The average home in British Columbia uses around 10,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year.

There are approximately 2.2 million homes in B.C. This means the province needs to make sure the grid has enough energy to supply about 22 billion kilowatt hours every year to keep those homes warm and the lights on.

And that’s just for homes. It doesn’t include all the electricity needed for industry, businesses and a rapidly expanding electric-vehicle market.

In B.C., the average resident pays around $100 a month for electricity, roughly $1,200 per year for those 10,000 kilowatt hours.

Residential rates just went up on April 1, when BC Hydro increased its rates by 3.75 per cent. That’s partly to start paying off some of the sunk costs the government has already invested in building new power infrastructure. 

Electricity demand is only going to rise over the coming decades, as B.C. tries to reduce its use of fossil fuels while also bringing a whole lot of industrial projects onto the grid.

So where will all this energy come from, where is it going — and who will pay for it? There’s much we don’t know (yet) but here’s what we do.

First, let’s clear up a couple of things about the units of measurement — because utility companies use a variety of terms to describe electricity generation, output and consumption.

Kilowatts, megawatts and gigawatts represent an amount of power, at a single point in time. 

1,000 kilowatts is one megawatt. And 1,000 megawatts is one gigawatt.

Add the word “hours” to the end of any of those units and it describes how much of that power gets used up (or is generated) over time. Kilowatt hours is the unit most British Columbians will encounter, on their monthly bills, so while the others are useful to know we’ll stick to that measurement as much as possible.

Take a fridge, for example. If yours sucks up about 200 watts per hour (a large, older fridge might use twice as much) that means you’ll use around 1,750 kilowatt hours per year to keep the milk fresh. To meet the demand of millions of fridges, power producers need to make sure they have enough capacity to send all that electricity across the province every day. 

Ensuring there’s enough electricity to go around is getting expensive for the B.C. government — and the taxpayers that fund it.

B.C.’s newest source of hydroelectricity, the Site C dam, produces about 5,100 gigawatt hours (GWh) per year, or 5.7 billion kilowatt hours. It added about eight per cent more power to the province’s existing grid.

Site C cost around $16 billion.

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BC Hydro doesn’t expect to pay off the costs of building Site C until 2094, 70 years after the project began producing electricity.

Now, the province is planning to invest at least $6 billion to build the first two phases of the North Coast Transmission Line, a network of around 450 kilometres of high-voltage power lines spanning the northwest. The B.C. government says it is building the line to “enable development” of mining and LNG projects. A third phase is proposed, for power lines heading north to service mines and Ksi Lisims LNG. If that happens, the final cost for the transmission network could rival Site C.

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To state the obvious: this is a lot of public money. It’s hard to grasp just how big these numbers are. Understanding the difference between one million and one billion, expressed in time, might help. 

One million seconds is about 11.5 days. One billion seconds is more than 30 years.

So when the estimated cost of the first two phases of the North Coast Transmission Line doubled from $3 billion to $6 billion in 2025, that’s like jumping from 90 years to 180 years.

On top of infrastructure investments like Site C and the transmission lines, B.C. spends public money enticing private companies to build big industrial projects. Those subsidies are eventually reflected in residential utility bills — and in other ways across the economy. 

Take the push to grow the province’s LNG industry. Last year, the B.C. government coughed up $200 million to connect Cedar LNG, a liquefaction and export facility being built in Kitimat, to the grid.

Or take LNG Canada, the country’s first major liquefaction and export facility, also in Kitimat. It received a suite of subsidies, including reduced rates for the small amount of hydroelectricity it uses, as well as tax credits and an exemption from B.C.’s industrial carbon tax for the first two years of operations. Between the provincial and federal governments, public investments in LNG Canada are estimated to be almost $4 billion.

In the years ahead, homes and businesses in B.C. are going to need more power. BC Hydro predicts annual demand for electricity is likely to climb from 58,400 gigawatt hours in 2025 to more than 87,600 gigawatt hours by 2050. These amounts are way too big to wrap your head around if we convert them to kilowatt hours, but let’s just say it’s a lot.

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The more things we need to plug into the grid, the more power the grid needs to be able to deliver. The sooner we plug things in, the faster BC Hydro has to find ways to meet that demand.

Electricity demand in B.C. could rise even faster if the province prioritizes providing power to industries, which are eager to portray their products as “clean” or “green” in an increasingly climate-conscious market. LNG facilities that plan to power their operations with B.C.’s electricity are already advertising their products as “low carbon” and “net zero.”

B.C.’s history of abundant, cheap and low-emission electricity has been hailed as one reason the province is well-positioned to supply LNG to countries like South Korea and Japan.

But liquefying natural gas requires an enormous amount of energy. As a liquid, methane takes up a fraction of the space that it does as a gas, making it viable for transport overseas. That process requires not just chilling the gas, but supercooling it, which LNG Canada does by burning gas to power massive turbines. But other approved facilities, like Ksi Lisims LNG and the aforementioned Cedar LNG, want to use electricity instead. Hence, the new power line with a multi-billion dollar price tag.

So how much power does all this industrial infrastructure need?

Well, Ksi Lisims, a floating LNG facility proposed for B.C.’s North Coast requested the equivalent of around 5,200 gigawatt hours, or 5.2 billion kilowatt hours, from BC Hydro.

That’s more than the electricity output of the Site C dam potentially going to power just one project.

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Cedar LNG expects to use up to 1,800 gigawatt hours, or 1.8 billion kilowatt hours.

Powering just those two LNG projects could use up to the equivalent electricity that would keep power flowing to 700,000 homes.

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All that electricity isn’t free, of course. But it is cheaper for industrial users. Residential customers currently pay $118.70 for the first 670 kilowatt hours they use in a month.

That climbs to around $140 for each additional 1,000 kilowatt hours. Small businesses pay about the same as heavy-use households. 

But for larger businesses it’s the opposite: the more they use, the less they pay.

Large industrial customers — consumers that use more than 550,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year — pay $67.90 per 1,000 kilowatt hours, slightly over half the residential rate.

So what does all this mean for the average British Columbian?

Well, to keep the lights on in homes across the province over the coming decades, B.C. will continue to build out more power capacity. It will also keep trying to find ways to use industrial revenues to balance the government’s budget, so homeowners don’t have to pay (much) more per kilowatt hour consumed. But the province is up against the clock — and a moving target. 

Less than six months after releasing a new forecast for electricity demand, BC Hydro now anticipates needing to supply an additional 2.7 billion kilowatt hours to its customers. The LNG industry is identified as a driving force behind that increase.

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Because B.C. relies heavily on hydroelectric dams, the province’s ability to meet demand with power produced domestically is subject to droughts. When this happens, the province imports electricity from its neighbours, including Alberta.

Whether on monthly bills or in other ways spread out across the economy, taxpayers are paying for provincial support of massive industrial projects, including the push to get those projects on the grid. Those hidden costs could eventually surface on utility bills or through cuts to other government services.

Either way, future British Columbians will pay for decisions made today about how to make sure all that electricity keeps flowing through the wires.

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This investigation is a collaboration between The Narwhal and Point Source, a U.K.-based investigative journalism organization.

An LNG facility in Western Canada burned more gas in 2025 than any other liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facility on record in 2024, raising concerns about Canada’s claim it’s producing the cleanest LNG in the world. 

Burning excess methane gas, or flaring, is a normal safety procedure at liquefaction facilities. It releases greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide as well as emitting dangerous pollutants such as sulfur dioxide and small particulate matter, which affect human health. The LNG Canada facility in British Columbia flared 350 million cubic metres of gas in 2025, according to figures submitted to the provincial regulator and analyzed by The Narwhal in partnership with U.K.-based journalism organization Point Source. That means Canada’s first major LNG facility is one of the highest sources of LNG flaring emissions globally.

The flaring volumes reported by LNG Canada to the regulator are around 50 per cent higher than estimates for the world’s most polluting LNG export terminals in 2024, according to data that was used as the basis for the World Bank’s most recent Global Gas Tracker report.

The data was published by the Earth Observation Group at the Colorado School of Mines, a research team that specializes in producing nighttime satellite imagery to track gas flaring.

According to the group’s estimates, Nigeria’s Bonny Island LNG terminal was the highest-flaring facility of 2024. It burned an estimated 234.4 million cubic metres of gas, closely followed by the Arzew-Bethioua terminal in Algeria, which burned 233 million cubic metres.

Global flaring data from LNG facilities operating in 2025 have not yet been published but the Canadian facility will be among the world’s top sources of flaring at LNG terminals, according to Mikhail Zhizhin, a researcher at the Payne Institute for Public Policy in Colorado. Zhizhin was instrumental in the development of technology to monitor gas flaring from space.

“If the flaring data that has been supplied by LNG Canada to the regulator is accurate, it puts the facility amongst the highest flaring LNG facilities in the world,” Zhizhin said in an interview.

In an emailed statement, LNG Canada attributed the flaring to the facility being at an early phase and said it will be infrequent during normal operations.

The high volume of flaring from the $40-billion Canada-based facility raises new questions about ongoing problems with some of the terminal’s key mechanical components — and concerns about what it could mean for the local community, Kitimat, B.C. 

According to government data, LNG Canada flared a minimum of 127,900 cubic metres of gas every day in 2025, with the daily average being much higher: almost one million cubic metres. The worst month for flaring was June 2025, when the facility burned almost 110 million cubic metres. The data show 3,648 million cubic metres of gas were sent to LNG Canada last year, meaning almost 10 per cent of all gas transported to the terminal was burned off without being used for power or exported.

“This is definitely high,” Christopher Doleman, an LNG and gas specialist at the U.S.-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, said. “Proponents may argue that it is regular during commissioning, but the several instances of unplanned flaring by the company suggest that this is out of the ordinary.”

Some of those unplanned flaring events included flames reaching heights of 90 metres, roughly the size of London’s Big Ben, along with plumes of black smoke settling over the community.

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The export plant sent its first shipment of LNG overseas on June 30, 2025.

Flaring at LNG Canada has consistently exceeded allowable amounts permitted by the provincial government. According to the regulator, LNG Canada — owned by Royal Dutch Shell, Petronas, Korea Gas, PetroChina and Mitsubishi — has been flaring at levels that are “not consistent” with government permits, meaning the facility has been breaking provincial regulations for several months.

