investors in May the debate around oilsands development has been “myopically focused on the climate agenda,” according to the Canadian Press.

“The result of this myopic dialogue … is that we have created a set of national policies and regulations that make resource development and investment in Canada uncompetitive with the rest of the world,” he said, at the same time he announced an 83 per cent increase in the company’s profits. He also said increasing the carbon price would negatively impact the sector.

Cenovus reported $1.6 billion in earnings in the first three months of this year (McKenzie himself made $10.4 million in salary, stock options and bonuses in 2024). Suncor, another alliance company, reported earnings of $2.1 billion in the same time frame — 50 per cent higher than the same period last year.

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Canada’s vast landscape, which boasts 20 per cent of the world’s fresh water, a quarter of global wetlands and 28 per cent of its boreal forests, is critical to its economy. Natural resource industries — forests, farms, fisheries, mining and oil and gas — together make up approximately seven per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product. 

Tension exists between expanding these industrialized sectors and protecting the ecosystems on which they depend. In Manitoba, some worry protecting the Seal River Watershed, which spans more than 50,000 square kilometres in the province’s north, will hinder opportunities in mineral resources and hydro; to the east, critical mineral mining ambitions in Ontario’s Ring of Fire clash with the protection of the Hudson and James Bay Lowlands, the second-largest carbon sink on earth; and in B.C., Coastal First Nations have protested that lifting the large tanker ban through their waters will endanger the protected Great Bear Rainforest.

These tensions make it easy to frame nature as the antithesis of economic activity, if it’s always put in opposition to projects that are described as growing Canada’s wealth, sovereignty and security. But a growing chorus of economic and policy leaders, alongside conservation groups, are making the case for nature to be seen as a critical financial asset — not a barrier, but another opportunity for economic growth. 

The federal government’s vision for conservation, laid out in its 2026 nature strategy, is of a nation that “protects, restores, and values nature as a foundation of our economy, sovereignty, and well-being.” 

One of the pillars to achieving that vision is “valuing nature and mobilizing capital,” according to the strategy. It estimated the value of “ecosystem services” — the direct and indirect contributions of nature to well-being and quality of life — to be $3.6 trillion, or “more than double our 2018 GDP.” In other words, the government is looking to spur more private sector investment in conservation by showing businesses how valuable nature is to their bottom lines.

The numbers show conservation is comparable with many of Canada’s major industries. While it may not produce the same scale of economic value as major resource extraction sectors like oil and gas — which does not approach the value of sectors like health care or education — it is a significant contributor to Canada’s economy. And the return on investment is high: a recent analysis by the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) found every dollar spent on protected areas generated more than $3.50 in visitor spending, helping fuel local economies and generate government revenues. 

Like the oil and gas sector, Canada can choose to invest in the potential of conservation and champion it as a cornerstone of our country’s economic future. And as Canadians grapple with the increasingly severe impacts of the climate crisis, the role of intact ecosystems becomes even more valuable. 

These nine charts capture some of the value of Canada’s natural environments, and the economic potential of conservation.

Economic contributions from protected areas — by province

Gross domestic product (GDP) contributions of selected Canadian industries

How are the industries defined?+

Statistics Canada tracks economic activity indicators for a wide range of sectors using the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), which assigns a code to specific activities and sectors. Industries and government agencies tally these statistics in different ways to determine overall sector impacts. 

This analysis uses Statistics Canada’s data, and defines each industry as follows:

Agriculture: Crop and animal production (farming), related support activities and food manufacturing, including mills, bakeries, meat and dairy production.

Fisheries: Aquaculture, fishing, hunting and trapping and seafood product preparation.

Forestry: Forestry and logging, related support activities, wood and paper product manufacturing. 

Mining: Mineral mining (ore, non-metals, potash) and quarrying activities, including related support. Also includes mineral product manufacturing and metal manufacturing. 

Oil and gas: Oil and gas extraction and related support activities, petroleum and coal product manufacturing, natural gas distribution and pipelines.

Transportation: Air, rail, water, truck and transit and ground transportation (including public transit and taxis). 

Utilities: Electric power generation, transmission and distribution and water and sewage systems.

Jobs and compensation

More than 150,000 people work in protected and conserved areas — not far behind the oil and gas and forestry sectors. As the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society points out, many of these jobs are in Indigenous, rural and remote communities, where unemployment rates are high compared to urban areas. In parts of Canada where other economic opportunities are scarce, protected and conserved areas offer the opportunity to create long-term stable employment. 

Conservation provides value, but how are conservation workers valued? Compensation for the approximately 150,000 Canadians who work in protected areas is low, compared to other sectors; on average, an oil and gas worker makes nearly four times as much annually. 

Tax revenues and subsidies

Governments collected more than $1.4 billion in tax revenues from parks and protected areas in 2024, most of which stemmed from visitor spending, according to the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society’s analysis. That’s comparable to government tax revenues from the forestry industry, at $1.2 billion. Major resource industries like forestry and oil and gas also create government revenue through royalties and other fees. 

But for many of these industries, government revenues can be offset by tax breaks, grants and other subsidies.

Governments invested $2.3 billion in parks and protected spaces in 2024, generating $0.62 in revenue for every dollar invested. By comparison, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimates the federal government spent $3.17 billion USD (or $4.34 billion CAD) on fossil fuel subsidies — almost $1 billion USD more than the United States spent on subsidies, despite their industry’s far greater output. That number is likely an underestimate, as a lack of clear data and complex incentive structures make it difficult to track how much governments give out to industry. 

Environmental Defence, which releases an annual report tracking Canadian fossil fuel subsidies, estimates the government doled out more than $30 billion in subsidies and financing to fossil fuel companies in 2024. Most of that funding came in the form of a $20-billion loan for the Trans Mountain Expansion project. 

Carbon storage

The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society estimated the carbon stocks stored in Canada’s existing protected areas by comparing protected area boundaries to data showing the carbon concentration in soil, vegetated areas and seabed sediments. 

It found a total 51.4 gigatons of carbon stored in the country’s protected forests, peatlands, wetlands, soil and seabeds. 

If this carbon was all emitted as carbon dioxide, the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society estimates, it would equate to 188.4 gigatons of emissions. 

By protecting these regions from industrial disturbances like mining, logging or draining, that carbon stays in the ground. If released, that carbon comes at a cost. 

Canada’s industrial carbon price, which charges businesses for emissions that exceed a predetermined limit, is $110 per tonne as of 2026. A carbon credit — doled out for activities that remove or avoid carbon emissions — is worth the same.

At that price, the carbon stored in Canada’s protected areas is worth $20.7 trillion. 

That’s about 10 times the value of Canada’s global mining assets ($352.6 billion), global energy assets ($827 billion) and domestic farm sector assets ($992.4 billion) combined.

Annual carbon capture

Protected and conserved areas remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, a process known as “carbon capture.” Manitoba’s Riding Mountain National Park, for example, removed an average of 108,328 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year from the atmosphere between 1990 and 2020. This is significantly less than Shell’s Quest carbon capture and storage project, but it’s also just one of hundreds of parks and protected areas across Canada.

Most parks, like the ones included in this chart, are sequestering carbon each year. However, when parks or protected areas are hit by wildfires, they can become carbon emitters.

– With files from Michelle Cyca

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