Catherine McKenna’s most memorable moment as environment minister happened in August 2019 during a visit to the Northwest Territories — more than 2,840 kilometres away from Ottawa. 

It was August 2019 and McKenna was touring the newly announced Thaidene Nëné National Park, 14,000 square kilometres of wilderness that would be protected in partnership between the Government of Canada, the Łutsël K’e Dene First Nation, the Northwest Territory Métis Nation and the Deninu K’ue First Nation. 

The group camped on the land and went swimming in the freezing water. At night, they sat around the campfire and McKenna heard the Indigenous leaders speak about what the land meant to them. When they woke up early the next morning, McKenna watched an eagle in the sky. Later, she found an eagle feather near her. Her companions told her it was a sign: the park was meant to be. 

“I remember thinking: if only we could get every Canadian out on the land with the Indigenous people, and maybe they’ll care and understand why this was all so important,” she told The Narwhal through tears. “I felt like the luckiest person to do that job. I grew up in the Hammer [Hamilton, Ont.] and got to be in one of the most crucial portfolios and visit this land. And, I got to do it my way. I stayed true to myself and I left when I felt it was time to leave.” 

McKenna shared this memory in an exit interview with The Narwhal, sitting in a waterfront park in her hometown, where she is enjoying a mini-break with her parents and kids after announcing her retirement from politics. 

McKenna has been a leading minister in a government for six years as it made precedent-setting decisions such as implementing a national price on pollution, overhauling Canada’s environmental assessment regime and spending billions of taxpayer dollars to buy the Trans Mountain pipeline system and the rights to a proposed expansion project from a company that believed its proposal was too risky. She is departing as the infrastructure minister, a position in which she is leading the country’s first national infrastructure assessment. 

The decision to leave politics is rooted in just two things that McKenna says time and again: “My kids and climate change.” She adds: “There’s too little time on both.”

McKenna says she finalized her decision to leave after a conversation with John Kerry, the U.S. climate ambassador, about public and private sector climate financing and other global climate commitments. Two weeks later, she announced her retirement.

McKenna will still remain involved in climate effort and said that she’ll be adopting a more global focus moving forward. Photo: Christopher Katsarov Luna / The Narwhal

“The fact is, climate change is a global issue. There’s obviously a lot more to do in Canada, but the whole world needs to do what Canada has done,” she says. “The whole world needs to have a serious climate plan; they have to have a price on pollution; they have to phase out coal, they have to make investments in public transit and clean energy; they need to do it in partnership with Indigenous peoples; they need to make sure that inclusivity is part of it.” 

McKenna suggests that she’ll be adopting more of a global focus in her climate efforts moving forward. There’s a sense that she can’t do much more in government other than help make it better and safer for future female leaders. She repeatedly mentions the blowback she received from conservative premiers throughout her time in politics. She carefully hints her work was limited by the mechanics of federalism.

But she also makes a promise that when it comes to climate change, she’s not going anywhere. 

There’s been a lot of commentary around your departure that suggests the reason you’re leaving is you felt ineffectual on the climate file in your new role. How do you respond to that? 

I think we did loads in government, and I think we need new people to come in and continue the legacy. Climate is everything. I feel like I did what I came to do. When I came in, we were a joke internationally. We were trying to roll back everything as opposed to moving forward. We’ve done a lot since then, but I really think there are other ways for me, personally, to work on climate change. 

I’m not at all sure what it’s going to be, but COP 26 [the 26th meeting of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change] is really important. I started my political career at COP 21; I was just on the job for a few days. I know a lot of folks there. It needs to be a success and that means support for developing countries. So I’m going to do what I can on climate here but I think there’s a lot of work that needs to be done internationally. And I will certainly be working with the Inuit; they’ve done the least to cause climate change and they are the most impacted. They’re hunters going underwater. 

You were Canada’s second-longest serving environment minister. Were you willing to make the move to infrastructure or were you persuaded into it? 

I had become the face [of the climate portfolio] in a negative way, in a way that just focused on the politics with premiers. It became distracting. But I also saw an opportunity in infrastructure because we have to build the future we want. Every single dollar we spend on infrastructure has to be through a climate lens. I’ve totally transformed, I think, the thinking on infrastructure including the Canada Infrastructure Bank being really focused on getting private sector support for clean infrastructure. I’ve also tried to build this idea that you either increase emissions or reduce emissions when you build things. We brought in natural infrastructure; no one really thought about nature as infrastructure. 

It was great because now I had money to make these investments. And the pandemic made it even more important to build back better. People realized we have to do a lot better and think about climate and also equity when we’re building. 

Lately we’ve been hearing a lot about how to “build back better,” physically and more broadly. There has been a big debate happening in the U.S. right now about President Joe Biden’s $2 trillion infrastructure bill, which includes much more than just roads and bridges. It includes broader action on climate change and “human infrastructure” — measures like an expanded child tax credit and elder care and telecom investments. The bill has sparked a debate over what constitutes “infrastructure.” How do you define it? 

I think Canadians don’t know what “infrastructure” means because it’s a made-up, terrible, bureaucratic term. I think infrastructure is everything you build for the future you want. A clean future. An inclusive future.

Every dollar has to create jobs and growth, it has to tackle climate change and build resilience and it has to build a more equitable society. The good news about infrastructure is it’s tangible and real. We need a vision for our country and then we have to build it, and every day wake up and make sure we’re reducing emissions. 

(Note: the version of Biden’s infrastructure bill passed by the House of Representatives on July 1 is a much slimmed down version of what was originally proposed. The Senate is still debating the proposal.) 

Your government had this big idea that the government, through the Canada Infrastructure Bank, could attract private sector dollars to build things. Has this approach shown any results whatsoever? 

There’s a limit to taxpayer dollars — that’s just a fact. And there’s a lot of private sector dollars and the question is how do you get those dollars to build things that are in the public interest. I think this idea is now just hitting its stride. You’ve got to get the right projects. I think we can innovate but other countries are looking at this as a model too. The U.K. is building one. I had a great call with U.S. Secretary [of Transportation] Pete [Buttigieg] about it. We nerded out on how you do big things with focus and purpose.

This isn’t about making massive returns on investments. This is about getting more infrastructure built in the public interest than we would be able to do otherwise by bringing in the private sector. 

In her time as the environment minister, McKenna said she “had become the face [of the climate portfolio] in a negative way.” Once she became the infrastructure minister, she saw an opportunity to build infrastructure through a climate lens. Photo: Christopher Katsarov Luna / The Narwhal

We’re talking as Lytton and Kamloops in B.C. are facing a record-breaking wildfire season. There’s a heat warning where we are today. Has the government done enough to prepare for the dire and deadly consequences of climate change? 

No one will ever do enough, because the whole point of even the Paris Agreement is that every five years you have to increase your ambition. Time is not on our side. What we’re seeing now, it has to be a wake-up call for everyone, including provinces who have to be part of the solution. That is always a bit of a challenge in Canada, to bring all provinces on side. 

When people say: ‘Can’t you do more in Canada to tackle climate change?’ Well the whole world has to [do more], not just Canada. I feel like I’ve left a legacy and a roadmap and everyone now has to grind away. 

We’re also talking soon after news broke that ExxonMobil lobbyists had admitted to using all kinds of methods to fight against climate science and legislation like the carbon price. During your time in government, you faced severe pushback for Bill C-69 and also for purchasing the Trans Mountain pipeline. Can you tell me about your relationship with oil and gas as environment and climate change minister? 

Look, I try to be a practical person. Some energy companies are very progressive and realize they need to be energy companies, not just oil and gas. Suncor supported a price on pollution, and that was extremely helpful. Others were less helpful — they fought tooth and nail. Sometimes it was acrimonious and I felt I got into these massive fights, including with premiers.

What happened with ExxonMobil is completely unconscionable. I don’t know if those tactics are used here but if they are they should be called out, because the reality is they are playing games with our planet and our future and the future of our kids. I’m hopeful that with our new net-zero legislation we will take some drama out of this and everyone’s just going to have to be held accountable to whether you meet your targets and industry has to be part of it. 

You’ve previously said Canada couldn’t phase out oil overnight and that the pipeline project would help with the transition to more renewable energy because all profits from the line will be directed to clean energy initiatives. Do you still stand by that? And how should Canada be phasing out oil? 

I think the world is changing very fast. The shift to clean energy is happening very quickly, faster than when I started this job. I think if [the oil and gas industry] don’t do it, they’re going to be gone like the dinosaurs. The good ones are trying to figure it out and are diversifying. The others have decided to wait it out. They’re not going to win. We have to move to a cleaner future; the risks of not doing that to their own business are enormous. But we have a premier in Alberta who spent a billion dollars on a project we didn’t have any control over, and now that money is gone when it could’ve been used for retraining or clean energy investments.

While some oil and gas companies were helpful during her tenure as environment minister, others were less so. “Sometimes it was acrimonious and I felt I got into these massive fights, including with premiers,” she said. Photo: Christopher Katsarov Luna / The Narwhal

Looking back, is there anything you wished you had done differently in your dealings with oil and gas? 

Maybe I could’ve been more blunt, because I actually try to be polite. 

I don’t like vilifying people; I just want people to do the right thing. This is a competition to be clean; it’s a race to the top and I want everyone to be part of it. 

The carbon price has now been in effect for two years and has been increased. After all the political pushback and the court cases it was put through, is it doing what it was designed to?

The whole price-on-pollution trajectory was hard. I just felt the weight of having to carry a policy that was so important and thinking ‘am I doing everything to explain to Canadians about why it matters? How do I explain to them that this thing that seems a bit abstract is actually important?’ 

I just remember that one cover of Maclean’s: the resistance. The resistance to what? The resistance to a cleaner future? The resistance to change? The resistance to good jobs? The resistance to what kids want? It was just a bunch of men. It wasn’t always fun. I wish that we could have worked better. I tried really hard to work with every province but they doubled down so we doubled down. I explained to them that they could design this price however they want to. They didn’t buy it; it was just a game.

Powerful conservative leaders from across the country are suddenly united against Justin Trudeau’s carbon tax plan. And they’re spoiling for a fight. Meet the resistance. Read the full story by @InklessPW: https://t.co/XeO3T69ggP pic.twitter.com/6ncZD0biTJ

— Maclean’s Magazine (@macleans) November 7, 2018

After the Supreme Court decision and after this two-year battle over it, do you think the carbon price is going to last?