In January, The Narwhal revealed an “integrity issue” with the facility’s flaring equipment resulted in LNG Canada burning significantly more gas than expected — and it could take three to five years to fix. The issue was identified shortly after the LNG plant started testing its equipment in late 2024, but the government regulator did not learn about the problem until April 2025. 

Company officials have since met with local politicians but have failed to provide the public with details of why the issue might take so long to fix.

LNG Canada declined to answer this question, though the spokesperson said “we continue to tune the equipment to real-world conditions.”

“In normal operations at LNG Canada flaring will be related to infrequent activities such as maintenance, planned turnarounds and facility upsets,” the spokesperson wrote.

‘Completely untrue’: experts question environmental claims about Canadian LNG

Analysts believe the high flaring levels at LNG Canada raise serious questions about environmental claims that have been made about the facility.

Last summer, the premier of British Columbia, David Eby, said gas processed at the Kitimat terminal is the “lowest-carbon LNG in the world.”

Discussing why energy-importing countries would benefit from purchasing fuel processed at the facility, he said: “They should be using Canadian LNG that’s produced ethically, that promotes environmental protection, as well as high-quality labour standards and safety standards.”

Shell CEO Wael Sawan similarly said last year that LNG Canada would be “one of the lowest carbon projects anywhere in the world.”

Speaking in India in March, Prime Minister Mark Carney said: “Canada is well-positioned to contribute as a reliable supplier of the world’s lowest-carbon, responsibly-produced LNG from our West Coast.” 

Eby declined an interview request and did not respond to questions about the current state of the facility. Shell did not respond to questions. Carney also declined an interview request and referred questions to the federal Energy Ministry, which did not respond by publication time.

Doleman said the new information calls these environmental claims into question. 

“This flaring data undermines the claims that are being made about the facility producing low-carbon LNG,” he said in an interview. “Statements that have been made by officials saying that the LNG is the cleanest in the world now seem to be completely untrue.”

LNG Canada said high levels of flaring are normal during the start-up phase of a project of this type. The spokesperson said air quality data recorded in Kitimat show levels of nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide remained “consistently low” in 2025.

“LNG Canada continues to prioritize the safety of its people, the community and its assets, to support safe and responsible operations,” the spokesperson wrote.

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There is significant uncertainty about the true volumes of global gas flaring due to the difficulty of measuring emissions via satellite. Recent research by the Colorado School of Mines has suggested the true levels of flaring from the world’s LNG facilities may be significantly higher than previously estimated, Zhizhin said.

The fact that LNG Canada flared a significant volume of gas every single day in 2025 is unusual, according to researchers. A peer-reviewed paper published last September found LNG terminals in a start-up phase have a 90 per cent chance of flaring less than six days a year and only a 10 per cent chance of flaring for as many as 255 days in a single year.

Laura Minet, lead author of the paper and head of the Clean Air Lab at the University of Victoria, in British Columbia, explained “the probabilities are based on what has been happening in other facilities around the world between 2012 and 2022.” She said the frequency of flaring at LNG Canada does not appear to be typical, especially compared to LNG facilities that have moved from commissioning into regular operations. But, she said, because companies around the world aren’t required to track how much gas is flared, getting accurate data can be challenging.

“The fact that LNG Canada is saying the technical issue is going to take three years to fix is concerning,” Minet added. “It raises questions over what is getting prioritized and where the likely environmental and health impacts from this pollution fit into those priorities.”

Doleman agreed.

“The operators and project proponents should tell people why this plant is flaring so much and tell them exactly how they are going to address this issue,” he said.

LNG markets subject to instability as U.S.-Israel war on Iran continues

The ongoing global energy crisis in the wake of the U.S.-Israel attacks on Iran in late February has seen the price of LNG more than double for some importers and led to windfall profits for some exporters. 

A second phase of the LNG Canada project, which would double output from the plant, was recently given federal support and placed on a list of projects deemed to be of national importance. The consortium of companies behind the facility are actively seeking investment in the expansion.

The U.S. is currently the world’s largest LNG exporter, followed by Australia and Qatar. Geopolitical instability caused by the war in the Middle East — which saw Qatar halt LNG production in March — could influence importing countries like South Korea and Japan as they balance energy needs.

However, the current wave of high prices could have lasting impacts on demand for LNG as importing nations look to cheaper alternatives, Doleman said. Recently, a planned LNG import terminal in China was cancelled by state-owned Sinopec, which reallocated its investments to the development of domestic gas reserves. In New Zealand, plans for an import terminal are being reconsidered as the country’s government weighs the financial risks. 

“The current high price environment is killing long-term demand for LNG around the world and it is going to be interesting to see how things pan out for the [Canadian] facility over the coming years,” Doleman said.

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Summary

• B.C.’s throne speech was not delivered in 2026 due to the tragic shooting in Tumbler Ridge.
• The Narwhal obtained a copy of the speech via freedom of information request.
• The unshared speech gives an insight into B.C.’s priorities which include mining and liquefied natural gas (LNG).

In a typical year, the spring sitting of the B.C. legislature starts with a throne speech.

The speech from the throne — as the document is formally known — is delivered by the lieutenant-governor on behalf of the provincial government. It is a snapshot of the political moment, a mixture of policies and milestones the government of the day considers accomplishments, as well as hints about legislative priorities for the coming months.

For journalists who cover the legislature, the throne speech is an opportunity to peer at the political tea leaves and guess at what lies ahead.

But in 2026, the government’s planned throne speech was never presented in the legislature. Two days before its scheduled delivery, a horrific event occurred in the small town of Tumbler Ridge, B.C.: a mass shooting that resulted in the deaths of nine people, many of them students and staff at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.

In the wake of the tragedy, the date set for the throne speech was postponed and the province observed a day of mourning. A few days later, Lieutenant-Governor Wendy Cocchia delivered a short and somber speech dedicated to the community of Tumbler Ridge.

But what was in the speech the government was poised to deliver? The Narwhal filed a freedom of information request for a copy of the speech with Premier David Eby’s office. And we received a mostly un-redacted copy.

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Over the year ahead, the B.C. government plans to continue championing liquefied natural gas (LNG) and mining development, which — along with forestry — form the province’s economic foundation, according to the speech.

“This natural inheritance remains central to our future prosperity,” the speech says.

British Columbians should look forward to “a more sustainable forestry sector,” even as tariffs imposed by the United States continue to bite, the speech says. The government will also continue to work toward “delivering B.C. energy to growing markets” — supporting companies producing LNG to ship to markets on the other side of the Pacific — and “driving momentum on critical minerals,” it says.

A section of the speech is dedicated to the North Coast transmission line, which the government says will deliver “clean, reliable electricity needed to unlock tens of billions of dollars worth of private sector projects across” northwest B.C. The transmission line may almost exclusively serve large industrial customers, such as the Ksi Lisims LNG facility and multiple proposed mines. But its cost, which was most recently estimated at $6 billion for a little more than half the line’s length, will be shared between all BC Hydro ratepayers. 

The North Coast transmission line will be built “in true partnership with First Nations,” the throne speech says before it segues into a section titled “Reconciliation and Partnerships with Indigenous Peoples.”

‘Reconciliation is the responsibility of elected governments,’ throne speech says

For its next 431 words, the throne speech highlights the importance of reconciliation with First Nations and the work the province has done since the unanimous passage of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act in November 2019. It affirms the existence of Aboriginal Title, recognized by Canadian courts and in the Canadian Constitution.

“Reconciliation is the responsibility of elected governments,” according to the throne speech. 

“Repealing the Declaration Act, or walking away from negotiations with First Nations, would not change that reality,” the throne speech says. “It would create chaos, delays, lost jobs, and endless lawsuits.”

On page 13, the tone of the speech shifts as it mentions “recent court decisions [that] have raised questions about what reconciliation means in practice.” While those decisions aren’t named in the speech, the province is seeking to appeal a December 2025 decision by the B.C. Court of Appeal, which agreed with an argument from the Gitxaała and Ehattesaht First Nations that the government’s obligations under the Declaration Act — to align provincial laws with the principles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples — are legally enforceable.

Since December, Eby has been touting plans to amend the Declaration Act to “address some serious legal liabilities that were created … through the court decision.” This angered First Nations leaders across B.C., who told Eby in a meeting last week that his plans to amend the law were “totally unacceptable.” So, on April 2, he made an abrupt announcement saying he would suspend parts of the Declaration Act and the Interpretation Act in the coming weeks instead.

However, suspension still requires legislative amendments, which will be voted on in the legislature by May 28. 

Eby said he is willing to risk the future of his government to get it done.

“This will be a confidence vote,” Eby told reporters on April 2. That means if the majority of MLAs vote against the legislation, the NDP government will have lost the confidence of the house, likely triggering a snap election.

These plans to change the landmark Indigenous Rights law over the objections of many First Nations leaders seem contradictory to the throne speech promise that the B.C. government “will not abandon responsibility for reconciliation.”

You can read the entire 25 pages of the throne speech here, except for a few lines redacted by the premier’s office under section 12 of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, which covers matters discussed in cabinet. 

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Summary

• A tiny village in Newfoundland and Labrador could become the site of a major floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility
• Amid talk about exporting LNG from the east coast, some community members look to Kitimat, B.C., home to Canada’s first major LNG facility 
• Residents of the village of Fermeuse, home to about 300 people, may be tempted by the prospect of jobs but one Kitimat, B.C., resident warns: “The noise, pollution, traffic and burden on the infrastructure is not worth it”

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About an hour’s drive from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, the little fishing village of Fermeuse sits on the shores of a deep harbour, sheltered from the tempestuous North Atlantic. Atop a hill overlooking the village, eight slow-turning turbines harvest energy from the nearly ever-present wind that flows from the open ocean. Generations of fishers have plied the waters off the coast, harvesting cod, crab and numerous other species.

More than 5,000 kilometres away, on the northwest coast of British Columbia, the town of Kitimat, B.C., is newly home to Canada’s first major liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility. LNG Canada started operations here last year, lighting up the night sky with its noisy and bright flare stack and welcoming a stream of supertankers to the deepwater channel that connects the community with pan-Pacific shipping routes. Years in the making, the LNG export project has undeniably changed life for those who live alongside it.

Fermeuse could be facing similar changes.

