The grounding of a fuel barge near Bella Bella is raising fresh concerns about B.C.’s ability to respond to marine oil spills as a tug releases diesel fuel into the traditional waters of the Heiltsuk First Nation — and oil spill response crews have still not arrived on scene more than 15 hours after the accident.

The Nathan E. Stewart, a 10,000-ton tanker barge owned by Texas-based Kirby Corporation, ran aground around 1 a.m. Thursday in Seaforth Channel near Gale Pass on Athlone Island.

Although the barge itself was empty, three fuel tanks for the 100-foot tug powering the vessel were damaged and hold an estimated 60,000 gallons of diesel fuel, according to a statement from the Heiltsuk First Nation.

“A spill in this area is problematic because it’s an area where our clam harvesters do a lot of commercial digging,” Jess Housty, councillor for the Heiltsuk First Nation, told DeSmog Canada.

Diesel Spill ‘Not Even Close to Being Contained’

Five Heiltsuk vessels responded to the grounded tug in the early hours of Thursday morning and three Coast Guard vessels are also at the spill site working to contain the release.

Emergency responders from the Western Canadian Marine Corporation, a private oil spill response company, are en route to the spill location from Prince Rupert. The response crews include a mobile skimming vessel, two boom skiffs and a response barge which spokesperson Michael Lowry, told DeSmog Canada will arrive around 6pm this evening.

“We have equipment caches all along the coast and we train local contractors along the coast,” Lowry said, adding some emergency responders were on scene before 11am this morning.

Housty told DeSmog Canada she worries the primary oil spill response vessels, which are traveling from more than 300 kilometres away, won’t arrive soon enough to protect marine life from uncontained diesel fuel.

Housty said her community set up a containment boom from the community dock to try to limit the spread of fuel to sensitive clam beds.

She added the Nathan E. Stewart tug had a spill kit on board but that the containment boom it carried was barely large enough to encircle the tug. Coast Guard vessels had ten sections of boom measuring 50 feet each.

That is far from enough to manage the spill, Housty said. “It’s not even close to being contained.”

Housty said U.S.-based barges like the Nathan E. Stewart are exempt from some regulatory standards if they carry less than 10,000 tons of fuel, including a requirement to have a pilot on board while traversing Canadian waters.

“It doesn’t sound like this vessel was regulated strongly enough,” Housty said.

Regulation for marine oil spill response rests with the federal government, Karen Wristen, executive director of Living Oceans Society, told DeSmog Canada. But much of that responsibility has been shirked off to industry itself, she said.

“The owner of the vessel is responsible to have a spill response service in place,” Wristen said. “But that’s a real problem on most of the coast because the current caches of marine response equipment are either in Prince Rupert or Vancouver and there’s a heck of a lot of coast in between.”

Wristen said poor response time in instances like this allows for oil to dissipate in marine environments.

“This is diesel, it’s a very light fuel. Oil spreads very quickly on the surface of water and unless a ship itself is carrying enough equipment to boom the area — which is rare — it’s very unlikely you can protect shoreline.”

Lack of Emergency Response Strain on Community

According to Heiltsuk Integrated Resource Management Department director Kelly Brown diesel fuel from the spill has already made its way to land.

“It’s really bad out here. A lot of fuel is on the beach already, and fuel is in the water,” she said.

“The initial spill response has been totally inadequate. The first responding vessels were not equipped to deal with a spill, and had to return to town to gather more gear. The Heiltsuk are providing our own equipment because what responders have been able to provide so far is insufficient.”

Wristen said there is an urgent need for industry to coordinate oil spill response with communities along the west coast.

“This highlights the need to do spill response planning that involves communities that are sufficiently trained.”

Wristen said there is a big role for government to play in integrating industry and community spill response capabilities.

“We don’t have any of that kind of planning in B.C.” she said, adding, “It’s very different in the States, though.”

Wristen said the Exxon Valdez disaster dramatically changed the way industry and communities in the U.S. cooperate in the planning and supervision of oil operations.

“People realized they needed to be involved in the planning,” Wristen said. “It took many years but they have an active advisory council that involves community and industry stakeholders to talk through these issues to ensure industry is properly regulated and supervised so those regulations are followed.”