The only way any policy is totally resilient is if Canadians believe in it, and that’s where I have faith. I remember in every question period being slammed by the Conservative Party on having a price on pollution, and even though I don’t agree with the way they’re doing it, they now have to say you have to have a price on pollution. I feel like that’s progress. That is progress.   

This interview has been edited for brevity.

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Łutsel K’e, N.W.T. — Our nine-passenger Cessna drops 2,000 feet out of the sky as pilot Andy Brock descends into the East Arm of Great Slave Lake. 

Seen up close, the blurry and distant landscape resolves itself into full relief.

What had been a low, rolling landscape of bogs and Canadian Shield rock as we left Yellowknife to the west now pops up like braille: imposing cliffs drop off into the world’s deepest freshwater outside of Siberia. Wind blows up the East Arm, catching the waves and pulling them over into whitecaps and swaying the tiny plane’s wings as it buzzes overhead. 

Jutting out from the shoreline in the distance is the small community of Łutsel K’e, population 303.

With me on board is a group of conservationists from Nature United making their way to Łutsel K’e to celebrate Canada’s newest national park: Thaidene Nëné (pronounced THIGH-den-nay NEN-ay), The Land of the Ancestors. 

The park — part wildlife conservation area, part territorial park and part national park reserve — makes up 26,525 square kilometres of lakes, old-growth spruce forests, rivers and wildlife. 

It straddles the tree line, a fuzzy border between the boreal forest and the barren lands to the north. In that way it can act as a buffer against climate change, providing a refuge for the species that live on the edge, such as caribou, relieving those animals of the stress development brings.

The community of Łutsel K’e at sunset. Photo: Pat Kane

“If you think of an intact, unimpeded watershed — and how many of those are left on the planet, really? — I mean, that’s an incredible opportunity that Thaidene Nëné has,” says Kris Brekke, executive director of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society for the Northwest Territories.

The smooth ceremony heralding the park’s inauguration belies the rough, incremental negotiations that have brought it there. 

Like the landscape itself, the process looks cleaner from afar.

Thaidene Nëné was first proposed in the 1960s, and now after five decades and a fundamental inversion of the power structure between the federal government and the Łutsel K’e Dene First Nation, the park is becoming a reality. 

Its creation speaks to a rebalancing of Parks Canada’s relationship with Indigenous communities and a rethinking of the colonial mentality of creating parks by removing people from the land.

“It’s almost a complete flip,” says Rob Prosper, a retired VP of parks establishment and conservation for Parks Canada.

James Marlowe meets the group in his ancient blue pickup truck moments after the plane kisses the gravel landing strip. The East Arm is legendary among anglers for its enormous lake trout, but, remote and lacking in infrastructure, it has been mostly left out of Yellowknife’s tourism boom. Marlowe started River’s East Arm Tours in the last year, with some government support for equipment and licensing, in anticipation of a spike in tourism. 

“I know that it’s a good business and since I have the equipment on hand, I’ve decided to see if I can take people out on fishing tours,” he says. 

Marlowe’s truck bounces into an empty lot next to his house on the edge of Łutsel K’e. The makeshift camp is a collection of canvas wall tents — the preferred bush lodging, lined with spruce boughs and fitted with a small wood stove — a lean-to over a picnic table, an outhouse and a small wash station. 

“Welcome to The Ritz,” he says.

James Marlowe reclines by the fire at “The Ritz.” Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

‘This is our highway’

There are no hotel rooms available in Łutsel K’e the week of the Thaidene Nëné announcement. On a quiet day, there might be as many as 10 rooms available, but this is among the busiest days the community has had in years.

Łutsel K’e’s handful of meandering and nameless dirt roads are surrounded on three sides by water, making up a vaguely rectangular community that was only established in any permanent form a generation or two ago. But the community is strong, with an enduring connection to its lands and waters; more people here own boats than cars, Chief Darryl Marlowe explains. There are no roads connecting Łutsel K’e to the rest of the territory. 

“This is our highway,” he says as we cruise out on the lake in the boat he inherited from his grandfather. 

There are no highways connecting Łutsel K’e to the rest of the Northwest Territories. Photo: Pat Kane

The community of Lutsel K’e, as seen from the water. Photo: Pat Kane

The water, now calm after its mid-afternoon bluster, reflects the evening light as Marlowe’s boat skims along. Across the water from Łutsel K’e is the Frontier Fishing Lodge. The community is buying the high-end business; it will form one cornerstone of its strategy for growing the tourism industry, from its current three independent startup operators to a more centralized system complete with bookings, promotional materials, accommodations and networking. As it is now, none of the tourism businesses in town has a website or booking system.

With or without the fishing lodge, the community expects the financial returns from Thaidene Nëné to be substantial. A $30 million trust fund — established by a $15 million federally matched donation from Nature United — will generate dividends for the community. The fund is expected to roll off at least $1 million per year, which can pay for guardians, training, planning, research partnerships and youth engagement: “Anything that’s about taking care of this land,” explains Jenny Brown, the director of conservation for Nature United.

“It’s critically important,” she says of the trust fund. “The park is three different governments working together to manage it, and without a source of revenue for Łutsel K’e to perform that role, it would be difficult for them to do that.”

Jenny Brown, the director of conservation for Nature United, sits on the back of Marlowe’s truck at “The Ritz.” Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

That money and the activities it enables could make the difference between the community being able to take meaningful part in managing Thaidene Nëné National Park Reserve and sitting on the sidelines. Without that capacity, several people told The Narwhal, the community would not have agreed to accept the park — but it did, with 88 per cent support in a February vote.

Cruising alongside Marlowe’s boat is a crowded vessel carrying Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna, surrounded by aides and Parks Canada officials (though without the personal security she recently took on amid ongoing harassment. “You’re safe here,” Marlowe assures her). 

The camp the community has prepared for McKenna includes a second group of canvas wall tents and a fire. Two trout, fresh from the lake, are roasting on the fire. The peaceful setting is a welcome reprieve from the ramp-up to the federal election, her aides say, a lull before the storm of campaigning.

McKenna’s hosts for the night are the Ni Hat’ni Dene Rangers, the Watchers of the Land. As the “moccasins on the ground,” guardians are the embodiment of the First Nation’s relationship with its land. Crews made up of paired adults and youth monitor, patrol and conduct sampling operations across the territory. They interact with tourists and other users of the area, gently reminding them whose territory they’re visiting.

The Ni Hat’ni Dene Rangers transport Environment Minister Catherine McKenna to their camp. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

Ni Hat’ni Dene rangers on patrol near Łutsel K’e. Photo: Pat Kane

“The importance [of the guardians] for me and the community is just knowing that we have our own people out there, monitoring the waters that we know,” explains Prairie Desjarlais, who heads up the program. “No one’s disrespecting it.”

The guardians are expanding into year-round operations now, and expect to add new teams and new responsibilities such as monitoring caribou. 

Ashton Catholique is 15 years old, and has seldom been out on the land. But he knows he wants to be a guardian. It’s not just a chance at a job, though the opportunities are set to grow in the coming years. He says it’s a chance to learn the traditional skills and “to pass them down to the next generation.” 

Federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna meets with youth, including Ashton Catholique (right front) and members of the Ni Hat’ni Dene guardians. Photo: Pat Kane

A 2016 study of the Ni Hat’ni Dene Rangers program found a $4.5 million investment in the program had returned $11.1 million in social, environmental, economic and cultural benefits. It decreased crime. It strengthened language retention. It increased the availability of traditional foods. The study suggested that a sustained, long-term investment by the government would increase those benefits. 

“This renewed responsibility for territory is going to bring a mentality in a community that’s going to encourage people to stay in school, to participate in traditional territory management and the pride associated with playing that role,” explains the now-retired Prosper, who, aside from his work for Parks Canada, is a member of the Acadia First Nation

Accordingly, that basic premise — having the local people on the land, monitoring their own waters — has been baked into the park. 

Standing by the water of the East Arm, McKenna explains that she expects the concept to be a central part of most new park negotiations in the future.

“This is part of reconciliation,” she says. “When you talk about reconciliation, often it’s an abstract concept, but in the context of protected areas, land, water, air, animals, ice ⁠— that’s really everything for Indigenous peoples.”

A musk ox mother and calf appear on the hill above the camp where McKenna stayed the night. Musk oxen have become increasingly common near Łutsel K’e. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

Suddenly, yells from up the beach interrupt McKenna’s train of thought. A pair of CBC reporters have spotted a mother musk ox and her calf, on a ridge overlooking the campsite. McKenna, never having seen a musk ox, tears off to get a look. It’s explained to her that the animals have become ubiquitous near the community lately, even verging on an annoyance (indeed, that night, the animals would have to be chased away from the minister’s campsite after wandering in amongst the tents). 

But to the outsiders watching the exotic northern animals amble across the horizon, it’s a small taste of what the park will be protecting.

Changing parks

‘Protecting’ may be too strong a word here — and that, explains McKenna, is a long overdue approach.

“Could you imagine establishing a park where the Łutsel K’e Dene weren’t allowed to hunt or fish?” McKenna marvels in her speech at the following day’s ceremony, witnessed by a room packed with First Nation members and guests. The musk oxen spotted by McKenna’s camp will be fair game for Indigenous hunters within the park.

That’s in line with what some conservation organizations have been saying for years. “Economic diversification has to be part of conservation,” says Tracey Williams, Northwest Territories lead for Nature United. “You have to have revenue,” she says, if the community is going to have a diversity of opportunity for its people.

A circle dance forms around the sacred fire prior to the signing ceremony. Photo: Pat Kane

Environment Minister Catherine McKenna makes an offering of tobacco to the fire at a ceremony before the signing. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

Parks Canada, it seems, would agree. 

The agency will create “opportunities to advance the socio-economic well-being of Indigenous partners,” reads a Parks Canada document released in July. The document commits the agency to working with Indigenous communities to maximize local economic benefits — not just cultural benefits — from parks.

Long before the current era of reconciliation-driven conservation, however, and far from McKenna’s disbelief at a park without Indigenous harvesting, a previous generation of government officials could scarcely have imagined the current park.