When the Atlantic cod fisheries collapsed in the 1990s — putting more than 35,000 people out of work across Newfoundland and Labrador — many left the village in search of good paying jobs, including in the province’s booming oil and gas sector. Now, as nearby offshore oil developments like Bay Du Nord get a boost from the federal government and the province eyes new revenues from the sector, the sleepy village of around 300 residents could become the focal point for an influx of new industry.

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Crown LNG Holdings Ltd., under the name of its Newfoundland affiliate, Fermeuse Energy, plans to develop a swath of the harbour to support several projects, possibly including a liquefied natural gas processing and export terminal. The company is approved for a marine base but has not yet submitted an official proposal for an LNG plant. In late January, Fermuese Energy signed an agreement with Hanwha Ocean, a South Korean shipbuilding company and expert in offshore facilities, to “jointly advance the Newfoundland and Labrador LNG development project in Canada.”  

“If the political will and the community support comes along, then we will move ahead with the project by the end of this year or next year,” Swapan Kataria, CEO of Crown LNG, told The Narwhal in an interview.

Valerie Walsh, whose family has lived in Fermeuse for generations, said many in the community are tempted by an idea that “our sons and daughters who moved away for work will maybe move back to Fermeuse” to build the LNG project.

“It’s a sought-after harbour,” she said, explaining it’s protected from the open water and safe for large boats. “It could be really rough in the North Atlantic, but boats can come in here and they’re protected.” 

But Walsh is worried residents will be seduced by industry without knowing what they’re really signing up for.

“I don’t know if it’s because the fishery collapse just took the wind out of everybody’s sails and they’re just waiting for the saviour to come along, which is oil and gas,” she mused. “[The company] can make it seem safe. They can make it seem a lot of things. I think this will be the end of the harbour and any natural thing for us. … There will be no whales coming in anymore, no puffins, no fishery, no boats, no anything.” 

“I don’t know that the community really understands it.”

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Details about the potential LNG project are vague, but the company has said plans could include a 380-kilometre pipeline along the ocean floor, trenched for part of that distance to protect it from icebergs, connecting untapped offshore gas reserves to the village. There, a floating liquefaction facility could supercool the gas, reducing its volume for marine transport to overseas destinations. Kataria said the facility, if built, would process and export up to 10 million tonnes of LNG per year. The company acknowledged an LNG project would bring change to the community and said if anything were to move ahead, public consultations and stakeholder engagements would be held.

“We are only approved for a marine base and I think it’s important to qualify that in order to avoid any future confusions,” Kataria said. “We are certainly there to service the offshore growth in the industry.” 

How the LNG project fits into the picture is that those same offshore areas are home to “a lot of gas reserves which nobody is going after,” he said. “We are connected with the industry, and we feel that there is gas which can be monetized.”

‘We don’t know what’s going to happen’: locals question how Fermeuse LNG would impact community

On the north coast of B.C., the massive LNG project was under construction for about five years, employing locals and flooding the community with thousands of out-of-town workers. It now employs around 300 people and will provide the community with $9.7 million in annual taxes for the first five years of operations.

Kitimat residents have experienced months of disruption to their daily lives since LNG Canada started flaring activities in late 2024. Flaring is the burning of excess or waste gas, a normal part of operating a liquefaction facility. In Kitimat, flaring has at times exceeded 90-metre-tall flames, about the height of London’s iconic Big Ben, in part due to an ongoing equipment issue. 

That causes light pollution, noise and emissions, as well as releases air pollution. Flaring at LNG facilities releases carbon monoxide, nitrous oxides, fine particulate matter and sulphur dioxide, all of which can have impacts on human health. For its part, LNG Canada in Kitimat says flaring is “safe, controlled and provincially regulated.” But that hasn’t stopped residents there from being concerned.

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Walsh said she’s afraid ceding the harbour shores to an industrial hub for LNG and oil development would be a death knell for the villagers’ way of life.

“My father’s from here, his father and his father before that,” she told The Narwhal on a phone call. “We are literally closing the door on our way of life in this harbour if we let this industrial LNG come in.”

Brenda Aylward lives on the other side of the harbour from Walsh, where she raises sheep and grows vegetables while caring for her aging mother.

“It’s a fifth-generation farm and I’ve been involved pretty much my whole life,” she said. It’s a small farm-to-table operation she’s planning to expand — and she wonders what the impacts of an industrial project in the harbour would have on her livestock.

“I have fields that border the ocean,” she said, explaining the farm is just a few kilometres from the proposed industrial site. “Livestock are quite skittish, to noise and to light. Sheep are the most affected because they are the most skittish livestock.”

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She said she has questions about how LNG operations and related marine traffic could alter the flock’s grazing and breeding patterns. Research from animal behaviour expert Temple Grandin has shown stress in livestock can cause agitation, increased thyroid activity and spikes in cortisol.

“[Will] I have my lambs when market time comes?” Aylward wondered. “We don’t know what’s going to happen there.”

Fermeuse Energy did not directly address questions about potential impacts and said there will be an opportunity for community members to get answers.

“We certainly understand that there will be questions from the residents of the area,” Stephen Tessier, a spokesperson with the company, wrote in an emailed statement. “We (Fermeuse Energy) are still in the discovery stage and we need to have a handle on actual product and political will in Newfoundland and Labrador in order to proceed.”

Tessier said before the company submits an application, it will conduct engineering and environmental studies.

“Once that happens, there will be public consultations and stakeholder engagements where the residents can ask questions, clarify their doubts and choose to support the project,” he wrote. “We look forward to working with the towns and residents as this project moves forward.”

One of Aylward’s neighbours, Jenny Wright, has similar questions about potential impacts to the community.

“We live right on the water,” she said. “We bought a traditional old Newfoundland home and my husband is a house builder and he’s renovated every last piece of it.”

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She suggested the community should be looking at different options to create jobs beyond oil and gas.

“We are right on the East Coast Trail,” she said, referencing a 336-kilometre network of paths and trails, adding the region would be wise to capitalize on a growing tourism sector. “We can develop an economic plan here that is sustainable, like other towns in Newfoundland and Labrador have done, like Petty Harbour, who own their own fishery, have a co-operative plant and developed and promoted small businesses being around there — and then started a non-profit to educate people on the fishery.”

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‘We depend on a clean coastline, clean water and a quiet environment’

Before the cod moratorium — an indefinite closure to the fishery implemented by the federal government in 1992 — came into effect, Fermeuse had a fish plant, too, and the harbour still supports an active fleet.

“Pretty soon — the end of March, early April — is the time for the crab boats going in and out,” Wright said. “Our first signs of spring are the fishery is up and going again. And then, of course, the whales that will come in shortly after that.”

She fears an influx of industry in the harbour would change everything.

“I’m exhausted with hearing everybody when they hear the word LNG go, ‘Oh, this is great, oil and gas is going to save us — it’s going to bring back jobs and all the young people, they’re going to come home and we’re going to flourish again.’ We’ve just done this over and over and over again, and we’re not learning from it.”

Walsh has been trying to get information about what the company wants to do — to little avail, she said — and help her community understand what’s at stake.

“Nobody can visualize it,” she said. “I don’t think they understand what it’s actually going to be like, physically, how the harbour will change. LNG is big money — a company can spin it whatever way they want. They can make it shiny and beautiful and never tell you the downsides.”

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Kitimat’s story, some residents say, is a cautionary tale some places like Fermeuse can learn from.

“Expect all the promises they make never to materialize,” a Kitimat community member, who The Narwhal is calling James Smith to protect his family from repercussions, said. “And realize they often spend more effort trying to control the narrative than being transparent. You’re dealing with shiny on the outside, rotten to the core.”

Smith sent The Narwhal images of his property taken at night during recent overnight flaring activity.

“[My] house was lit up like daylight and shaking from the noise,” he wrote in a message accompanying the photos. “On top [of that] there was an ear-piercing whistle.”

Aylward, the sheep farmer, shuddered to think of her community changing so dramatically. 

“It’s devastating to think that something like that will come to this tiny little place,” she said. “We depend on a clean coastline, clean water and a quiet environment, for our food production and our lives. We do not want or need this here in our community.”

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‘We already have the buyers’: Crown LNG says Fermeuse is well positioned to get gas to waiting markets 

Kataria agrees building an LNG facility in the harbour would mean significant change for residents of the fishing village.

“It is wrong of me to say that their life’s not going to change,” he said. “If you were looking at a peaceful water view, it is not going to remain the same. People’s expectations that the view is not going to change or the noise levels will not change or the traffic will not change, I think is wrong — because it will change. Industrialization will bring all those things.”

He said while the LNG development is in early stages, bringing industry to Fermeuse means jobs for a community that lost its base economy more than three decades ago.

“If I have the year right, it is 35 years plus [that] there has been no economic upswing in that community,” he said. “Let’s say it was a community of 1,500 people, or 2,000 people, gone down to 300. Do they need jobs? Do they need a change? I don’t know.”

“I think everybody understands that there is a give and take,” he added. 

Kataria said he’s optimistic about Prime Minister Mark Carney’s statements in recent months in support of LNG exports, but he hasn’t seen the political will to support an official proposal yet. 

If things do move forward, he said the main destination for exports from Newfoundland would be Europe, which continues, for now, to import fossil fuels to replace Russian gas since President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022, but he also wants to tap into India’s “insatiable demand” for LNG. He noted the company could leverage an international loophole to get the gas there.

“There is a mechanism in place on international trading, where we could actually sell the cargo on the high seas to people taking it to Europe, and people bringing it from the other part of the world into Europe. We can take it from there and just hand it over to India.”

These kinds of high seas cargo swapping, or ship-to-ship transfers, are governed by rules set out by the International Maritime Organization — but the process is also used by the likes of the Russian shadow fleet, a cabal of shady shipping operators making vast sums of money by obscuring the origin of oil that would otherwise be heavily sanctioned.

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“We already have a licence for importing 7.2 million tonnes in India,” Kataria said, adding the company is currently working on approvals to build a five-million tonne import facility in Scotland. 

“We are LNG terminal developers,” he explained. “We are not coming to Canada to … build a project and wait for somebody to come and buy the product from us — we already have the buyers. We’re coming there because we need it. It’s the other way around.” 