Fuel Spill in Heiltsuk Marine Breadbasket

Heiltsuk Chief Councillor Marilyn Slett told DeSmog Canada diesel fuel is notoriously difficult to clean up.

“Looking at this, we know from our neighbours to the north, the Gitga’at are still affected 10 years later from the sinking of the Queen of the North,” Slett said.

“This spill is in a breadbasket for our community and going forward this is going to have a long term impact on our community sustenance.”

The fuel spill has contaminated water that is home to 25 important species the Heiltsuk harvest, according to a Heiltsuk Traditional Use Study that is currently being conducted by the nation.

Manila clam beds in the area provide the Heiltsuk with an estimated $150,000 annual income.

Housty told DeSmog Canada the spill is precisely what her community has been fighting for years to prevent but without success.

“It’s infuriating that you have levels of government who are making decisions from Victoria or Ottawa who are treating this like an academic or political exercise when there are communities who have so much more at stake than anyone realizes,” Housty said.

“This is a place where we’re three weeks from the opening of a commercial clam fishery where our community members are expecting to participate in commercial clam harvest to get their families through Christmas.”

“None of these realities are understood by these decision makers in government or industry offices.”

Diesel Spill Near Bella Bella Exposes BC’s Deficient Spill Response Regime https://t.co/hlcE2Z1s6l @JustinTrudeau @christyclarkbc #bcpoli

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) October 14, 2016

Chief Councillor: ‘Complete Nightmare for Our Community’

Slett said the emergency responders will now be focused on a salvage operation “because the tug has completely sunk.”

“This is a complete nightmare for our community,” Slett told DeSmog Canada. “We’re working to mitigate what we can but the damage has been done.”

Slett said this kind of incident is precisely what her community raise concerns about at the joint review panel hearings for the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline.

Those hearings brought the issue of increased oil tanker traffic off the rugged coast of B.C. to the public’s attention. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau campaigned on a promise to ban oil tanker traffic on B.C.’s north coast — something he has been dragging his feet on doing.

Housty said this fuel spill has reignited calls for a legislated tanker ban on the coast, but said that won’t be enough to prevent accidents like the one unfolding in Heiltsuk waters.

“A lot of the feedback that we’re getting on social media is this is why we need a tanker ban on the coast but that wouldn’t even prevent this kind of thing from happening.”

“This tanker ban is being legislated to protect the coast but there are people actively lobbying to limit what that ban includes,” Housty said.

Housty said that ban, as it’s currently being discussed, won’t cover fuel barges like the Nathan E. Stewart, which ferries petroleum products between B.C. and Alaska.

Slett said more has to be done to protect the communities impacted by the movement of petroleum products off the B.C. coast.

“We’ve been talking a lot about this oil tanker moratorium and I know there’s been a lot of discussion on what it will cover but this incident proves that anything we do here has to protect the integrity of the ecosystems, of the marine life, of the coast,” Slett said.

“It must protect the lives of the people who live here and derive their sustenance from the natural environment.”

Image credit: West Coast Marine Response Corporation

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Ecojustice lawyers were among the many to file motions to the National Energy Board late last week regarding Kinder Morgan’s poor and non-existent responses to questions posed to it by intervenors. And while we were generally disappointed by Kinder Morgan’s evasive approach, we were shocked at one reply in particular.

When asked whether there is any evidence from cold water oil spills to suggest marine fish are impacted, Kinder Morgan’s response was that: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.”

That’s right –  Kinder Morgan’s view is that when oil is spilled in water, there is little harm to fish, and it is more likely the fish will be just fine.

The motion Ecojustice lawyers filed on behalf of our clients, Living Oceans Society and Raincoast Conservation Foundation, asks the Board to order Kinder Morgan to fully respond to our clients’ first round of information requests about the Trans Mountain Expansion Project.

Kinder Morgan received more than 10,000 questions from intervenors. As we wrote last month, the company asked for an extension of the time limit to respond, but got only 14 of the 23 days they asked for. Our clients supported the request, in the interest of allowing Kinder Morgan time to provide as much information as possible.

Kinder Morgan's slippery responses

But now that the responses are in, we wonder whether the extra nine days would have made a difference. Responses from the company have ranged from vague to incomplete to non-existent. In short The information provided by Kinder Morgan is not nearly good enough. Of the 253 responses our clients received from the company, at least 77 – approximately 30 per cent – were inadequate. 