“There’s some horrific stories by Indigenous people,” says Steven Nitah, a former chief who acted as chief negotiator for the Łutsel K’e Dene First Nation during the planning process. 

Wood Buffalo National Park looms large in the minds of northern Indigenous peoples, especially the Métis. It was established in 1922, and “all Aboriginal rights were considered extinguished,” a Parks Canada webpage reads. Some Indigenous harvesting was allowed, but only in arbitrary ways dictated by government officials. Métis were excluded entirely for more than 80 years.

Nitah says the policies were violently enforced.

Steven Nitah, Lutsel K’e Dene First Nation’s lead negotiator for Thaidene Nene National Park. Photo: Pat Kane

“I know of a story where a family was forced out at gunpoint — and after walking to a community that they’d never lived in before, they burned their home,” he says.

Kevin McNamee, director of protected areas establishment for Parks Canada, says that while he isn’t aware of those exact events, the history of Wood Buffalo is a troubling one for the agency. 

“The history of that park certainly hung over some communities, particularly the Northwest Territories Métis Nation,” he says. 

That kind of relationship was by design: the government wanted control of the land.

“Parks were established, almost by definition, by removing Indigenous people, disconnecting them from their traditional territory, taking away any responsibility for management of their traditional territory,” explains Prosper. “It has taken 130 years to rebuild that trust.” 

Those stories, or ones like them, were known by the Łutsel K’e Dene when Parks Canada first approached them in the late 1960s to establish a park in the East Arm.

The government’s expectation would have been similar to its expectations in places like Wood Buffalo — that the park would be a place of wilderness carefully managed by Ottawa bureaucrats, not by the people on whose doorstep it would be established, the people who had stewarded and depended upon that land since time immemorial.

“In those days, a national park would not allow them to continue their traditional ways of life: no hunting, no trapping, no fishing,” explains McNamee.

Then-chief Pierre Catholique was taken across the country from park to park by the government officials in a charm offensive. He wasn’t swayed.

If the plan was intended to exert pressure to make a decision, it backfired spectacularly. “He says, ‘I’ve got to talk to my people first,’ ” says Nitah. A subsequent meeting of Dene chiefs, to discuss these dealings with Ottawa, would form the beginnings of what became the powerful Dene Nation.

The chiefs together decided to reject the proposal. “We said no — then thought about it for 35 years,” Nitah cracks. He says a second overture, in 1982, was met by a demand by hereditary Chief Joe Lockhart that they “Pack up [their] maps and go.” 

It wasn’t until the helicopters arrived that the community started seriously considering the idea. 

Warding off a mining boom

The same year that Parks Canada was first approaching the Łutsel K’e Dene, a geologist named Chuck Fipke got stuck on the side of a mountain on the other side of the Northwest Territories. A week into his ordeal, a helicopter landed to rescue him, at the behest of Stewart Blusson. The two became friends, then business partners and then they altered the course of Northwest Territories history.

The fortunes of the territory were beginning to sink during the 1980s. The price of gold, which had driven the economy of Yellowknife and powered mines around the territory since the 1940s, dropped by more than 60 per cent throughout the decade. Exploration was down, and the mines were beginning to close. 

But then, for the industry, a miracle: in November of 1991, Fipke and Blusson found 81 small diamonds at a site 300 km northeast of Yellowknife. The discovery made both men fabulously wealthy, and set off an unprecedented staking boom across the territory. The Northwest Territories became known overnight as one of the world’s great diamond mining districts, and everyone wanted in on the action. By 2004, an area bigger than New Zealand had been staked in the territory.

“Helicopters were hovering in people’s yards, and putting stakes into their yards,” Nitah says. “That’s when the elders said, you know, it was getting a little out of hand; we need to protect the core of our homeland.” 

The people of Łutsel K’e decided that using the federal government’s laws would be a way of warding off the danger of a mining boom in its backyard. And things had changed on the Parks Canada side: a new designation, the “national park reserve,” had been created, which recognized Indigenous harvesting rights and in some ways acted as a placeholder for land claims. 

Following the ratification of the Constitution in 1982 — which included Section 35 and its hunting and gathering provisions — the community also felt confident the park could not take away their rights. 

Other parks had been established in the interim; most significantly, northern parks like Kluane, which allowed harvesting, and Gwaii Hanaas National Park in Haida Gwaii, which is co-managed by the Haida and monitored by their Watchmen.

Armed with these new possibilities, Łutsel K’e Dene chief Felix Lockhart approached Parks Canada in 2000, and the proposal went ahead. Thaidene Nëné started down the long road toward establishment in 2004. The details began to trickle out: it would be co-managed between Parks Canada, the Łutsel K’e Dene and the territorial government. It would be open to First Nations and Métis fishing, hunting and travel throughout the region. There would be an administrative and welcome centre built in the community, creating and sustaining local jobs.

The negotiations went on, led by a few negotiators. But Dene cultures, until just a few generations ago, relied on oral history and a set of broadly applicable Dene laws to make decisions — and a network of chiefs that would usually be appointed for set purposes, for set periods of time. 

“We never really had a centralized leadership in the Denesołine culture,” Nitah explains.

For the Łutsel K’e Dene to now be put in a position of articulating those traditions on paper, as dictated by representatives behind closed doors, to a government that, historically, had acted in bad faith too many times to count, was a leap of faith.

A major sticking point in negotiations, according to negotiator Steve Ellis, was deciding who had what powers between the Indigenous communities and the governments. 

Steve Ellis acted as a negotiator for Lutsel K’e during the park negotiations. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

“How do you preserve a minister’s discretion while also recognizing the inherent authorities and jurisdictions of the First Nation?” he asks. “So that was, by far, the hardest piece: who’s the boss?”

There were competing claims by other northern First Nations to resolve. The Yellowknives Dene First Nation, with a land claim in progress that overlaps with the territorially managed part of the park, would later go so far as to boycott the signing ceremony.

“We want it, as per our original area we selected,” says Yellowknives Dene Chief Ernest Betsina. “We want it for us.”

Debating these sticky issues of competing jurisdictions and rights would take up the next 15 years — plenty of time for the mining industry to find as many ways as it could to keep a share of its own.

Mining for controversy

A backgrounder from the Łutsel K’e Dene First Nation from 2013, ten years into the planning process, lauds the ongoing work to create a 33,000 square kilometre reserve. At the same time, work was underway to cut the limbs off the park.

A 2013 mineral and energy resources assessment ⁠— a normal, required part of the park establishment process ⁠— shows where the conflicts between mining and conservation were going to occur: the area surrounding the Gacho Kue diamond mine to the northwest, a set of prospecting permits to the northeast, gold-copper-iron deposits in the southwest and uranium deposits in two separate areas on the southern end of the park.

Those would all be hacked off like the branches of an unruly tree. 

“We reduced the size of the area of interest by over 7,000 square kilometres to address [the mining industry’s] concerns,” says Nitah. “And we even cut off a big chunk on the southern side where there’s very little to no geological information.”

In its final form, including the territorial protected area and national park, Thaidene Nëné would be 26,525 square kilometres.

Despite the concession of more than 20 per cent of the park, the vocal Northwest Territories mining lobby was not happy to have a park in its backyard — an area it has always had free access to. Nitah dismisses their concerns.

“For them it’s all about having access to land in the spirit of colonialism,” Nitah says. He maintains that the community is not anti-mining — and that in fact mining companies would be welcome to work with the community to explore their territory — but that development needs to be on their terms. The original 33,000 square kilometre area, he says, is still an Indigenous Protected Area in the sense that it remains under the jurisdiction of the community.

As the plan progressed, op-eds, open letters and press releases bashed the park for closing off some of the Northwest Territories to development. The Northwest Territories and Nunavut Chamber of Mines complained that the minerals assessment had “glossed over” areas with high potential for mines, and not done as thorough a job as a mining company would have done in looking for minerals.

Alan Latourelle, the CEO of Parks Canada at the time, disagrees. 

“I think that we’ve done our homework,” he says. “We, the federal government, when I was there, invested a significant, significant amount in terms of the Mineral and Energy Resource Assessment.”

One letter from the Chamber of Mines to the territorial government’s Standing Committee on Economic Development, dated May 1, 2019, asked that the government change the legislation to allow pipelines and transmission lines through the park, limit the size of protected areas and redefine a park as a “development” so that it would require the same level of environmental scrutiny as a new mine would.

A Chamber of Mines submission to Parks Canada in July of 2019 complained that the park was withdrawing too much land from development. That included the Lockhart River, what it characterized as “the Northwest Territories’ third most attractive and natural hydropower development opportunity.” 

The Lockhart River is home to the Ts’ankui Theda, the Old Lady of the Falls, and an important spiritual gathering place for the Łutsel K’e Dene First Nation. Since the 1970s, the site has been repeatedly considered as a potential hydropower site, and each time, the plan has been rebuffed by people familiar with Ts’ankui Theda’s significance to the Dene. 

In a final bid to prevent the park from becoming a reality, the lobby complained that “cumulative effects of land closures” — i.e. areas not open to mining — had not been considered, and also demanded an environmental assessment of the park. 

Proponents of the park, meanwhile, were doing their own analysis, and they liked what they saw. One study, Nitah says, found that the economic benefits of the park that would accrue directly to Łutsel K’e were about the same as would come from a diamond mine, in terms of the amount of employment each would generate.

Peter Lockhart works at the Diavik mine. He says he would rather work in ecotourism. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

Derek Sanderson and his children in Lutsel K’e. Many families are hoping the economic opportunities of Thaidene Nene will benefit their children and future generations. Photo: Pat Kane

“There’s nothing you can do that’s going to appease the mining community, for the simple fact that exploration activity is not allowed in a national park,” Nitah says.

As he emcees the signing ceremony in the Łutsel K’e community hall, Nitah declares victory.  

“We’ll never have to defend our homeland within Thaidene Nëné from industrial development again,” he announces. “We can live free from that stress.” 

Peter Lockhart is among the crowd at the ceremony. He works at the Diavik mine, but says he’s glad the park is coming.

“The mines will close,” he says. Diavik Mine is set to close around 2025, with the other two following suit soon thereafter. There are no new diamond mines on the horizon, and just a handful of smaller metal mines in progress. Regardless, Lockhart would rather work as an ecotourism guide — an industry with an unlimited future, or so the community hopes.