Lloyd Parrott, Newfoundland and Labrador’s energy and mines minister, told The Narwhal he considers natural gas a “key priority” for the province but he’s waiting on an official proposal for an LNG plant in Fermeuse.

“The department has not received a formal request for support for the Fermeuse energy project,” Parrott wrote in an emailed statement. “Our government will always make time to meet with companies to discuss potential projects that have the potential to provide benefits to Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.”

In Kitimat, Smith warned the promise of benefits may not be enough to offset the impacts of living beside an LNG plant.

“The noise, pollution, traffic and burden on the infrastructure is not worth it,” he said.

For her part, Walsh doesn’t want Fermeuse turned into an industrial hub.

“I just don’t want my community destroyed,” she said. “We’re at a crossroads. We’re caught up in this now. And I just don’t think it’ll be for the betterment of us, the people who live here.”

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Summary

• The Norwegian company Marinvest Energy AS wants to build Canada’s third largest LNG export facility on the shores of the St. Lawrence River in Quebec
• The company has a non-disclosure agreement with Ottawa which prevents discussion of the proposal with “officials outside the federal government”
• Quebec is an ideal location for ships headed to Europe, but a similar proposal was rejected in 2021 over concerns about risks posed to Indigenous communities and the environment

We’re trying out staff-written summaries. Did you find this useful? YesNo

As the war in the Middle East escalates and oil and gas prices surge, a secretive liquefied natural gas (LNG) project proposed for Quebec is steadily advancing.

The LNG project would ship liquefied gas from the deepwater port of Baie-Comeau, a small city on the shores of the St. Lawrence River, to global markets. 

The project would require a new pipeline — through a small portion of northern Ontario and a swath of Quebec — to send mostly fracked gas from Western Canada to Baie-Comeau, in the province’s Côte-Nord region.

But you won’t find any information about this major resource project on the website of Marinvest Energy AS, the Norwegian company behind it.

Nor will you find any information about the Baie-Comeau LNG project on any federal government website, even though access to information documents reveal Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberal government has established a multi-departmental “deal team” to facilitate the project.

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“There’s been no public announcement, no project description and nothing has been made public,” Louis Couillard, Greenpeace Canada’s climate campaigner, told The Narwhal. “I’m just puzzled at how a project can move along like this without an official proposal.” 

In an emailed statement, Marinvest Energy AS confirmed it is in discussions with First Nations as it develops the project and said it will not be giving an interview “at this stage.” In an emailed response to questions, the Quebec government said it never publicly discusses talks it may “have, or not have” with project promoters.

That leaves Montreal-based Couillard and others in the dark, except for information gleaned from access to information requests that are heavily redacted. One thing they do reveal is Marinvest has a non-disclosure agreement with the government of Canada “such that this project is not to be discussed with officials outside the government.” 

So, what else do we know about the Baie-Comeau LNG project? 

And can it go ahead even though another Quebec LNG export proposal was soundly rejected by the provincial and federal governments only a few years ago? At issue then were risks posed to Indigenous communities, beluga whales and attempts to slash greenhouse gas emissions. 

Read on.

First of all, what exactly is the Baie-Comeau LNG proposal? 

Here’s what we know. 

The project has four components: a gas pipeline, an undisclosed “renewable energy supply,” port infrastructure and gas liquefaction and storage. 

That information comes from Invest in Canada, the federal agency that promotes direct investments by foreign companies. It is included in 137 pages of documents Greenpeace obtained through federal access to information legislation and shared with The Narwhal.

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The pipeline and renewable energy supply “would be developed in partnership with First Nations,” according to the documents, which say the project is in the “pre-planning stage.”

The documents also say Marinvest “claims it is making progress on project development” and the company may reach out to Canada’s new Major Projects Office with a project description in early 2026. 

In an emailed response to questions, a spokesperson for Canada’s Major Projects Office said the project has not “been referred” to the office and “nor has the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada received an initial project description, which would start the impact assessment process.” The spokesperson said to contact Marinvest Energy for details about the project.

How big is the Baie-Comeau LNG project?

In a word, big. Really big. “It’s a huge project in terms of the volume [of] exports that they want to do,” Couillard said. 

Neither the company nor the Quebec or federal governments have released information about the volume of LNG the company plans to export. But a company representative earlier told Le Devoir the project would export about ten million tonnes of LNG per year.

That compares to about three million tonnes in annual exports from the Cedar LNG project in B.C., about two million tonnes annually from B.C.’s Woodfibre LNG project and about 12 million tonnes annually from the recently approved Ksi Lisims LNG export project, also in B.C.

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It would make Baie-Comeau Canada’s third largest LNG export project, after Ksi Lisims and LNG Canada, the country’s first, in Kitimat, B.C.

The access to information documents lift the veil — a wee bit— on the federal government’s level of commitment to the project.

“Given the scale and significance of this energy infrastructure project, we’d like to establish a monthly coordination call to keep federal partners informed of the latest developments,” Anne-Sophie Proutiere, senior federal partnerships advisor for Invest in Canada, wrote to her colleagues last May, according to the documents.

“These ‘deal team’ calls will also serve as a forum for departments to provide guidance and support to facilitate the investment,” Proutiere wrote. 

Proutiere’s email was sent to colleagues in a variety of departments, including Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada. The subject line was “monthly coordination call — Marinvest Energy project”.

Another email said the calls would “coordinate federal FDI [foreign direct investment] efforts to support this investment in Canada.” 

What’s the big deal about secrecy? 

The documents also reveal the non-disclosure agreement Marinvest has with Canada.

Duff Conacher, cofounder of Democracy Watch, a non-profit organization promoting government accountability and corporate responsibility, warns against fast-tracking major resource project decisions like the Baie-Comeau LNG project and failing to consult with the public and stakeholders before final decisions are made.

Fast-tracking “usually leads to waste, and harm and corruption and boondoggles that actually don’t further the public interest,” Conacher said in an interview.

“It’s just impossible for people sitting behind closed doors in Ottawa in the government to make good decisions about anything, because they need to connect to the reality of the impact of the decisions and action,” he said. “And the only way to do that is to consult with the public in a meaningful way before making the decision.”

Conacher said fast-tracking decisions about major resource projects usually slows them down “because once the public learns about it, the pushback is greater than if people had been consulted in the first place.” That pushback can lead to court cases and other challenges, he pointed out. 

The Carney government has demonstrated a lack of commitment to transparency in many areas of government actions, he said.

Couillard said he’s worried people who would be impacted by the Baie-Comeau LNG project and the project’s pipeline won’t have the information “necessary to understand what’s being fast-tracked in their backyards.”

Phew, that’s a lot. So who’s behind the Baie-Comeau LNG project?

Greg Cano, who is connected to B.C.’s contentious Coastal GasLink pipeline, is the chief operating officer for Marinvest Energy Canada, a subsidiary of Marinvest Energy AS. 

According to Cano’s LinkedIn profile, he’s a mechanical engineer who is an executive sponsor and former chief operations officer for Pacific Atlantic Pipeline Construction Ltd, a subsidiary of Italy’s Bonatti Group. 

That name might sound familiar — the pipeline construction company was a primary contractor for the Coastal GasLink pipeline, which ships gas from northeast B.C. to the LNG Canada export terminal in Kitimat. Pacific Atlantic Pipeline Construction made the news in 2022 when Coastal GasLink terminated the company’s contract, alleging poor performance.

You might be scratching your head by now, thinking Cano’s name also sounds vaguely familiar. Based in Calgary, he’s the former longtime director of project planning and execution for TransCanada, a major North America pipeline company now called TC Energy. TC Energy co-owns and operates the Coastal GasLink pipeline. 

And gas for the Baie-Comeau LNG project would be shipped to the new pipeline through TC Energy’s network, according to Couillard. 

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If you live on Vancouver Island, there’s all the more reason to recognize Cano’s name. He was the former project lead for the Steelhead LNG, an export project proposed for Vancouver Island that was halted in 2019.

The Narwhal reached out to Cano by email but did not hear back. 

Marinvest Energy AS declined an interview request. “In a spirit of respect and transparency, our priority is to continue discussions with First Nations communities in order to further develop the project’s concepts,” Justin Meloche, the company’s media relations director, said in an emailed statement. 

“Additional information will be made public once the project has reached a more advanced stage and when concrete elements can be shared responsibly,” Meloche added.

Marinvest Energy registered to lobby the federal government in May 2025. The company said it would engage with the Prime Minister’s Office, the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Finance Canada, Natural Resources Canada and the Canada Infrastructure Bank.

The stated goal was to determine “the applicable conditions for implementing a transformative and beneficial energy project for the future of Quebec and Canada.”

Since then, five lobbyists from National Public Relations have filed reports saying they lobbied federal departments, agencies and the Prime Minister’s Office.

The access to information documents note Marinvest is also in discussion with Alberta and Quebec representatives.

“They’ve been lobbying [for] their project behind the closed door for over a year,” Couillard pointed out. “But for the public, there’s absolutely no info except what we find through .” 

“We’re in the dark right now in regards to the regulatory stages that this project is in.” 

Would the Baie-Comeau LNG project export fracked gas?

Yes. The vast majority — 80 to 90 per cent — of natural gas from Western Canada is extracted through hydraulic fracturing, commonly known as fracking. The access to information documents state the gas for the project would come from Western Canada.

Steven Haig, a policy advisor for the International Institute for Sustainable Development’s energy program, pointed out fracking is a “particularly emissions-intensive method for producing natural gas. 

“And also, by nature of the process … there are significant risks of methane leaks, which add to the emissions associated with the production,” Haig said in an interview. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that traps heat in the atmosphere, contributing to global warming and climate change. It can also cause respiratory and cardiovascular issues. 

What about Indigenous communities near the LNG terminal and along the pipeline route? 

Couillard isn’t convinced a majority of Indigenous communities will support the Baie-Comeau LNG project even after consultations. 

“Quebec has a problem,” he said. “It’s all unceded. There’s no treaties here. So technically, all these communities need to give their free, prior and informed consent for the project to go ahead.” The Assembly of First Nations of Quebec and Labrador formally — and vocally — opposed TransCanada’s bid to build the Energy East bitumen pipeline, which was cancelled in 2017. 

The documents obtained by Greenpeace and other environmental groups list Indigenous communities and organizations that could be affected by the pipeline and LNG project, but all further information is redacted. 