In 20 responses, Kinder Morgan refused to answer the question in whole or in part, by:

• Claiming it was “not relevant” to the review (including the record of leaks and ruptures on Kinder Morgan’s other pipeline systems, and the make and model of clean-up equipment); or
• Stating that it did not have the information (including air monitoring information), because the data do not exist, because the answer was not in the documents they relied on in the application, or because they had not done the necessary work to answer.

In five responses, Kinder Morgan gave a response which only partially answered the question or provided an answer but not the supporting data requested.

In the remainder of the responses, Kinder Morgan simply didn’t answer the questions it was asked. Here’s a snapshot of the ways the company answered questions with non-answers:

• Cited a large document or report rather than provide an clear answer;
• Referred to a document that did not contain any answer to the question; 
• Said it would file an answer later; or
• Cited a legal standard rather than address facts. 

As we mentioned above, when our clients asked if there was evidence from cold water oil spills, beyond evidence from the Exxon Valdez oil spill, of marine fish communities or habitat being impacted for more than two years after a spill, this was Kinder Morgan’s response: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.” 

In support of that mystifying non-answer, Kinder Morgan cited a 264-page report from Enbridge’s reply evidence in the Northern Gateway pipeline hearings. 

We’ve written about how, in the wake of the 2012 omnibus budget bill, reviews of major pipeline projects have been scaled back dramatically, sacrificing good science and process for “efficiency." The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Expansion Project hearing, with its 15-month time limit and lack of oral cross-examination, is a prime example of how this shift is deeply problematic. 

We are now halfway through the two rounds of intervenor information requests, which are intervenors’ only chance to ask Kinder Morgan questions about its 15,000-page application. Our clients are increasingly worried that they will be unable to meaningfully challenge Kinder Morgan’s evidence, particularly given its evasive approach to our information requests. 

But as for the fish, according to Kinder Morgan, they will be just fine.

– See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/blog/the-fish-are-fine-kinder-morgan-says#sthash.r1Uyl1mI.dpuf

Ecojustice lawyers were among the many to file motions to the National Energy Board late last week regarding Kinder Morgan’s poor and non-existent responses to questions posed to it by intervenors. And while we were generally disappointed by Kinder Morgan’s evasive approach, we were shocked at one reply in particular.

When asked whether there is any evidence from cold water oil spills to suggest marine fish are impacted, Kinder Morgan’s response was that: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.”

That’s right –  Kinder Morgan’s view is that when oil is spilled in water, there is little harm to fish, and it is more likely the fish will be just fine.

The motion Ecojustice lawyers filed on behalf of our clients, Living Oceans Society and Raincoast Conservation Foundation, asks the Board to order Kinder Morgan to fully respond to our clients’ first round of information requests about the Trans Mountain Expansion Project.

Kinder Morgan received more than 10,000 questions from intervenors. As we wrote last month, the company asked for an extension of the time limit to respond, but got only 14 of the 23 days they asked for. Our clients supported the request, in the interest of allowing Kinder Morgan time to provide as much information as possible.

Kinder Morgan's slippery responses

But now that the responses are in, we wonder whether the extra nine days would have made a difference. Responses from the company have ranged from vague to incomplete to non-existent. In short The information provided by Kinder Morgan is not nearly good enough. Of the 253 responses our clients received from the company, at least 77 – approximately 30 per cent – were inadequate. 

In 20 responses, Kinder Morgan refused to answer the question in whole or in part, by:

• Claiming it was “not relevant” to the review (including the record of leaks and ruptures on Kinder Morgan’s other pipeline systems, and the make and model of clean-up equipment); or
• Stating that it did not have the information (including air monitoring information), because the data do not exist, because the answer was not in the documents they relied on in the application, or because they had not done the necessary work to answer.

In five responses, Kinder Morgan gave a response which only partially answered the question or provided an answer but not the supporting data requested.

In the remainder of the responses, Kinder Morgan simply didn’t answer the questions it was asked. Here’s a snapshot of the ways the company answered questions with non-answers:

• Cited a large document or report rather than provide an clear answer;
• Referred to a document that did not contain any answer to the question; 
• Said it would file an answer later; or
• Cited a legal standard rather than address facts. 