‘A little less remote’

“I hope my kids come here,” McKenna says, as she closes out her speech, before she and the other dignitaries sign the documents that would formally establish Thaidene Nëné. “I hope they meet the young people here, who will be the leaders one day — that they’ll have good jobs here in your own community, on your land, protecting your land.”

There’s a long way to go before that vision, one shared by the people of Łutsel K’e, is ready to be implemented. 

The 45-minute flight back to Yellowknife can feel like a vast gulf separating the northern hub from the tiny community. That short trip, $500 return on scheduled flights, means that just a tiny fraction of the 75,000 tourists visiting Yellowknife each year ever make it as far as Łutsel K’e. 

“This place is remote,” says Williams, who lived in Łutsel K’e for 12 years. “It just became a little less remote.” 

A document from the territorial government, which lays out the challenges of growing the tourism industry, points to a lack of trained guides and operators, little marketing, a lack of accommodation and food service and the high cost of airfare. 

Ray Griffith, originally an outsider who has worked for the band in different capacities for decades, was recently tasked with bringing would-be tourism operators like James Marlowe up to code and helping them grow their businesses. So far there are three tourism businesses in Łutsel K’e — a small start for a community hoping to grow an ecotourism-based economy. But Griffith remains optimistic.

Ray Griffith, originally an outsider, has been living in the community for decades. He has been tasked with getting the tourism industry in Lutsel K’e off the ground. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

“I’m expecting that we can develop a pretty vibrant economy that could make a huge difference to the community,” he says, “because it’s long-term, and it’s the kind of jobs that people enjoy: getting them out on the land, making money from their own land and their own cultural experiences.”

Tourism may have unintended consequences for the community as well. The sacred falls of Ts’ankui Theda, for instance, are part of the park, having been included to avoid their disruption by a hydropower development. They are not, however, a place that the Dene visit lightly but only in times of “great need,” Williams explains. Tourists may not share that view, so the park’s managers will have to decide who can visit, and when.

Rain pours down on Marlowe’s canvas tents at “The Ritz” the morning after the announcement, pausing just long enough for the visitors to pack up the tents and eat some breakfast in the lean-to. 

Sitting in the drizzle by his campfire, Marlowe contemplates the possibilities for his business and his community. For young people like Ashton Catholique and Peter Lockhart there will be jobs on the land. For leaders like Steven Nitah and Darryl Marlowe, there will be decisions to be made about how to use the park and the proceeds of the $30 million trust fund for the benefit of their people. For Prairie Desjarlais’ guardians, and for the conservationists, there will be data to gather, waterways to study and fisheries and hunts to monitor. 

And for James Marlowe and his fellow guides, there will be visitors.

A small propeller plane waits for passengers on the gravel Łutsel K’e airstrip. Photo: Jimmy Thomson / The Narwhal

The entire Nature United crew piles into the back of the blue pickup for the short ride to the airport, but they’re met with bad news: the charter flight is cancelled due to weather, and they will have to find another way back. The place may be a little less remote now than it was before, but there are more hurdles to visiting here than the vast majority of tourists are willing to cross.

Northern parks are well known to be under-utilized relative to their southern counterparts. Aside from Kluane in Yukon, all eight national parks in the north last year saw a total of 6,338 visitors — and more than half of those were visiting Wood Buffalo. Aulavik, on Banks Island, had 18 visitors; Tuktut Nogait, in the northeast part of the Northwest Territories, recorded zero.

What the northern parks have that the southern ones do not always have is living Indigenous culture: they are mostly on the traditional territories of First Nations and Inuit communities that are actively practicing the activities that keep their cultures alive. In these new parks that encourage traditional activities to continue rather than limiting or eliminating them as before, visitors can experience something truly unique and authentic. 

“They advertise geography, but invariably the most powerful experience people have is a cultural one,” Prosper says. 

If Griffith and his small cadre of guides are hoping to cash in on an immediate boom in tourists now that the park has become a reality, they’re probably setting themselves up for disappointment. But Marlowe says he’s busy enough already. He spent all of August hosting and guiding, and new opportunities are arising from unexpected places: a group of survivalists has already booked him for a winter camping excursion, testing their mettle against the harsh elements of the Northwest Territories.

“There’s going to be an influx of people from all over the world,” he says, certain of himself, and of the draw of Thaidene Nëné’s wilderness and culture. “I’m ready.” 

Editor’s note: The Narwhal was invited to join Nature United’s charter flight to Łutsel K’e, as well as their camp at “The Ritz.” As per The Narwhal’s editorial independence policy, the organization did not have any input into the writing of this article.

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There are few eyes and ears on the ground during the winter around the Broken Group Islands in Barkley Sound, but Darrell Ross is hoping that will change with the help of federal funding for the Indigenous Guardians program.

The islands, part of Pacific Rim National Park Reserve, are rich in cultural sites, and central to the Tseshaht First Nation creation story, but, with limited funding, a Beachkeeper Program has been able to operate only in the summer.

Now, there should be year-round opportunities to teach young people about their history, train band members in safety techniques and monitor fisheries and tourism activities, said Ross, Tseshaht research and planning associate.

“Youth are the priority — and safety because you can only get to central Barkley Sound by boat or float plane,” Ross said, after federal Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna announced $5.7-million in federal funding for 28 Indigenous Guardians pilot programs.

The federal government committed $25 million for Indigenous Guardians in last year’s budget and the pilot programs, in First Nations, Metis and Inuit communities across Canada, will be assessed to help plan a full-scale network of Indigenous Guardians to monitor and protect sensitive areas.

“There has been a great deal of interest and we did want to make sure we had projects on the ground in the communities this year. We are going to learn a lot from the different approaches,” McKenna said in an interview with The Narwhal after making the funding announcement Tuesday at the Institute of Ocean Sciences in Sidney, B.C.

Nine of the pilot projects are in B.C., including tribal park monitoring and tourism guiding by the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation in Tofino.

Guardians will help monitor illegal fisheries and forestry activities, protect cultural sites and, in the North, monitor how climate change and increased shipping in the Northwest Passage are affecting the Arctic.

Izaac Wilman, representing Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. — recipient of one of the funding packages — said the main food source for communities in Nunavut is the ocean, so, as the climate changes, monitoring is essential.

“Increased shipping and oil and gas exploration poses a risk to our lands, wildlife and our relationship to both. Being that Nunavut is a food insecure place, it’s important we keep our wildlife healthy and sustain healthy relationships,” he said.

The projects fit well with the government’s $1.3-billion nature legacy, announced in this year’s budget, which focuses on how to protect species and nature, McKenna said.

“It’s attracting interest from around the world because Canada has a huge amount of virgin land and we have an opportunity to showcase to the world how to do things better, including working with Indigenous peoples,” she said.

Reconciliation played a major part in the decision to fund the programs, said McKenna, who emphasized that, as minister, she has learned to listen and understand the importance of Indigenous knowledge.

“The idea of reconciliation has so much to do with the land,” she said.

Indigenous guardians reclaim the land

The projects also mesh with Canada’s international commitment to protect 17 per cent of land and fresh water by 2020, a commitment that was given a boost last month by creation of the first federally recognized Indigenous Protected Area.

The 14,281 square kilometre Edehzhie protected area will be followed by other Indigenous Protected Areas, McKenna said.

Canada’s new Indigenous Protected Area heralds new era of conservation

“These are a top priority,” she said.

“We are looking at a very big announcement early next year — a marine conservation area. It would be really exciting and I think it would really capture the imagination of the world and there are a number of other initiatives across the country we are working on,” she said.

McKenna, who will meet with B.C. Environment Minister George Heyman on Wednesday, downplayed disagreements between the federal government and B.C. over the Trans Mountain pipeline and protection of endangered mountain caribou.

The federal government has relentlessly pushed the Trans Mountain oilsands pipeline despite opposition from the B.C. government, several First Nations and a court ruling against the project.

“Obviously there are some files that are going to be more challenging, but when we look at what we need to do when it comes to taking action on climate change, protecting more of our nature, protecting species at risk, we absolutely have to work together,” she said.

Last May, the federal government warned B.C. that it needed a strong protection plan for endangered southern mountain caribou, appearing ready to step in and override provincial powers over resource development in caribou critical habitat.

McKenna declared an imminent threat to the recovery of 10 herds, but, instead of an emergency protection order that would allow the federal government to step in, both levels of government have been working on a joint recovery plan.

However, during the last six months, the province has approved 83 logging cut blocks in critical habitat of the eight most endangered southern mountain caribou populations.

Thirty of B.C.’s 54 caribou herds are at risk of local extinction and 14 of those herds now have fewer than 25 animals, but pleas for federal action have not been heeded.

McKenna said her department has been working closely with B.C. and she will be bringing up the topic during her meeting with Heyman.

“We know we need to take action to protect the caribou and there are also First Nations communities that are incredibly important to the discussions and I am looking forward to finding a resolution — a path forward — really shortly,” she said.

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After more than a year of public hearings, the federal government unveiled its new and improved environmental assessment legislation in February 2018 with much ado.

But the new rules — designed to restore public trust in Canada’s process for reviewing major projects — didn’t contain any details on what kinds of projects would trigger a review under the new legislation.

Environment Minister Catherine McKenna skirted the issue, saying her ministry was still evaluating what kinds of activities would show up on a yet-to-be-released “project list” that was pending further consultation with Canadians.

But when pressed on the issue, McKenna told reporters she didn’t believe oilsands projects developed via in-situ methods should be included. McKenna reasoned that because Alberta already has a hard cap on emissions, future oilsands projects would be exempt from federal environmental review.

The implications of excluding new oilsands projects because of a provincial emissions cap (which is controversial) weren’t lost on Adam Scott, senior advisor with Oil Change International.

Unbelievable and unacceptable. @cathmckenna proposes exempting #tarsands in-situ projects from any federal environmental assessment because ‘Alberta has a hard cap on emissions’ #cdnpoli

— Adam Scott (@AdamScottEnv) February 8, 2018

“It’s just appalling,” Scott told DeSmog Canada in an interview. “There’s no other way to say it.”

Unlike the more familiar open-pit mines of the Alberta oilsands, in-situ projects extract the region’s viscous bitumen by injecting steam into the ground, which softens the oil that is then pumped to the surface.