In Ontario, those communities include Apitipi Anicinapek Nation, Métis Nation of Ontario (region three), Taykwa Tagamou Nation, Beaverhouse First Nation, Matachewan First Nation and potentially Mattagami First Nation and Temagami First Nation.

The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada recommended Marinvest engage with about two dozen Indigenous communities and organizations in Quebec, according to the documents. They include many Cree, Algonquin, Atikamekw and Innu communities, such as Pessamit, an Innu community about 60 kilometres south of Baie-Comeau. 

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Along with other Innu communities, Pessamit opposed a different LNG export project proposed for the Saguenay region of Quebec on the grounds it would pose a threat to ancestral lands and impact fish and caribou. Pessamit representatives were unable to respond to a request for comment before publication.

So what about the rejected LNG project in Quebec?

The Quebec government nixed plans for a LNG plant in the Saguenay region in 2021, saying it risked “disadvantaging the energy transition.” The province’s environmental review agency found the project’s risks outweighed its benefits. It said the proponent, GNL Québec Inc., had failed to demonstrate the project would reduce greenhouse gas emissions or accelerate the transition to clean energy. 

The Saguenay LNG project would have been about the same size as the Baie-Comeau LNG project, according to Le Devoir.

The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada also found the Saguenay LNG project was likely to harm the environment, leading Ottawa to reject the project in 2022. The agency determined the project would have negative effects on nearby Innu communities, harm the beluga whale population through increased shipping traffic and cause greenhouse gas emissions to rise. 

Why ship LNG from Quebec?

Quebec has a distinct advantage over LNG shipped to Europe from other places in North America: geography. 

A typical shipping route between Baie-Comeau and the Dunkirk LNG terminal in northern France would take about eight days, according to the Montreal Economic Institute, a public policy think tank that receives 11 per cent of its annual budget from the oil and gas industry. (Names of individual funders are not disclosed.)

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It would take about 14 days at the same speed for LNG from the Gulf of Mexico’s terminals to reach Dunkirk and more than 17 days from Doha, Qatar, another big LNG export terminal.

“Geography plays in Quebec’s favour,” Gabriel Giguère, a senior policy analyst with the society, said in a February news release. “A shorter distance means shorter delivery times, and therefore lower transportation costs, compared to dealing with its main competitors.” 

Will there be an environmental assessment ? 

Some form of environmental assessment is likely if the Baie-Comeau LNG project proceeds, but the process could be fast-tracked. 

In December, the Quebec government introduced Bill 5, which aims to accelerate authorizations for projects deemed to be priorities and of national importance. 

The Quebec bill, which has not been passed by the National Assembly, follows the federal government’s Bill C-5, passed last June. The federal legislation aims to accelerate “nation-building” projects.

What about the Baie-Comeau LNG project’s economics? 

The oil and gas industry is pushing for LNG expansion, pointing to Europe’s desire to replace Russian gas and Canada’s drive to diversify exports following tariffs U.S. President Donald Trump slapped on Canadian goods. 

“But it’s important to remember that these are multi-billion dollar, multi-decade projects and their long-term viability is a serious concern as global markets shift towards cleaner, more reliable energy sources,” Haig, from the International Institute for Sustainable Development, said. 

As importers shift towards cheaper, more reliable renewables, “An oversupply of LNG is imminent, with a massive wave of new projects coming online around the world, especially in the U.S. and Qatar,” Haig said.

He said the growing war in the Middle East won’t change that. “There’s a difference between short-term supply disruptions and long-term outlook in the market.” 

Doubling down on LNG is likely to expose Canadians to “more risk and volatility, not less, by linking Canada’s domestic natural gas markets to more volatile international LNG market,” Haig said. Many countries are already investing in safe, clean energy, he pointed out.

“When it comes to backing renewables or fossil fuels, let’s pick the horse that’s already ahead.” 

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Canada’s first major liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant, on the B.C. coast, has been having problems with a key piece of equipment since the facility fired up in late 2024. The companies behind the project, a consortium of foreign-owned corporations, have said it will take three years to fix the problem — a timeline experts have questions about. 

Earlier this year, The Narwhal revealed LNG Canada has been flaring, or burning off, more than 15 times the amount of gas its permits allow. Internal documents obtained by The Narwhal found this unexpected increase is due to an “integrity issue” with one of its flare stacks. For several months, residents of Kitimat, B.C., have been voicing concerns with the intermittent 90-metre-high flames, noise and air quality issues due to the increased flaring.

To understand why this is happening and what it could mean for residents of the coastal community, The Narwhal spoke to legal, policy and engineering experts. They speculate the three-year timeline is more likely a financial decision for LNG Canada, combined with a lack of enforcement by the BC Energy Regulator, the provincial agency tasked with regulating energy resource activities.

“Nobody wants a bunch of flaring at these kinds of volumes,” Matthew Johnson, the scientific director of the Energy and Emissions Research Laboratory at Carleton University, said. 

LNG Canada told the BC Energy Regulator it needed to flare an additional 170,000 cubic metres of gas daily to mitigate the issue, which would produce roughly 430 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per day — equal to driving a gasoline-powered car roughly 1.5 million kilometres. The regulator has told The Narwhal the actual average of gas flared due to the issue was even higher, averaging more than 205,000 cubic metres per day over the summer and early fall.

Flaring burns off excess gas, such as methane, produced at the plant when liquefied natural gas is processed. That waste gas is sent up a metal tube that stands more than a hundred metres high and ignited by a pilot light, converting the raw gas into carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide — among other potential gases — and water vapour. If the flare isn’t designed correctly, the gas may not make it to the pilot flame. As a result, more gas has to be used to increase the pressure to reach that flame.

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Johnson wouldn’t speculate on the specific issue or its fix without seeing all of the technical documents, but questioned why LNG Canada didn’t appear to be able, or willing, to fix the problem sooner. Other mechanical engineers The Narwhal spoke to suggested the delay is likely a financial decision rather than a manufacturing one: shutting down the facility to replace the equipment would likely be more costly than continuing to flare gas that could be sold.

A spokesperson from LNG Canada responded to questions about the three-year timeline by referring back to a previous statement emailed to The Narwhal in mid-January. It stated LNG Canada is focused on safety and, as the facility is in early operations phase, flaring is a normal occurrence. It noted disruptions will be reduced during “regular operations.” 

“We continue to meet regularly with community members, First Nations, local stakeholders and government agencies to listen and respond to any concerns raised about our activities. LNG Canada extends its continued appreciation to the Kitimat community and to the Haisla Nation for their continued support,” the spokesperson said.  

Johnson still questions the three-year timeline. “We should pay attention to this issue, and should try to force them to get this under control,” he said. Johnson is especially worried about what has been reported about the observations and experiences of Kitimat residents.

“Anecdotes about sooty films on cars, if true, would be especially concerning,” he said, regardless of whether the flare was operating properly or not.

The BC Energy Regulator maintains “there have not been any measurements in the Kitimat Valley in excess of the B.C. Ambient Air Quality Objective metrics attributable to LNG Canada’s operations.” It referred The Narwhal to publicly available data. However, since learning about the issue in April, the regulator has required LNG Canada to submit daily reports related to elevated flaring and the presence of black smoke.

‘It’d be nice to have some transparency’

It was never a secret that LNG Canada would be one of the province’s largest polluters. Project documents produced in 2014 include estimates that, once complete, the facility will emit roughly four million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent annually for at least 25 years. Most of the project’s emissions are expected to come from its turbines and acid gas incinerators — not flaring.

B.C. rules require flares to convert 98 per cent of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, to carbon dioxide, though Johnson said there’s no reliable way to independently verify how much is burnt off in real time.

Neither the B.C. Environmental Assessment Office, which was responsible for approving the greenhouse gas management plan for the project, nor the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, responsible for making sure the project adheres to the environmental protection and impact mitigation conditions under which the project was approved, responded to questions of when or if they had been informed of the integrity issue.

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The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada specified in an email that one of the major concerns for flaring was the impact on migratory birds. One of the conditions for LNG Canada was to limit flaring to “what is necessary for maintenance or emergency situations.” In LNG Canada’s 2024-2025 annual report, released in April, the company listed no malfunctions had occurred during the reporting year.

LNG Canada’s first phase was always expected to increase B.C.’s total emissions by about 6.6 per cent, according to the 2015 assessment report by the B.C. Environmental Assessment Office. With the additional flaring due to the integrity issue, the emissions are 4.5 per cent higher than anticipated, based on the flare data provided to the regulator. 

Despite the additional gas being flared, it’s still a fraction of what will be shipped and sold from LNG Canada: an estimated 14 million tonnes of gas per year. Choosing to prioritize profits might be a “pragmatic decision and maybe that’s the correct decision,” Johnson said, “But it’d be nice to have some transparency.”

BC Energy Regulator inspected LNG Canada when flaring issue was present, found it ‘in compliance’

Public records on the BC Energy Regulator’s compliance and enforcement website show just two inspections of LNG Canada since the flaring issue was identified: one in February 2025, three months after the company identified the integrity issue but two months before the company informed the regulator. That inspection was marked “in compliance,” and another in August was listed simply as “inspected.”

To date, the regulator has issued no penalties, no inspection reports and no formal non-compliance findings. Last summer, the regulator recategorized the additional flaring from “non-routine,” a designation that allows for as much flaring as needed in emergency situations, to “routine,” meaning the company was required to submit daily non-compliance reports for exceeding the permit limit, internal documents showed.

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“What you’ve discovered regarding LNG Canada is the latest example of the persistent (and frankly disgraceful) non-enforcement of environmental law in Canada against industrial polluters,” David R. Boyd, a professor of law, policy and sustainability at the University of British Columbia, told The Narwhal by email. Boyd recently co-authored a report examining air pollution enforcement across Canada, which found governments often rely on “co-operative and non-responsive” approaches and rarely impose penalties on repeat offenders. 

“Canada and B.C. governments pay lip service to the widely accepted polluter-pays principle but rarely apply it in practice,” he told The Narwhal. “Large corporations frequently break environmental laws but are rarely penalized for doing so.” 

A spokesperson for the BC Energy Regulator told The Narwhal the daily reports filed by LNG Canada are because the flaring is “not consistent” with the facility’s permits, using that term instead of the term “non-compliant.” In order for the activities to be found non-compliant, they have to be identified in an inspection by the regulator and then documented and investigated. 