As we mentioned above, when our clients asked if there was evidence from cold water oil spills, beyond evidence from the Exxon Valdez oil spill, of marine fish communities or habitat being impacted for more than two years after a spill, this was Kinder Morgan’s response: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.” 

In support of that mystifying non-answer, Kinder Morgan cited a 264-page report from Enbridge’s reply evidence in the Northern Gateway pipeline hearings. 

We’ve written about how, in the wake of the 2012 omnibus budget bill, reviews of major pipeline projects have been scaled back dramatically, sacrificing good science and process for “efficiency." The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Expansion Project hearing, with its 15-month time limit and lack of oral cross-examination, is a prime example of how this shift is deeply problematic. 

We are now halfway through the two rounds of intervenor information requests, which are intervenors’ only chance to ask Kinder Morgan questions about its 15,000-page application. Our clients are increasingly worried that they will be unable to meaningfully challenge Kinder Morgan’s evidence, particularly given its evasive approach to our information requests. 

But as for the fish, according to Kinder Morgan, they will be just fine.

– See more at: http://www.ecojustice.ca/blog/the-fish-are-fine-kinder-morgan-says#sthash.r1Uyl1mI.dpuf

This is a guest post by Ecojustice staff lawyer Dyna Tuytel.

Ecojustice lawyers were among the many to file motions to the National Energy Board late last week regarding Kinder Morgan’s poor and non-existent responses to questions posed to it by intervenors. And while we were generally disappointed by Kinder Morgan’s evasive approach, we were shocked at one reply in particular.

When asked whether there is any evidence from cold water oil spills to suggest marine fish are impacted, Kinder Morgan’s response was that: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.”

That’s right — Kinder Morgan’s view is that when oil is spilled in water, there is little harm to fish, and it is more likely the fish will be just fine.

The motion Ecojustice lawyers filed on behalf of our clients, Living Oceans Society and Raincoast Conservation Foundation, asks the Board to order Kinder Morgan to fully respond to our clients’ first round of information requests about the Trans Mountain Expansion Project.

Kinder Morgan received more than 10,000 questions from intervenors. As we wrote last month, the company asked for an extension of the time limit to respond, but got only 14 of the 23 days they asked for. Our clients supported the request, in the interest of allowing Kinder Morgan time to provide as much information as possible.

Kinder Morgan's slippery responses

But now that the responses are in, we wonder whether the extra nine days would have made a difference. Responses from the company have ranged from vague to incomplete to non-existent. In short, the information provided by Kinder Morgan is not nearly good enough. Of the 253 responses our clients received from the company, at least 77 — approximately 30 per cent — were inadequate. 

In 20 responses, Kinder Morgan refused to answer the question in whole or in part, by:

• Claiming it was “not relevant” to the review (including the record of leaks and ruptures on Kinder Morgan’s other pipeline systems, and the make and model of clean-up equipment); or
• Stating that it did not have the information (including air monitoring information), because the data do not exist, because the answer was not in the documents they relied on in the application, or because they had not done the necessary work to answer.

In five responses, Kinder Morgan gave a response which only partially answered the question or provided an answer but not the supporting data requested.

In the remainder of the responses, Kinder Morgan simply didn’t answer the questions it was asked. Here’s a snapshot of the ways the company answered questions with non-answers:

• Cited a large document or report rather than provide an clear answer;
• Referred to a document that did not contain any answer to the question; 
• Said it would file an answer later; or
• Cited a legal standard rather than address facts. 

As we mentioned above, when our clients asked if there was evidence from cold water oil spills, beyond evidence from the Exxon Valdez oil spill, of marine fish communities or habitat being impacted for more than two years after a spill, this was Kinder Morgan’s response: “Harm to marine fish populations seems to be the exception, rather than the rule, following marine oil spills.” 

In support of that mystifying non-answer, Kinder Morgan cited a 264-page report from Enbridge’s reply evidence in the Northern Gateway pipeline hearings. 

We’ve written about how, in the wake of the 2012 omnibus budget bill, reviews of major pipeline projects have been scaled back dramatically, sacrificing good science and process for “efficiency." The Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Expansion Project hearing, with its 15-month time limit and lack of oral cross-examination, is a prime example of how this shift is deeply problematic. 