In-situ development represents the future of the oilsands. Between 2016 and 2040, in-situ is expected to double in daily production reaching 2.9 million barrels per day.

And while the process is less visible than its open-pit counterpart, in-situ oilsands mining has greater greenhouse gas emissions and significant land disturbance that clashes with the rights of local Indigenous peoples.

NDP MP Linda Duncan said by not releasing the project list the federal government has left everyone in the dark.

Duncan, who serves as vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development which is responsible for reviewing the new legislation, said in-situ projects were exempted from federal assessments under the previous Harper government during dramatic cuts to Canada’s environmental rules. The new proposed federal legislation, bill C-69, was meant to make the gutted rules more robust.

“Everybody agrees that this bill should not be finalized until everybody knows what the project list is,” Duncan told DeSmog Canada.

“Who is it going to apply to? It’s ridiculous that they didn’t have the consultations simultaneously. This is a really serious matter. One of the things that we heard from industry today was that they’re just fed up.”

In-situ projects expected to emit 65 megatonnes of emissions by 2030

In-situ projects don’t result in the same level of visual devastation as open-pit mining: there are no toxic tailings lakes or gargantuan trucks needed.

But they have their own set of significant impacts, which critics argue should fall under the purview of federal assessment.

For one, they emit far more greenhouse gases that mining on a per-barrel basis. A 2016 assessment by the Pembina Institute found the “emissions intensity” of in-situ is about 60 per cent higher than mining. That’s because natural gas is burned to create the steam used in the process, making it extremely emissions intensive.

By 2030, in-situ projects are expected to emit 65 megatonnes of emissions per year: almost equivalent to all passenger transport in the country.

Sharon Mascher, law professor at the University of Calgary and expert in environmental law, said in an interview with DeSmog Canada that such climate impacts from in-situ projects warrant federal assessment.

“I would argue that the federal government has the constitutional power to deal with greenhouse gas emissions and they need to show some leadership if they’re going to purport to be acting in a way that’s consistent with their obligations under the Paris Agreement,” she said.

“They need to exercise that jurisdiction to make sure that over the long term Canada’s greenhouse gases are not increasing  but are decreasing and eventually reaching carbon neutrality.”

Alberta’s emissions cap allows for a 40 per cent expansion in emissions, up to 100 megatonnes. But that doesn’t include electricity cogeneration, oilsands that doens’t require steam extraction and new or expanded upgraders — which combine for another 15 megatonnes of emissions.

As noted in the recent collaborative report by Canada’s auditors general, Alberta is one of nine province and territories that doesn’t even have a 2030 emissions goal in place.

Mascher said the only way an exemption for new in-situ projects would make sense would be if the federal government conducted a strategic assessment of all existing legislative frameworks in order to provide assurance that new production fits within Paris Agreement obligations.

However, strategic assessments aren’t legislated — meaning they’re completely at the discretion of cabinet.

No environmental assessments for in-situ oilsands projects under the federal government’s new rules. @cathmckenna https://t.co/WjhonE2XgN

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) April 3, 2018

Without federal assessments, ‘there’s no credibility to the system at all’

Greenhouse gas emissions aren’t the only potential impact of in-situ projects.

As recently reported by DeSmog Canada, Fort McKay First Nation in northeast Alberta is currently fighting a proposed in-situ project that is feared to jeopardize a nearby sacred region.

Specific concerns include the introduction of linear disturbances like roads and cutlines — which can further endanger caribou — and constant water withdrawals.

“They’re massive water polluters with large impacts on land and endangered and threatened species like woodland caribou,” Scott said. “They obviously need to be part of any review. It’s just essential. Without that, there’s no credibility to the system at all. They need to be on the project list as a default.”

There’s growing interest by oilsands producers in the use of “solvents” for in-situ projects, which would greatly reduce the amount of natural gas required for extraction but have unknown impacts on groundwater quality.

Duncan emphasized it’s the primary responsibility of the federal government to address Indigenous rights.  In addition, she emphasized that only the federal government can regulate navigable waters, fisheries and trans-boundary waters.

Even though the previous environmental impact system implemented under Harper exempted in-situ projects, Duncan said it’s imperative that they be included in the project list.

“It’s still having a huge impact on the landbase that is by and large traditional Indigenous lands,” she said.

Committee required to review legislation without knowing what it will apply to

The proposed legislation is currently being reviewed by the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development. After it’s approved, it’ll return to the House for third reading and eventually royal assent.

In late February, the Liberals introduction a “time allocation” motion over bill C-69 in the House of Commons, limiting debate to only two days before sending it off to the Liberal-stacked committee.

But Duncan said the committee process itself is also being fast-tracked, with limitations on hearing witnesses and proposed amendments.

In response, she gave notice of a motion to break up the bill for review and send sections to relevant committees: parts addressing the Canadian Energy Regulator to the Natural Resource committee and parts about navigable waters to the Transport committee.

Those calls were rebuffed.

Now, her committee has to review over 800 clauses by late April.

Some have speculated that the continued exemption for in-situ for Alberta is a subtle trick to ensure the emissions cap remains regardless of who wins the next provincial election.

Scott suggested that would be a “terrible strategy.”

“The Alberta cap is an ineffective way of dealing with climate impacts of oil and gas operations,” he said. “Exempting projects with the environmental impacts of in-situ tarsands projects really shows the impact system was broken entirely.”

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One year ago, after scathing reports by international agencies, the federal government promised to better protect Wood Buffalo National Park, with Environment Minister Catherine McKenna saying a warning from the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, followed by an equally dire assessment by the International Union on the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), were a call to action.

But that action is moving at a glacial pace, even though the stated threats to the integrity of Canada’s largest national park, such as upstream oilsands development, climate change and construction of the Site C dam, are continuing unabated.

“Change in the [Peace-Athabasca Delta] is undisputed and there are clear, consistent and conceivable hints at causal relationships with industrial development, confirmed by western science and local and indigenous knowledge,” the report warned. It also took aim at forestry, pulp and paper, uranium mining, agriculture and other resource development in the watershed.

Now, with World Heritage Centre deadlines approaching, a coalition of Indigenous and environmental groups is pushing for faster decisions and dedicated funding to help address the park’s many problems.

“When our community heard Minister McKenna tell us that the mission report was a call to action we were hopeful,” said Melody Lepine, director of government and industry relations at Mikisew Cree First Nation.

“A year later, there is little concrete action to report to our elders except that we keep trying to get government to honour its commitment. So much more needs to be done and done fast,” she said.

Last July Lepine told a World Heritage Committee session in Krakow, Poland, that Canada is not acting in good faith and described how the Peace-Athabasca Delta — the world’s largest freshwater inland delta — is threatened by dams and rapid industrial development.

Wood Buffalo encompasses about 4.5 million hectares of boreal plains in northern Alberta and the southern Northwest Territories, is home to the world’s largest herd of free-ranging wood bison and is the breeding ground for the only wild, self-sustaining migratory flock of whooping cranes.

The park was visited by UNESCO inspectors after a 2014 petition from the Mikisew Cree First Nation and the subsequent report warned that, without a major and timely response, the organization would recommend that Wood Buffalo be included in the list of World Heritage in Danger, a list usually reserved for sites in countries dealing with disasters.

A November report by the IUCN raised further red flags, saying the park had deteriorated since the IUCN’s 2014 assessment and that the federal government’s response has been “inadequate in light of the scale, pace and complexity of the challenges.”

Wood Buffalo received the worst rating of all of Canada’s 10 natural world heritage sites and, only the Florida Everglades received a lower IUCN rating in all of North America.

The World Heritage Committee has asked Canada for a Strategic Environmental Assessment to be completed by next month and for an Action Plan to be submitted by December 1, so that it can make a decision on further action by summer 2019.

But even the planning has run into problems, with the federal government not taking into account some of the activities and threats outside the park boundaries.

“Canada’s ongoing refusal to consider the impacts of the Site C dam dam on the Peace-Athabasca Delta is astounding, “ said Galen Armstrong, Sierra Club B.C. Peace Valley campaigner.

The committee agreed in its report.

As for Site C project, the mission notes that the joint review panel’s conclusion that project impacts on the Peace-Athabasca Delta would be “negligible” is not substantiated by any information presented in its report and appears to be based exclusively on the proponent’s definition of downstream impact area.

McKenna, in a statement, said the government is responding to the World Heritage Committee’s request and the 2018 budget proposes “historic investments” to protect Canada’s nature, parks and wild spaces.

“Included in these investments in Canada’s natural legacy is a commitment to invest in the action plan that is being developed for Wood Buffalo National Park World Heritage Site,” she wrote.

Becky Kostka, Smith’s Landing First Nation lands and resources manager, said there have already been missteps and the initial draft of the Strategic Environmental Assessment was inadequate, simply pulling together previous studies, and did not represent Indigenous voices and Indigenous knowledge.

“Local knowledge-holders would have liked a bigger part,” Kostka told The Narwhal.

“Previously they (government) said there were no environmental changes north of the Peace River and when I talk to the elders they say there are significant changes happening across the park.”

However, there appears to be a willingness to make changes and a series of meetings are now being planned, she said.

Funding is another problem and diverting scarce resources previously allocated for Wood Buffalo will not suffice, said Kostka, who is also concerned about the tight time-frame for producing an action plan.

Those concerns are echoed by Alison Ronson of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society.

“It is clear the World Heritage Committee is expecting Canada to deliver more than a plan to plan,” she said.

“With the commitments for environmental conservation in the new federal budget, Canada can and must develop an action plan with real resources.”

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While much of the country’s attention was focused on the rapidly escalating stand-off between Alberta and British Columbia over the Trans Mountain pipeline this week, another major environmental announcement went largely unnoticed.

On Thursday, the federal government quietly approved BP Canada’s plan to drill up to seven deep exploration wells off the coast of Nova Scotia between 2018 and 2022. In her decision statement, Environment and Climate Change minister Catherine McKenna wrote the project “is not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects.”

That conclusion ran contrary to serious concerns that environmental and fishing organizations have raised about the project — including BP’s role in the catastrophic 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, the proximity of the project to critical fish and marine mammal habitats, the company’s dependence on toxic chemical dispersants in the case of an oil spill, and a blowout containment strategy that would require at least two weeks to ship and equip a capping device from Norway.