“It seems very much the kind of thing that the regulator and the permitting conditions were designed to prohibit,” Amanda Bryant, manager of the Pembina Institute’s oil and gas program, said. “They’ve got the tools. I think it’s about willingness to escalate and willingness to enforce.”

The regulator did not specify whether the consortium would be facing any penalties for the permit violations for flaring, but noted “an enforcement action could occur at any time in a three-year period following the date of discovery if the facts of an investigation support compliance action.”

However, that would also mean three years of emissions before a potential penalty is levied. “It’s really difficult to see how waiting three years to actually solve the problem is in the public interest,” Bryant said.

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For more than a year, LNG Canada has been troubleshooting problems with its flare stack in Kitimat, B.C. As The Narwhal reported, an “integrity issue” at the plant meant LNG Canada burned significantly more gas than expected, leading to increased noise and emissions for months on end. The problem could take up to three years to fix.

“It pisses me off — but it’s no surprise,” said James Smith, a community member whose name has been changed to protect his family from potential repercussions. “And it makes me say: ‘Okay, so what do we do about it now? How do we correct this?’ ”

Smith said he feels a sense of relief now the truth has come to light, because people have accused him of “being insane or being alarmist” whenever he complained about the noise.

“I can’t take a shit in my bathroom without my Apple Watch telling me I need hearing protection,” he said. “That’s a problem.”

It’s not just noise polluting the northwest B.C. community, however. 

LNG Canada, a consortium of companies led by multinational Shell, has been consistently flaring more than 15 times the amount of gas it would need to burn if its equipment was working as designed. Provincial data provided to The Narwhal shows the facility burned an average of 205,000 cubic metres per day between July 1 and Nov. 30, 2025. It was expected to only need to burn around 11,000 cubic metres per day.

“All I know is what I see every day: big clouds of black smoke floating over my house and flares keeping my backyard lit up all night long,” Kitimat resident Chris Godfrey told The Narwhal, adding he’s curious what LNG Canada will do now the data is public. “I don’t know what the people of Kitimat can do. They can sit and bitch about it and whine about it, but there’s nothing really we can do.”

District of Kitimat Mayor Phil Germuth said LNG Canada informed him about the issue, without specifying when he first became aware of the problem. He told The Narwhal he was unaware of many of the details, including the scale of the problem.

“They let us know a while back — I don’t know exactly when — the flare tips weren’t exactly operating as sold to them by whoever the manufacturer was,” he said in an interview following publication of The Narwhal’s reporting about the problems. “Yes, it’s a disappointment, but it’s something that couldn’t have been predicted, right? I mean, LNG Canada was as surprised as we were.”

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When asked whether he felt the district should have shared more information about the flaring problem with the community, he did not directly answer.

“We don’t actually do communications for LNG Canada,” he said. “They do their own so it’s not really our thing to do.”

“Most people obviously realize that, hey, this is just part of the process of getting a plant up and running and you have to put up with a little bit of short-term inconvenience to get that 40 years of economic opportunities that it brings to the community and the province,” he added.

Cheryl Brown, a member of local environmental advocacy group Douglas Channel Watch, said she recalls representatives of LNG Canada being upfront about the problem during a technical meeting with the group. While the industry officials acknowledged the issue early on, she said they didn’t fully explain the extent of the problem nor talk about solutions. 

“How do they fix this? We meet with them in February, and that’s going to be my question,” she said. “Do you have to shut the whole place down? You can’t fix a flare with the other flares burning — that doesn’t make any sense at all. So how do you do this?”

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How to ‘gaslight people better’

Germuth said he believes the consortium adequately kept the public informed about flaring. 

“It’s unfortunate that maybe a little more information could have been given out,” he said. “Absolutely, that’s unfortunate — but here we are. They put their communications out to the community: ‘This is more flaring than we thought, here’s what it’s going to be, and on this day we’re expecting this height.’ … We think they’ve been fairly open and honest in that way, and doing as much as they can.”

Councillor Terry Marleau disagreed. 

Marleau directly questioned Teresa Waddington, a senior official with the consortium, during a council meeting last November, and said she didn’t give him proper answers. He said he thinks LNG Canada should have done more to ensure the public was informed.

“You’d probably do better with people and journalists and council and everybody else, if you talk about the facts,” he said. “What’s it going to cost them? Not a heck of a lot, if you actually just work on saying, ‘Here’s exactly what’s happening with those flare stacks and here’s what we’re trying to do.’ ”

He acknowledged Kitimat has a long industrial history and most residents, himself included, generally support industrial development, including LNG Canada.

“It’s a really big employer and it’s a really important part of our community,” he said. “But I also want to make sure we look after our environment and our community.” 

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“The downside is not as big as they think it is, by actually coming across really openly to our small community,” Marleau continued. “But we don’t control that. We can only try and work towards getting them to realize that.”

He said one resident he’s been talking with told him he’s unable to work because the flaring has impacted his sleep so severely.

“I find that horribly sad,” Marleau said. “It’s obvious that the noise is to do with the [flare] stack. It’s nothing else in the plant — they’ve said that. They’ve checked all the parts of the plant and the noise is to do with the stack.”

Smith’s experience has been the same. He’s frustrated by the paternalistic way the companies communicate.

“They say, ‘We’ve learned. We’re a better company.’ No, you’ve learned to try to gaslight people better, and you’ve learned to become sneakier, and how to control the narrative more,” he said. 

Smith pointed out recent reports of Shell and Mitsubishi, one of the other members of the consortium, looking to divest ownership of LNG Canada. The same report noted that Petronas, which also has significant stakes in natural gas wells near Fort St. John that supply the facility, already sold some of its shares.

“It’s like you realized you bought a Temu gas plant with AliExpress discount parts and you need to get out of it, because the liability risk is going through the roof,” Smith said.

“We will not comment on or validate speculation about our joint venture participants,” a spokesperson with LNG Canada told The Narwhal in an emailed statement. “For information regarding Shell or Mitsubishi’s respective interests, please contact those companies directly.”

Neither Shell nor Mitsubishi responded prior to publication.

Both Marleau and Germuth pointed out it’s in the consortium’s best interest to flare less gas — every cubic metre burned is less gas it can sell to buyers overseas. Germuth said that gives him confidence in the consortium to remedy the issue.

“It’s to their advantage to fix it as quick as possible,” he said. “We have no doubt they’re doing everything they can to rectify it, because it’s their bottom line. They’re burning gas that they don’t want to be burning. They’d rather be turning it into LNG. So, we’re confident they’re trying to find any way they can to alleviate this issue.”

Marleau echoed the thought and added he believes the consortium should also consider the costs of not being fully transparent with the residents most impacted by noise and emissions.

“I think you’d go a much further distance by actually owning up and talking about the problem,” he said. “Try and make life a little bit better in a community that you want to be part of for 30 or 40 years.”

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Construction on the North Coast transmission line is not expected to start until later this year, but last week BC Hydro took “a key step toward securing a major customer” for its electricity: Ksi Lisims LNG.

BC Hydro and Ksi Lisims LNG have signed a memorandum of understanding that “provides clarity on how and when BC Hydro will deliver as much as 600 megawatts of clean electricity to the proposed floating LNG facility,” according to the government’s press release. Energy Minister Adrian Dix hailed the agreement as a key step toward Ksi Lisims’ final investment decision, which is expected later this year.

The details of the agreement will not be made public, a BC Hydro spokesperson told The Narwhal in an email, because it contains confidential information about Ksi Lisims.

The Ksi Lisims LNG project is expected to consume as much electricity as 250,000 B.C. homes use in a year. How BC Hydro plans to supply that power — and what it means for the broader grid — has not been disclosed. But a key piece is building the multibillion-dollar transmission line. In December, Dix signed a cabinet order outlining many of the terms BC Hydro and North Coast transmission line customers will operate under, including that the costs for the project be recouped via hydro rates.

The most recent cost estimate for the first two phases of the North Coast transmission line is $6 billion, double BC Hydro’s initial $3-billion estimate. The third phase of the project, which will run high-voltage transmission lines north from Terrace, B.C., to Bob Quinn Lake near the Alaska border, has not yet been costed. B.C. is currently negotiating with the Canadian government to secure federal funding for the project.

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The B.C. government estimates the projects served by the new transmission line could yield $950 million per year in revenue for the provincial and local governments and boost B.C.’s gross domestic product by “nearly $10 billion per year.” Ksi Lisims is “expected to attract nearly $30 billion in investment,” according to the province.

But in order to lock in those economic benefits, BC Hydro has to provide “cost certainty” to those potential new customers. If that means reducing the amount of money private companies would otherwise be expected to pay, BC Hydro will have to find other ways of recovering those costs.

“Rate payers are going to pay in the end because [these projects] are going to need so much electricity that supply is not going to be able to meet demand and prices are going to have to go up,” explained Andy Hira, a political science professor and director of the Clean Energy Research Group at Simon Fraser University. 

New contracts could let big projects off the hook for connection costs

The North Coast transmission line will primarily serve industrial customers, including mining projects and the Port of Prince Rupert. The B.C. government has not been shy about promoting the project as a boon for private companies it hopes will invest in the province.

“This is the reliability companies can count on, every hour of every day,” Premier David Eby told a crowd at the Natural Resources Forum in Prince George, B.C., on Jan. 20. “Certainty that power will be there when companies need it. Certainty that it will be available at a predictable cost. That certainty is what turns proposals into final investment decisions.”

But here’s why that cost certainty could mean higher hydro costs for British Columbians. A cabinet order Dix signed in December could spare large North Coast power users from paying millions to hook into the power grid.

The order includes new contracts specifically for North Coast transmission line customers. One of those contracts deletes a handful of words from a decades-old contract called tariff supplement 6, which requires new industrial customers seeking more than 150 megawatts to pay the costs of generating and transmitting the power beyond that threshold.

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“This was an important protection for other customers and was put in place in the 1990s after a negotiation overseen by the BC Utilities Commission,” Richard Mason, a former BC Utilities Commission member, told The Narwhal. “New large loads using the North Coast transmission line will almost certainly require BC Hydro to add new generation, raising the average cost for everyone.”

The tweak in the new contracts seems to let large projects, like Ksi Lisims, seeking to connect to the North Coast transmission line off the hook for extra generation and transmission costs they would otherwise be required to pay.