We are now halfway through the two rounds of intervenor information requests, which are intervenors’ only chance to ask Kinder Morgan questions about its 15,000-page application. Our clients are increasingly worried that they will be unable to meaningfully challenge Kinder Morgan’s evidence, particularly given its evasive approach to our information requests. 

But as for the fish, according to Kinder Morgan, they will be just fine.

Image: Courtesy of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

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.

Environmental groups, including ForestEthics Advocacy, Living Oceans Society and Raincoast Conservation Foundation, filed a lawsuit today to block cabinet approval of the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline.  

Ecojustice lawyers representing the three groups filed the lawsuit at the federal court level, saying that the Joint Review Panel's (JRP) final report on the pipeline is based on insufficient evidence and does not satisfy the legislated requirements of the environmental assessment process.

"The JRP did not have enough evidence to support its conclusion that the Northern Gateway pipeline would not have significant adverse effects on certain aspects of the environment," said Karen Campbell, Ecojustice staff lawyer.

The panel, a joint effort of the National Energy Board and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency, held an 18-month review of the proposed $6.3 million Enbridge pipeline, which would ship 520,000 barrels per day of diluted oilsands bitumen to the B.C. coast for export on tankers.

The three groups behind the lawsuit were participants in the review process.

Campbell said that the panel made its recommendation "despite known gaps in the evidence, particularly missing information about the risk of geohazards along the pipeline route and what happens to diluted bitumen when it is spilled in the marine environment."

For example, the panel's conclusion that diluted bitumen is unlikely to sink in an ocean environment was refuted by a federal report released last week. This suggests that potential spills could have more serious environmental impacts and be more difficult to clean up than the panel's report makes evident.

Karen Wristen, executive director of Living Oceans Society, said that they "have no choice but to go to court and challenge the JRP's final report."

"The panel's recommendation was made without considering important evidence that highlights the threat Northern Gateway poses to the B.C. Coast," Wristen said.

The panel also failed to consider the final recovery strategy for humpback whales or identify mitigation measures to reduce the impacts on caribou, as required by sec. 79(2) of the Species at Risk Act.

"The proposed tanker route travels directly through humpback whale critical habitat identified in the recovery strategy. Yet the panel refused to consider this potential conflict when making its recommendation," said Dr. Paul Paquet, senior scientist at Raincoast Conservation Foundation.

Paquet said that "the panel's failure to consider the project's likely adverse impact on the whales makes no sense," considering that "the federal government will be required to legally protect the humpbacks and their habitat beginning in April."

Although the panel's final report concluded that 35 per cent of the Northern Gateway's economic benefit would come from upstream oilsands development, it did not address the environmental impacts associated with oilsands development, despite a clear request to do so.

Nikki Skuce, senior energy campaigner with ForestEthics Advocacy, said that the panel "cannot consider the so-called economic benefits of oilsands expansion tied to this pipeline but ignore the adverse impacts that expansion will have on climate change, endangered wildlife and ecosystems."

"The environmental assessment process is supposed to consider both sides of the coin, and in this instance the panel failed," Skuce said.

The panel's environmental assessment found the oil tanker and pipeline project was unlikely to have adverse environmental effects, aside from cumulative impacts on some grizzly bear and caribou populations. Campbell said this conclusion was reached "without considering all the necessary and available science."

Campbell added that the report "only tells part of the story, and we are asking the court to ensure that this flawed report doesn't stand as the final word on whether Northern Gateway is in the national interest."    

The lawsuit seeks a federal court ruling to prevent the government from relying on the flawed report to approve Northern Gateway.

A spokeswoman for Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver said the government would not comment on the lawsuit, reports the Globe and Mail.

"As the minister said before, we will thoroughly review the report, consult with affected First Nations, and then make our decision," said Melissa Lantsman, Oliver's director of communications. "Our government will continue to take action to improve the transportation safety of energy products across Canada."

Cabinet is set to make a decision based on the panel's recommendation in the following six months. Under the new environmental assessment framework forced through in the 2012 spring omnibus budget, cabinet has final decision-making power over Northern Gateway, bound by the 209 conditions laid out in the panel's report.

Image Credit: Pembina Institute / Flickr

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.