“We feel like we’re under assault,” said John Davis, director of the Clean Ocean Action Committee, in an interview with DeSmog Canada. “The coastal communities and fishing industry of Eastern Canada is just under assault by this government.”

The Clean Ocean Action Committee is a coalition of fish plant operators and fishermen representing more than 9,000 jobs in southwestern Nova Scotia.

The BP wells off the southeast coast of Nova Scotia are slated to be at least 3.5 times the distance from land and up to twice the depth of the well beneath the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig, which exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

ICYMI: BP Wants to Drill Underwater Wells Twice the Depth of Deepwater Horizon in Canada

McKenna’s approval isn’t the last word on the project: the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board still needs to oversee some final processes, including the creation of a spill response plan and issue a licence approval to drill.

But the offshore boards aren’t exactly known for interfering with development.

For all intents and purposes, this decision was the last opportunity for the federal government to make an intervention on a number of different issues: spill response, impacts of routine activities on marine mammals such as right whales, Indigenous rights or greenhouse gas emissions. While some legally binding conditions were included with the approval, none fundamentally addressed the major issues critics have with the project.

The 700 kilometre Scotian Shelf, which effectively divides the Continental Shelf and the deeper Atlantic Ocean, serves as the site of remarkable biodiversity, including whales, seals, sea turtles, fish, corals and birds. That contributes to highly successful fisheries such as the nearby Georges Bank.

“The edge of the Scotian Shelf is a remarkably productive area and important for a lot of animals,” Hal Whitehead, professor of biology at Dalhousie University, told DeSmog Canada.

“It’s that the drilling is actually on and near the shelf that worries me most.”

‘We’re Under Assault’: Feds Quietly Approve Deepwater Oil Drilling Off Nova Scotia https://t.co/4YwqVi9tLQ #offshore #NovaScotia #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/nF6vq0swy7

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) February 3, 2018

Limited Consultations Resulted in No Major Changes, Critics Said

There wasn’t much of a chance for the public to articulate its concerns at any point during the process, despite McKenna’s assurance there was “meaningful consultation and input from Indigenous groups and the public.”

“We were denied any opportunity for public hearings,” Davis said. “Any comments that we had to make about BP or the Environmental Impact Statement would have to be written briefs. And quite frankly, I work with a lot of really confident and thoughtful people, but most of my fishing community aren’t into writing briefs. But they would be happy to have a discussion. And we were denied that discussion. That really aggravated us.”

In its Environmental Assessment Report, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency reported that it received submissions from five organizations and 26 individuals.

But it’s unclear that the submissions had any discernible impact on the outcome, despite overwhelmingly opposing the project.

“Comments went in, but looking in particular at the spill response plan, I don’t see much change between the draft environmental impact statement and the environmental assessment report that just came out with McKenna’s approval,” said Gretchen Fitzgerald, director of Sierra Club Canada’s Atlantic region chapter.

The announcement occurs during a time of flux for the offshore boards and environmental assessment process in Canada

Next week, it’s expected that the government’s long-awaited overhauls of the country’s various environmental laws will be announced — with the new Impact Assessment Act and Canadian Energy Regulator Act having the potential to further entrench the regulatory responsibilities of the two petroleum offshore boards.

“We’re really going to be watching to see what the legislation is going to look like in regards to offshore oil and gas,” Fitzgerald said.

ICYMI: Canada’s Offshore Petroleum Boards Under Fire for Conflict of Interest

In addition, the federal government has been amalgamating regulations on offshore oil and gas activities under the primary consultation of industry players, moving from a prescriptive to a performance-based approach that gives companies far more flexibility in how it manages risk and prepares for situations like blowouts — such as not requiring a capping device nearby.

“When you’re drilling that deep, you better know exactly what you’re doing,” Fitzgerald said. “With the poor regulations and industry oversight that we perceive out there, we’re not reassured that’s happening. They’re very far from emergency and spill response.”

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“The first thing you have to do is have a plan; you have to implement your plan, and then you have to ratchet up ambition. That’s part of the Paris agreement, and that’s what we’re absolutely committed to doing.”

That’s Environment Minister Catherine McKenna in an interview she gave to the Globe and Mail before heading to Bonn for the COP23 climate talks.

Let’s just start by saying it’s really good to hear that McKenna understands she needs a plan. Two years into her mandate, she hasn’t shown us one. An actual plan would include numbers that add up to the stated goal. McKenna has offered no such thing.

The Trudeau government is very committed to talking about climate change, to talking up goals they aren’t going to meet. What they aren’t terribly interested in is telling the rest of us how they propose to get there, backed up by math.

“We are absolutely on track to meet our 2030 commitments,” McKenna told the Globe. “We have a plan … and there’s a whole variety of measures we need to be taking. We also aren’t doing this alone. We’re working with provinces and territories.”

That much is true: the federal government is relying on the provinces to get us to the planned 30 per cent reduction in 2005 emissions levels by 2030. But what the provinces have told us so far doesn’t add up to a 30 per cent reduction.

Let’s talk about the commitment to eliminate coal by 2030. McKenna and the British are pushing in tandem for that ban. That’s a good thing, of course; coal must be eliminated from the global fuel supply if we’re going to address climate change. But Canada generates 80 per cent of its electricity from non-GHG emitting energy sources, like hydro and nuclear. Easy enough for us to wag our fingers and tell the rest of the world to get off coal — but if the idea is to set an example, we’re failing.

For the British, and for Canada to some extent, the plan is to replace much of that coal-fired generation with natural gas. Emissions from natural gas run to about 50 to 60 per cent of the emissions from coal — but wind and solar emit nothing at all. So when will we eliminate all fossil fuels from the generation mix?

If the war on coal is won, the war on natural gas must follow. Is the Trudeau government willing to actually say that?

ICYMI: Can Trudeau Possibly Square New Pipelines with the Paris Agreement?

If we eliminated all the coal-burning we saw in 2015 (the last reported year) in favour of natural gas, our total emissions compared to 2005 would drop by … about 4 per cent. That’s not insignificant. It’s no silver bullet, either.

But a further 7 per cent reduction is available to us by moving completely to non-emitting sources such as hydro, wind and solar. That would get us one-third of the way to our Paris goal on its own. Unfortunately, that’s where the good news ends.

Alberta accounts for close to 60 per cent of all Canada’s emissions from burning fossil fuels to generate electricity. The province plans to get off coal by 2030, replacing half of that displaced fuel source with natural gas — with the remaining generation to come from renewables. Which sounds terrific until you read the fine print — and understand just how disingenuous McKenna is being in Bonn on the topic of coal. Alberta’s plan is to offset all those emissions reductions from eliminating coal by increasing emissions from oilsands production. So much for our Paris commitments.

Catherine McKenna Says Canada Has a #Climate Plan. Prove It. https://t.co/E3kQp7pg1t @cathmckenna #COP23 #climateaction #coal #natgas #oilsands

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) November 15, 2017

McKenna also is suggesting a ‘low carbon fuel standard’ will be a key factor in reducing our emissions. She’s not wrong; it’s a regulatory way to get industry to reduce the carbon content in the mix of fuels we all burn. But that’s a complicated policy to tackle and McKenna already is indicating the standard won’t be complete in time for the Christmas target date.

ICYMI: Low Carbon Fuel Standard: The Best Canadian Climate Policy You’ve Probably Never Heard Of

Under Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada adopted a national gasoline standard of 5 per cent ethanol content. It’s never been clear why he did that. The Harper government was notoriously indifferent to climate change policy. Canada imports both corn and ethanol, while we export oil we could make into gasoline ourselves.

If the idea was to cut carbon emissions, importing ethanol is a poor approach; it doesn’t really offer much of a reduction in emissions, for starters, and the ethanol imported from the U.S. Midwest is relatively carbon-intensive to produce.

Canada imports fully half the ethanol today we use in gasoline. We have consumed all our domestic capacity to make this fuel. If the Trudeau government boosts the ethanol content standard — say, by another 5 per cent — we’d likely end up importing it — which means we’d be competing directly with California, which is busy ratcheting up its own fuel carbon standard.

One recent estimate said that, in order to meet its upcoming fuel standard, California would require almost 75 per cent of Brazil’s production of sugar cane ethanol. That doesn’t leave a lot of room for us.

So the delay in announcing our new national fuel standard is hardly surprising, given the factors involved. Does the Trudeau government really understand what it promised to do? Hard to tell at the moment.

The minister is right — you need a plan. So where is it?

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Reading Environment Commissioner Julie Gelfand’s report on Canada’s climate action, we’d have to say that the woman sounds … ticked.

Here are five reasons Gelfand is wagging a disappointed finger at Canada’s environment officials.

1. Never met a climate target I actually…met

Canada has introduced several climate targets during the last 25 years but has failed to meet a single one.

As Gelfand puts it, “Since 1992, the government has repeatedly promised to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, adapt to the impacts of climate change, and support clean energy technology. However, since then, Canada has missed two separate emission reduction targets and is likely to miss the 2020 target as well; in fact, emissions have increased by over 15 percent.”

What are the details?

Canada set its first target, to reduce annual emissions to 613 megatonnes (Mt) by 2000, at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. In 2000, Canada was 20 per cent over the mark.

In 2005 the Kyoto Protocol aimed to reduce emissions to 576 Mt by 2012. Canada missed that target by 25 per cent.

In 2012 the Copenhagen Accord aimed to cut emissions to 620 Mt by 2020. That target was replaced by the Paris Agreement, which aims to reduce Canada’s emissions to 524 Mt by 2030.

According to Environment and Climate Change Canada’s own estimates, Canada will emit 814 Mt of carbon dioxide equivalent per year by 2030 — that’s 55 per cent over the target.

2. Climate Action Plan. We’ve done a lot of work on the plan part.

Gelfand’s audit found that when it comes to actually implementing plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Canada keeps kicking the can down the road.

On implementing regulatory changes, for example, “the federal government has yet to do much of the hard work that is required to bring about this fundamental shift,” Gelfand wrote.

“Instead of developing a detailed action plan to reach the 2020 target for reducing emissions, the government changed its focus to the 2030 target.”