“In other words, new customers with large loads won’t have to contribute to any extra transmission or generation cost,” Mason said. “These costs will now be socialized across all BC Hydro’s customers.”

The Energy Ministry did not directly address detailed questions from The Narwhal about the changes. An emailed, unattributed statement from the ministry confirmed “those costs do not apply to new large projects in specific industrial sectors connecting to the BC Hydro system in the North Coast region” under a new contract created by Dix’s order.

The implications of that change are concerning to Hira.

“The fact that they’re doing this behind closed doors, without any public discussion — that they’re passing on potentially huge costs to taxpayers and not providing any justification — is really alarming,” he said. 

The Narwhal asked both the Energy Ministry and BC Hydro how any additional generation or transmission costs would be recouped and whether the government has estimated how much those costs could be for North Coast transmission line customers. 

In its statement, the energy ministry confirmed those costs “will be recovered from all BC Hydro ratepayers, including those industrial customers.”

The statement did not include any mention of a cost estimate but did note that large industrial customers connected to the North Coast transmission line will pay BC Hydro for the electricity they use, as all BC Hydro customers do. North Coast transmission line customers will also have to pay a security deposit to BC Hydro and cover the cost of power lines to their connection point.

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The B.C. government has considered making changes to tariff supplement 6 since at least 2024. A briefing note prepared for Eby in March 2024 outlined the potential for an unprecedented increase in industrial electricity demand, driven mainly by large industrial customers. Requiring LNG, mining and other companies to pay the costs required under tariff supplement 6 “could be prohibitive,” the document stated.

But companies that expect to reap huge profits from B.C.’s natural resources are well positioned to pay their own costs, Hira argued.

“The government can’t state that companies that are prepared to invest millions in an LNG pipeline and port facilities can’t afford to pay an electricity connection fee — it simply doesn’t make sense,” he said.

Costs for connecting North Coast transmission line customers could be significant

In addition to Ksi Lisims, the North Coast transmission line could serve “half a dozen private mining projects worth $50 billion in investment,” according to Mining and Critical Minerals Minister Jagrup Brar. 

Under the new contracts in Dix’s December order, none will be required to pay the extra generation and transmission costs required under tariff supplement 6. The Energy Ministry did not respond when asked how much the change could save eligible projects.

However, another LNG project on the north coast provides a hint. Cedar LNG, near Kitimat, B.C., was subject to tariff supplement 6, seemingly for the first time in the transmission contract’s 30-year history. 

To get Cedar LNG connected to the power grid, the provincial government opted to contribute $200 million to help build a new 287-kilovolt transmission line and other electrical infrastructure in July 2025. The floating liquefaction and export terminal could produce three million tonnes of LNG per year for export to Asian markets, using 214 megawatts of electricity.

Neither the province nor Cedar LNG replied to questions about how much the company may have contributed toward the transmission infrastructure.

If all of the anticipated North Coast transmission line projects come with similar transmission costs, the cost to BC Hydro could be substantial, even before considering the cost of any new electricity-generating capacity that might be needed to meet the new power demand.

If electricity prices in B.C. do increase significantly, Hira pointed out B.C. could miss out on attracting other industries to invest in the province. Instead, he said, the province seems to be doubling down on natural resource extraction.

“You’re mortgaging the possibility of diversifying the province’s economy.”

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In the fall of 2024, LNG Canada fired up its flare in Kitimat, B.C., for the first time, burning off gas to test its systems. By December, company officials knew something was wrong.

Residents were also concerned, but had little explanation as 90-metre-high flames lit up the night sky and a deep roaring sound permeated the town.

More than a year later, complaints escalated enough that Kitimat District council sat down for a special meeting with Teresa Waddington, the deputy chief operating officer at LNG Canada. About an hour into the meeting, councillor Terry Marleau asked specifically about flare tips. The response from Waddington was jumbled.

“Uh, I’d say we’re, we’re reviewing the flare tips design,” she said. “We are looking long term at what else could we do other than just reduce flaring in order to make sure that we get to a better place.”  

A couple of minutes later, Marleau leaned into the mic: “So, is there an issue with the flare stacks themselves?” 

“It’s part of the learning curve of new equipment,” Waddington replied. “So on one hand, you know, great that we brought in a technology that gets such high levels of incineration, which results in less slippage of gas, which means you have lower [greenhouse gas emissions] overall, but on the same note, it’s not perfectly working.”

Just a few kilometres away from the nearest residential neighbourhood, LNG Canada had been feeding gas into its flaring system by a magnitude of more than 15 times the typical amount to compensate for what was described as an “integrity issue.” 

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Flaring is the burning of excess or waste gas produced during operations. Methane and other gases that escape the Kitimat facility during processing are sent up a metal tube that stands 122 metres high, where they meet a pilot flame and ignite, converting the raw gas into carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and water vapour. There are also often additional gases such as nitrous oxide, sulfur dioxide, volatile organic compounds and particulates released during the process. 

It’s a necessary safety protocol — if the flare is not designed correctly for the operating environment, the gas may not make it to the pilot flame and instead the flare can creep down the tube and melt the infrastructure. The solution is to increase the pressure, increase the volume of gas and increase the size of the flame. If all the gas is not fully combusted by the pilot, black smoke appears.

The Narwhal reviewed more than 2,000 pages of documents released through freedom of information legislation about the flaring issue in Kitimat. They showed how LNG Canada officials were discussing the flaring issues internally — and that they waited approximately four months to tell the provincial energy regulator. 

We also spoke with several industry insiders, former employees and local residents and analyzed publicly available permits and other government documents to piece together a timeline of events and impacts on the community. The documents reveal regulator and industry officials grappled with the issue for months while community members and local politicians asked questions about the flaring, some complaining about excessive noise and others expressing concerns about potential toxic emissions, black smoke and particulate matter. 

Among the documents is one prepared by the BC Energy Regulator, a government agency that oversees the oil and gas sector and other industries. It detailed an “emerging integrity concern related to one of LNG Canada’s flares” in April 2025, and noted LNG Canada said the issue would take three years to be resolved. 

In the meantime, the facility was “routing additional gas” to the flare to mitigate the problem, according to the document. The system should be fine to operate by burning 11,000 cubic metres of gas per day, but due to the issue it would need to burn at least 170,000 cubic metres daily, the document stated. Burning the extra gas would result in “a noticeable impact in the community with respect to noise, light and visual disturbance,” according to the regulator’s internal briefing note.

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When asked about this document, a spokesperson with the regulator confirmed awareness of the issue and said the average numbers were even higher. LNG Canada reported flaring an average of “approximately 205,000 cubic metres per day between July 1 and Nov. 30, 2025,” the spokesperson said via email. 

The email included detailed data and showed that on Sept. 1, 2025, LNG Canada flared 1,708,649 cubic metres of gas, making it the highest single day, according to the data. 

The spokesperson did not answer questions about whether the government agency communicated the problem with flaring equipment to the public, instead explaining LNG Canada had “fully mitigated” the integrity issue by “ensuring additional gas is flowed through the flare tip facilitating appropriate combustion.” The regulator spokesperson added LNG Canada is required to notify residents and local authorities “regarding certain flaring events.”

The Narwhal asked LNG Canada several detailed questions about the integrity issue, including why it did not appear to communicate clearly with members of the public, but a spokesperson with the consortium declined to answer.

“The LNG Canada facility has been commissioning and is currently in its early operations phase,” the spokesperson wrote in an emailed statement. “Flaring during commissioning and early operations is a normal occurrence in any LNG asset. In regular operations, flaring activities and associated noise reduce significantly.”

BC Energy Regulator officials kept the flaring issue quiet for more than six months

Kitimat sits at the end of a long fiord, surrounded by mountains and subject to extreme weather. Dramatic shifts in air pressure, high winds and other local environmental factors exacerbate the problems LNG Canada faced with its flare. As The Narwhal previously reported, community members have documented black plumes of smoke from the flare and some residents living close to the facility have said their yards, houses and vehicles are often left covered in a thin film of black residue.

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According to the documents, LNG Canada — a consortium of foreign-owned companies led by Shell — first reported non-compliance with government permits in May 2025, citing increased emissions were required to mitigate the integrity concern. The company said a replacement part, called a flare tip, would be needed and it could take up to three years to fully integrate the new equipment, but interim changes could be made. The BC Energy Regulator responded, asking the company to clarify the environmental and health risks of any modifications and said the company might also need to apply to amend its Air Waste Discharge Permit.

In July, the regulator wrote to LNG Canada officials saying the company was on the hook for the additional emissions and needed to fix the problem. The reason, it explained, was that because the additional flaring was for the purpose of “long-term integrity management,” it was not considered a “process upset,” a designation that would exempt it from permit limits. The regulator also required the company to report any emissions exceedances. After the consortium successfully sent its first shipment of LNG overseas in late June 2025, the regulator also issued a requirement for LNG Canada to file daily reports and updates.

The regulator told The Narwhal the consortium filed six “monthly self-disclosures [related] to document flaring which is not consistent” with the facility’s permits and noted it has not issued any penalties for non-compliance. 

“The [BC Energy Regulator] does not disclose information with respect to any ongoing investigations that may be underway, but to date, no penalties have been issued to LNG Canada.”

The regulator also noted it ordered LNG Canada to contract a third-party assessment of air quality in July, which concluded “no measured adverse impacts to air quality from the increased flaring rate.”

“The [BC Energy Regulator] is engaging with LNG Canada to minimize flaring rates from all facility flares,” the spokesperson added.

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The Narwhal asked LNG Canada why it didn’t communicate the problems with the flare tip to the public. We also asked for clarification on the nature of the issue, its impacts on operations and the community, including noise, emissions and other issues raised by community members. The Narwhal asked what had been done to ensure residents were kept informed about the risks posed by faulty or inadequate equipment. 

LNG Canada did not directly answer these questions.

“We continue to remain focused on safely operating the facility and minimizing disruptions to the community,” the spokesperson wrote, adding the 37th shipment is scheduled to depart in the coming days.

“We continue to meet regularly with community members, First Nations, local stakeholders and government agencies to listen and respond to any concerns raised about our activities. LNG Canada extends its continued appreciation to the Kitimat community and to the Haisla Nation for their continued support.”