The government has failed to actually implement new greenhouse gas regulations, like methane emission rules, “thereby losing opportunities to achieve real reductions in emissions,” Gelfand said.

Last year Canada did announce the Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change, which calls for policies aimed at reducing emissions in a number of sectors.

“It is crucial that the government turn its plan into actions,” Gelfand said.

3. Climate adaptation? That’s a movie with Nicolas Cage, right?

The government is also nowhere near ready to adapt to the impacts of climate change, according to Gelfand. According to recent research, Canada can expect more frequent and severe storms, droughts, floods and fires as a result of a warming climate.

Canada has done very little to prepare for this new reality. That’s despite the fact a 2011 report by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy estimated every dollar spent now on adaptation will result in $9 to $38 worth of avoided damages.

In 2011 Environment and Climate Change Canada developed a Federal Adaptation Policy Framework, but then did nothing to actually implement it or work with departments to identify what climate risks actually mean.

Gelfand found only five of 19 departments and agencies analyzed have fully assessed their climate change risks and taken action to address them. The other 11 have “taken little or no action to address risks that could hinder their ability to deliver programs and services to Canadians. “This means that the government does not have a complete picture of the risks it faces from climate change. If Canada is to adapt to a changing climate, much stronger leadership is needed.”

Five Reasons Canada’s Environment Commissioner Gave Ottawa a Failing Grade on #Climate https://t.co/tlA15WR62x #cdnpoli @cathmckenna

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) October 10, 2017

4. Well shucks, you’re right! We DID promise to phase out fossil fuel subsidies…

The federal government simply doesn’t have a solid strategy for eliminating fossil fuel subsidies, Gelfand found.

In 2009 Canada promised to eliminate inefficient fossil fuel subsidies but has so far done none of the leg work to identify what exemptions, tax breaks or funds fall into that bucket.

In fact, a 2017 spring report to Parliament from the federal auditor general found “a disconcerting lack of real results when [looking] at what the government had been doing” to meet that commitment, Gelfand noted in her report.

“We found that the Department of Finance Canada and Environment and Climate Change Canada — the two departments tasked with delivering on this commitment — had yet to determine which subsidies would require phasing out, according to the commitment,” Gelfand wrote.

“It is unclear how Canada will meet this international commitment by 2025 without a clear roadmap to get there.”

5. What do you mean climate change is here? NOW?

Canada warmed at twice the global average between 1948 and 2007.

And according to a 2016 federal auditor general report, disaster funds released through the Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangements in the previous six years is greater that all funds released in the previous 39 years.

Gelfand said Canada has been stuck in a “seemingly endless planning mode” and Parliamentarians are ready to move “into an action mode.”

But she adds, “that shift needs to happen, and it needs to happen now, because Canada is already experiencing the impacts of a changing climate.”

On a positive note, Canada does seem to be making progress on clean energy investments. Yaaaaaay?

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.

“If you were to get lost in the bush, I could find you.”

It’s an oddly placed sentiment in the city heat of Marrakech, Morocco, yet an entirely appropriate one for an indigenous panel at the UN climate talks hosted by Canada’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna.

Francois Paulette, revered Canadian indigenous leader and elder from the Dene Nation, told an international crowd of delegates, campaigners and press that back in Canada, his place is in the wild.

It is there Paulette learned from his elders the meaning of sin: “The biggest sin a man can make is to abuse the earth.”

“And now that’s why we’re in the place we’re in and why there is global warming.”

Although Paulette said he is not one for the city — he’d rather be on a riverbank back home in the Northwest Territories — he’s no stranger to international diplomacy. At his sixth UN climate summit, Paulette is more determined than ever to ensure indigenous perspectives and rights are central to international climate plans.

By all appearances Canada seems determined to do the same.

McKenna, introducing the group of high-level indigenous leaders, rearticulated Canada’s promise to strengthen its relationship with indigenous peoples.

“As the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau has said there is no more important relationship than our relationship with indigenous peoples, our First Nations, Inuit and Metis peoples,” McKenna said.

“I really believe that and that’s why it’s so important we’re working together.”

Federal Approval of Site C, Proposed Pipelines Problematic for Indigenous Rights

At last year's UN climate talks in Paris, Canada’s delegation was among those leading the fight to include indigenous rights in the agreement text.

Yet indigenous leaders sitting alongside Paulette and McKenna at the panel say more has to be done to live up to promises to respect indigenous rights, both on the international stage, and domestically in Canada.

Paulette said despite clear promises to renew Canada’s relationship with indigenous people, Trudeau recently approved federal permits for the Site C dam in British Columbia despite opposition from Treaty 8 First Nations.

“We have a problem with that.”

Paulette added that because of the environmental impacts of oilsands development on water and climate, he also cannot support the construction of new pipelines.

The Trudeau government is expected to approve the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline in coming weeks and in September approved the Pacific Northwest LNG export terminal — which is projected to be Canada’s largest single point source of greenhouse gas emissions — near Prince Rupert, B.C.

The recent project approvals, which contravene Canada’s promises to indigenous peoples as well as its climate commitments, have some worried Canada isn’t prepared to walk the talk.

“If we’re going to implement the Paris Agreement, it can’t just be in words,” Paulette said. “We need to be a part of that process every step of the way.”

Canada’s Pipeline Projects Run Up Against Indigenous Rights, Climate Targets

Kevin Hart, Assembly of First Nations Manitoba Regional Chief, said environmental degradation still disproportionately impacts indigenous peoples in Canada and around the world, a problem exacerbated by new pipeline proposals.

The Trans Canada Energy East pipeline and the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline are facing intense indigenous opposition, including legal challenges. A Canadian court found the now stalled Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline was conditionally approved by a government-appointed panel without adequate consultation for First Nations, as is required by the Canadian constitution.

The proposed path for the Energy East pipeline crosses Manitoba on its route to export facilities on the east coast. The controversial pipeline, which would transport 1.1 million barrels of oil per day, has been called a threat to indigenous land and water. The project’s current route has it crossing over the territory of 50 First Nations, according to the Council of Canadians.

“Our people are right smack dab in the middle of proposed pipeline development currently on the table,” Hart said.

Hart said if Canada is to live up to its climate commitments it cannot afford to build more pipelines.

“If there’s any expansion done in Canada it will be next to impossible for Canada to meet those targets now and in the future.”

Hart, who was speaking on a stage at the Indigenous People’s Pavilion at the UN climate talks, turned to address McKenna personally.

“And Minister McKenna, you as well as your colleague [transport] Minister Carr, know full well I’ve publicly stated I cannot support any pipeline currently or in the future.”

“Indigenous peoples have known for thousands of years how to protect the land, as Trudeau pointed out in Paris last year,” Hart said. 

He added the presence of indigenous leaders at the talks is to ensure that knowledge is incorporated into the Paris Agreement and what it means for major projects back in Canada.

Canada Fought to Include #IndigenousRights in Paris Agreement But Will Those Rights Be Protected Back Home? https://t.co/ON7QWn98r2 #cdnpoli

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) November 16, 2016

Canada’s Arctic Disproportionately Impacted by Climate Change

Natan Obed, president of the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, said Canada will actually miss out on the true rewards of climate action if it excludes indigenous perspectives.

“For the Inuit, in our homeland, we are on the forefront of climate change,” Obed said.

“When we talk about a global temperature increase of 1.5 or two degrees Celsuis, we don’t quite know what that means for the Arctic.”

Scientists have documented Arctic air temperatures warming twice as fast as elsewhere on the planet. Obed said the model his community has been using predicts the Arctic will experience two to four times the rate of warming felt elsewhere.

Inuit people in Canada’s north lay claim to a combined territory of 3.2 million square kilometres.

“That’s roughly the size of India,” Obed said.

Warmer temperatures and melting sea ice have dire consequences for the Inuit, he said.

Climate change “has a fundamental impact on our way of life and cultures as well as the way we transmit knowledge between generations.”

Obed said his people are inherently coastal people, who have carved out a unique way of life in a region of the world covered by ice for most months of the year.

“We have a connection to the ice that is beyond most cultures and societies in the world. So this issue matters to us more than anything.”

Echoing the concerns of other indigenous leaders at the panel event, Obed said these unique indigenous concerns should not be left out of Canada’s larger climate conversation.

“If we can't have policy space about an area that is most affected, that has an indigenous people whose society and way of life is threatened, then I doubt Canada will get the most it can from climate action.”

Images: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau via Prime Minister's Photo Gallery

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The Trudeau government’s rushed approval of the Petronas-led Pacific Northwest LNG project Tuesday — during sunset at a gated Coast Guard station near the Vancouver airport — struck some opposition MPs, and the Vancouver press corp, as oddly rushed.  

Now comes word, in a bombshell Reuters news report Friday morning, that Petronas may be looking to sell the Pacific Northwest LNG project, according to "three people familiar with the matter.” The B.C. government tried to throw water on the speculation Friday afternoon, saying it sought assurances from Petronas and that the proponent doesn't have plans to sell the LNG project.

However, the revelations have led some to speculate the Trudeau government knew about Petronas’ plans to sell and raced out west in a hurried attempt to save the project from collapse. Others have questioned if the provincial and federal governments knowingly approved a project destined for failure, and if so, why?

“It’s incredibly cynical if Trudeau’s government had advance knowledge this wasn’t going ahead,” Nathan Cullen, NDP MP for Skeena-Bulkley Valley, told DeSmog Canada.

Hasty LNG Approval Signaled Trouble

The timing of the announcement was peculiar since Trudeau’s ministers were in a cabinet meeting earlier that morning in Ottawa. One of them, Fisheries Minister Romeo LeBlanc, was scheduled to meet in Ottawa with five B.C. hereditary chiefs opposed to the LNG project.  

But that meeting was abruptly cancelled, and ministers Catherine McKenna, Jim Carr and LeBlanc jetted across the country to the airport-area press briefing, where they announced their approval of the controversial LNG project.

Cullen said the timing of the Trudeau government’s announcement was highly suspicious.

“I’ve been trying to understand why they announced the way they did,” he said. “It was disorganized, it was panicked and they had already flown out hereditary chiefs to Ottawa. This was a huge announcement, a big deal for Trudeau. Why the panic?”

“I think because Petronas was about to say, ‘we’re thinking of selling.’ They wanted to milk one last good news story out of it before reality hit and people realized Christy Clark’s [LNG] fantasy was nothing more than an attempt to get reelected.”

Canada’s climate change minister Catherine McKenna stands beside B.C. Premier Christy Clark during the Trudeau government’s announcement approving the Petronas-led Pacific Northwest LNG plant on Tuesday evening near the Vancouver airport. Photo: Mychaylo Prystupa.

When asked to confirm the news of Petronas’ intentions, Caitlin Workman, McKenna’s media officer, provided this statement via e-mail: “As far as I have seen there are only speculation and unnamed sources out there on that matter. The project was approved by the government based on a lengthy and thorough process that took about three years from beginning to end.” A media inquiry to Petronas, via its Pacific Northwest LNG office, was not responded to Friday afternoon.

Shannon McPhail, executive director of the Skeena Watershed Conservation Coalition, told DeSmog Canada the news reveals a dizzying level of political posturing on behalf of both the province and the federal government.

“Clearly they knew this was going to happen. What other reason was there for their hasty press conference in Vancouver?” McPhail told DeSmog Canada. “They didn’t plan that. They had meetings scheduled with hereditary chiefs in Ottawa. That was a last-minute, hasty decision.”

While McPhail said she was frustrated by the federal government’s decision to approve the project earlier this week, the news of Petronas’ potential exit from the B.C. LNG market puts it all into perspective.

As for B.C. Premier Christy Clark, McPhail sees it cutting two ways.

“Did the feds play her?” McPhail mused. “At the press conference Christy Clark couldn’t get that smile off her face — she looked like the cat that had caught the canary.”

“Then I started thinking — she didn’t know. They used her has a pawn to get what they wanted: a carbon tax across Canada.”

Did Christy Clark ‘Get Played’ or is She a Player?

Earlier this week Clark reversed a long-standing election promise that her government would not increase the provincial carbon tax. This was the result of an explicit political condition placed on federal approval of the Pacific Northwest LNG project.  

Clark sure as heck wanted this Pacific Northwest LNG approved. She set ambitious LNG targets for herself, promising to have three LNG facilities up and running by 2020 and committing much of her cabinet to LNG project approvals.

So far, none of the other already approved LNG projects — Squamish's small-scale Woodfibre LNG plant, and the two giant Kitimat LNG projects by Shell and Chevron — have moved ahead with final investment decisions.

But that doesn’t mean Clark wasn’t willing to leverage the federal approval of the Pacific Northwest LNG project for some political advantage.  

It’s entirely possible Clark’s cheshire grin at Tuesday’s rushed press conference was due to the fact that she could say “we did everything we could,” McPhail said.

“Maybe the cat that ate the canary face was just for show to demonstrate to media, ‘hey look I was right all along, we’re the jobs people and look how hard we worked.’ ”

But the approval of the Pacific Northwest project may just be setting the stage for the main B.C. event: the federal approval of the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline.

That’s what it comes down to for Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs.

“We suspect that in part the tradeoff between the federal government and the Clark government here in B.C. is that the premier agreed to sign on to the federal carbon tax proposal,” Phillip told DeSmog Canada.

“Furthermore we believe in exchange the federal government has agreed to complete the hat trick of betrayal of the promises and commitments made to the First Nations people during the course of the last federal election will be the approval of the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expansion proposal.”

The Vancouver Sun’s Editorial Board has yet another take on the connection between the LNG approval and the pending pipeline decision, stating that Trudeau’s LNG approval will win “applause from resource sector” while giving the Prime Minister the credibility to impose the moratorium on oil tankers on the northern coast, thereby killing Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline and “winning the admiration of the environmental movement.”

“Having earned his green spurs, he can [then] approve the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain” pipeline….having deftly played both sides of the street.”

The federal government is expected to make a final decision on the Trans Mountain pipeline by December.

For Project Opponents, Approval Still Represents Betrayal

Phillip is among many of the project’s opponents that consider the federal government’s approval of the project — even if a political charade — a deep betrayal.

“Let me begin by saying that to see the deception inherent in the approval of the Pacific Northwest LNG project proposal flies in the face of any notion of genuine reconciliation between the government of Canada or the province of B.C. and First Nations.”

Lax Kw'alaams woman Christine Smith-Martin crashed the Trudeau government’s Tuesday night Petronas LNG decision announcement in protest while holding a jar of salmon.  Photo: Mychaylo Prystupa.

“Clearly there has been a great deal of backroom dealing going on.”

Cullen, who spent Friday in Haida Gwaii for the royal visit, said many people in Northern B.C. are furious.

“Trudeau wasn’t invited here, the Premier wasn’t invited here for a reason. People are feeling very betrayed right now,” he said, adding Prince William and Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge, were canoed by members of the Haida nation wearing “no LNG” t-shirts.

“Haida elders expressed their real sadness and anger,” he said.

David Moscrop, a political scientist and PhD candidate at the University of British Columbia, said that kind of betrayal comes with high political costs.

“You don’t get to shake the betrayal because the approval didn’t work out — the betrayal sticks to you,” he told DeSmog Canada.

Moscrop, who studies democratic governance, said if the Pacific Northwest deal goes south it will be a lose-lose for the federal government.

“On the right and left they’re going to be accused of having sold out,” he said. “This doesn’t benefit anyone participating in this process.”

‘Cui Bono?’

Moscrop said ultimately, it may have been both the provincial and federal governments who got played.

“I like to ask the old question: ‘cui bono?’” he said, referring to the ancient question, meaning simply, who benefits?

“People think industry and government are friendly, but only to the extent that they can get something out of one another.”

“If industry thinks it can gain significant advantage by sticking it to the government, they will.”

Throughout the project review process Petronas, a company with a poor human rights record, leveraged poor market conditions as a way to gain an ever-sweetening deal for the project from the provincial government. Petronas successfully negotiated for enormous income tax breaks and weakening of carbon tax rules that could cost B.C. taxpayers millions of dollars.

“I don’t blame them — either get out or leverage this moment to get every nickel and dime out while the getting is good,” Moscrop said, adding if Petronas was eyeing a sale of its Pacific Northwest LNG project it will be easier now with a conditional approval under their belt.

McPhail said the idea Petronas is threatening to pull out of the project for leverage might be what worries her most of all.

“My biggest fear is this is a negotiation tactic from Petronas,” she said.

“This is smart business accounting, smart corporate accounting. That’s what these guys are doing. If they’re threatening now, people are going to say 'give them whatever they want, please don’t go.' ”

Image: Premier Christy Clark and the ministers gather in Richmond for the approval of the Pacific Northwest LNG terminal. Photo: Province of B.C. via Flickr

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The federal government has issued an approval for the $36-billion Pacific Northwest liquified natural gas (LNG) export terminal on Lelu Island on the B.C. coast, undermining its commitments to take action on climate change.

Tuesday’s decision — announced an hour behind schedule in Richmond, B.C., by a trio of ministers including Minister of Environment and Climate Change Catherine McKenna — means it will be virtually impossible for B.C. to meet its climate targets.

The announcement was seen as the litmus test on whether the Liberals would live up to its climate promises.

“With today’s decision on the Pacific NorthWest LNG project, Minister McKenna made it much more difficult for Canada to meet its climate targets and signaled that it’s OK for provinces to miss their own emissions targets," said Matt Horne of the Pembina Institute.

"If built, Pacific NorthWest LNG will be one of the largest carbon polluters in the country and a serious obstacle to Canada living up to its climate commitments."

Pacific Northwest LNG — wholly owned by the Malaysian government and boasting a questionable human rights record — lobbied the federal government 22 times between February 1 and April 21 this year, including meetings with McKenna and her chief of staff Marlo Raynolds.

The project will involve scaling up fracking in northeastern B.C., building a pipeline to the West Coast and constructing an export terminal on Lelu Island, near a crucial area for juvenile salmon.

The Pacific Northwest LNG project is expected to emit 9.2 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent annually — equal to 1.9 million cars.

By 2050, the entire province of B.C. is supposed to emit 13 million tonnes of carbon pollution. With this approval, meeting the climate target becomes an impossibility.

B.C. Premier Christy Clark had already torpedoed any credibility she had on climate change when she announced her widely criticized “climate action plan” this summer.

On Tuesday she trotted out her go-to myth that exporting LNG will reduce emissions in other parts of the world — which was quickly shot down. 

“Despite claims to the contrary, the production and export of LNG from B.C. has not been demonstrated to help reduce global emissions. Stronger climate policies — not increased fossil fuel production — are what we need to position the British Columbian and Canadian economies to thrive in a low-carbon future," Horne said.

Honeymoon Over for Liberals

The federal Liberals were riding on the coattails of their election promises and climate commitments made in Paris

Now the honeymoon is over.

“For British Columbians and all Canadians concerned about salmon habitat, climate change and reconciliation with First Nations, today’s decision is profoundly troubling,” said Christina Smethurst of Dogwood, B.C.’s largest citizen group. 

“It does not restore public trust in the federal environmental review process.”

The announcement comes on the heels of the Liberals pledging to repair relations between Canada and First Nations, but then approving permits for the Site C Dam against their wishes (the dam has been pushed by Clark in part to power the fracking fields in northeastern B.C. that will feed the Pacific Northwest LNG export terminal).

Adding to the heap of broken promises, the Liberals are also expected to approve the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline to Vancouver sometime before Christmas.

“Nation-to-nation” rhetoric is awfully convenient until you have to live up to it.

It’s also one thing to care about climate change as a concept and quite another to have the guts to turn down a project when you’re being barraged by lobbyists.

A refusal of Pacific Northwest LNG would have proven the federal government is one willing to make tough decisions to live up to its promises  — one that would refuse a project if it put climate targets out of reach. One that would invest in renewables, energy efficiency and public transit infrastructure.

Perhaps, one day, we’ll see some real change.

On the bright side, there are doubts Pacific NorthWest LNG will even be built.

“As the cost of renewable energy continues to fall, it is increasingly uncertain that LNG exports can compete in Asian markets,” Merran Smith of Clean Energy Canada said.

A new world is coming. Question is: will Canada compete in it?

Photo: Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr, Federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna, Premier Christy Clark and Fisheries Minister Dominic Leblanc. Photo by Province of British Columbia.

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