Between September 2024 and January 2026, LNG Canada posted more than 27 notifications of flaring events on its website and social media, some preparing the community for weeks or months of flaring.

“Flaring is a provincially regulated safety measure that ensures the controlled, efficient combustion of natural gas during specific operational phases,” LNG Canada regularly said in these notifications. “It is a critical part of safely operating a facility of this scale and is not expected to be routine during regular operation.”

But the consortium was not telling the public why the flare was so big nor explaining why so many “unplanned” flaring events were occurring. In early November 2025, for example, LNG Canada published a notification warning residents flaring would extend beyond the “originally anticipated timeframe.” It noted this would mean more “intermittent” noise and more emissions, without explaining why. 

Around the same time, the consortium offered to temporarily relocate some residents who had expressed concerns about the noise and emissions, if they agreed to “not make any complaints or raise any concerns or objections with respect to LNG Canada, the LNG facility or the works with any third parties, including but not limited to members of the media, the [BC Energy Regulator] or the District of Kitimat” related to flaring activities.

But complaints from residents continued to come in.

Just a few months ago, in that late November 2025 council meeting, Waddington addressed questions about the flaring from Marleau and other members of council. She was accompanied by a sound analyst hired to monitor ambient noise over Kitimat.

There had been more than 30 complaints from the town’s residents about unexpected noise since the LNG export facility started flaring excess gas a year earlier, Waddington said at the meeting. The council wanted to see the results of the consortium’s monitoring, understand the cause and hear how the company was managing the disruption.

Waddington assured Marleau, and council, the company was investigating.

“If you look at how the LNG Canada startup has gone, it’s actually been smoother than most,” Waddington concluded. “We are actually kind of setting the bar.” On Jan. 5, 2026, LNG Canada published its first notification of the year, of a week-long flaring event that had already begun.

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It took the B.C. Environmental Assessment Office more than four months to notify the public of an environmental infraction that happened during construction of a major liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility in Squamish, B.C. The records, posted to a government website on Dec. 30, show Woodfibre LNG was found to be out of compliance with government regulations in August, potentially imperilling juvenile salmon populations.

According to the records, Woodfibre LNG “failed to monitor for juvenile salmon during in-stream construction.” In response, the assessment office issued a notice of non-compliance. No fines have been levied against the company for the infraction.

A spokesperson with the assessment office said the delay in making the records public was in part due to the BC Public Service job action that spanned several weeks last fall and also because Woodfibre “submitted additional information, which took time to analyze.” 

“There need to be consequences for these companies,” Tracey Saxby, director of Squamish-based environmental watchdog, My Sea to Sky, told The Narwhal. “My understanding is that the consequences are not high enough for the companies to care. It’s easier for them to break the rules … and proceed on with business as usual, than to actually follow the rules and the laws and regulations.”

Saxby is concerned both the construction and operation of Woodfibre LNG will have major consequences for salmon and other species.

“We know from talking to scientists based in Russia that the noise pollution and the light pollution from these facilities will confuse and disrupt salmon migration patterns — and the Woodfibre LNG facility is located at a critical area on the salmon migration pathway into the Squamish River,” she said. “On the one hand, the government is spending millions of dollars to restore salmon habitat while another branch of government is approving destructive LNG projects that undermine all of that work and continue to threaten at-risk salmon populations.”

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Woodfibre LNG said the non-compliance was issued because the usual method of monitoring was “ineffective as the sub-surface water was too cloudy, which happens frequently due to the natural influence of turbid Squamish River discharge.” 

A spokesperson said in an emailed statement that when the first monitoring tool didn’t work, “qualified professionals” turned to “improved high resolution SONAR technology” and successfully continued monitoring.

“No harm to juvenile salmon was observed, and in-water work remained within permitted limits.”

The state of LNG in B.C. 

Construction of the LNG facility has been underway since fall 2023. When completed, the liquefaction and export plant will produce up to 2.1 million tonnes of LNG for export each year. It will receive natural gas from a FortisBC pipeline being built to connect to a network of pipelines and wells in B.C.’s northeast. Natural gas, which is mostly composed of methane, is primarily extracted from underground sources through hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.

The Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation) is supportive of the project and led the first legally-binding environmental assessments of the LNG facility and corresponding pipeline between 2013 and 2015. The nation is working with the federal government and local environmentalists on restoring parts of the Squamish River estuary, long impacted by industrial activities.

A spokesperson with Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw said the nation was unable to comment on the non-compliance because the relevant employee is on bereavement leave.

Woodfibre LNG, majority owned by Indonesian billionaire Sukanto Tanoto’s Pacific Energy Corporation, is the second major LNG export facility being built in B.C. Its much larger cousin, LNG Canada, began operating in Kitimat, B.C., last year. The province also approved Cedar LNG in Kitimat, which is currently under construction, and Ksi Lisims LNG, which will be built near the Nass River estuary in northwest B.C. The province’s support for the LNG export industry dates back to the early 2010s, when more than a dozen projects were first proposed.

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The environmental assessment office isn’t the only government body overseeing development of LNG projects and gas pipelines. The BC Energy Regulator is responsible for issuing permits and ensuring compliance with many laws and regulations intended to protect the environment and communities from harm. The regulator was originally called the BC Oil and Gas Commission and has special powers over several pieces of legislation.

But as The Narwhal previously reported, regulator officials don’t always enforce laws and regulations when they find companies aren’t in compliance with government rules. 

Woodfibre LNG said it is working with the assessment office to adapt its monitoring program.

“Salmon spawning is a regular occurrence at Mill Creek, which runs through our site, and we take care [to] preserve proper spawning conditions and to measure both the spawning and emergence events,” the spokesperson wrote.

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British Columbia’s modest climate gains are at risk after a wave of policy clawbacks this past year. 

According to the province’s recent accountability report — which reflects B.C.’s climate data on a two-year lag — carbon pollution declined by four per cent in 2023, meaning emissions are now nine per cent below the 2007 baseline. 

The province has also nearly halved methane emissions in the oil and gas sector from 2014, meeting this year’s target two years early. 

However, many climate measures that are just beginning to bear fruit, or will soon — such as the consumer carbon tax, electric vehicle (EV) rebates and sales mandates and net-zero requirements for liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects — have been pruned back or chopped entirely in 2025. What’s more, the province scrapped the promised oil and gas sector emissions cap and never delivered a clean transportation plan, although fossil fuel vehicles continue to account for 41 per cent of B.C.’s carbon pollution. 

As a result, the accountability report looks back at progress resulting from policies that now no longer exist, said Jens Wieting, senior policy and science advisor at Sierra Club BC. Yet the province doesn’t detail how it plans to drive down carbon pollution and its impacts on people’s health and pocketbooks, as climate disasters including record wildfires and floods, which recently devastated farmers in Abbotsford for the second time in five years, continue to occur, he said. 

Last year’s accountability report already indicated B.C. wasn’t on track to meet its 2030 carbon pollution target — a reduction of 40 per cent — yet the province has still slashed climate policies. 

“It’s irresponsible to leave people in the dark about what actions will be taken to get us closer to the 2030 targets, because climate change is a life and death issue, and that’s not reflected in this report,” Wieting said.

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A “shocking” detail in the report was the amount of carbon pollution being generated by the increasingly severe wildfires fuelled by drought, he said. 

Wildfire emissions in 2023, the worst season on record, were six times higher than B.C.’s total carbon pollution for the year. The province tracks wildfire emissions but they aren’t included in provincial carbon pollution totals because B.C., like other national and international jurisdictions, considers wildfires to be natural rather than human caused — a policy that is heavily criticized by climate experts. 

“[Wildfire] carbon emissions in 2023 added up to over 400 million tonnes, which is almost incomprehensible,” Wieting said, adding the figures underscore the urgency of delivering carbon pollution reductions that limit global warming below catastrophic levels. 

The province highlights its work to reduce carbon pollution in the forestry sector with measures such as using waste wood more efficiently, or tree planting, but it fails to mention any steps or climate benefits tied to protecting old-growth forests that trap large amounts of carbon while protecting biodiversity, he added. 

“There isn’t any reference to protecting forests as part of climate action and that’s a huge concern,” Wieting said. 

“It would be one of the most effective, most immediate benefits for the climate to keep those enormous carbon pools protected in standing old-growth forests.” 

Consumers pay for scrapped policies

Aside from limiting efforts to reduce carbon pollution, B.C.’s climate rollbacks have additional drawbacks, said Tom Green, senior climate policy adviser at the David Suzuki Foundation. 

Nixing the consumer carbon tax and the associated rebate means there’s less incentive for households and businesses to make the switch to EVs and heat pumps, or invest in cleaner fuels or technology instead of burning dirty fossil fuels, he said. 

Weakening B.C.’s EV standards to match pending national policies also doesn’t make sense given the province’s former rebates and sales mandate drove one of the fastest uptakes of clean cars in the country, Green said, noting nearly 200,000 EVs are in use on B.C. roads. 

“We’re ahead of the curve; we don’t want to try and match northern Saskatchewan,” he said. 

The modest emissions reductions in the accountability report don’t demonstrate climate policies don’t work, but rather that they do and the province needs to truly double down, Green said. 

“I think the message is when we put in place good climate policy and we don’t sabotage it, change it and weaken it due to industry pressure, then we get results,” he said. 

The province’s push to develop LNG export projects while backtracking on carbon pollution rules will also wipe out any climate gains, and move the province in the wrong direction from both a climate and economic standpoint, Green said. 

“We’re trying to bring down carbon emissions across the economy but we’re growing this massive LNG export industry, which is going to blow any ability to meet climate targets out of the water and lock us into long-term fossil fuel infrastructure,” he said. 

Previously, proposed LNG projects like Cedar LNG, now under construction, or the massive Ksi Lisims LNG proposal awaiting a final investment decision, were required to have net-zero emissions by 2030 to get provincial approvals. 

But in March, Energy and Climate Solutions Minister Adrian Dix rolled back the pollution rules, stating LNG proponents only have to “provide a credible plan” to reach net-zero if they can’t plug into B.C.’s electrical grid by that date. In a related move to clean up carbon pollution by electrifying LNG production and export projects along with mining sites, the province is fast-tracking the $6-billion North Coast Transmission Line.

But LNG projects will demand a substantial amount of energy and potentially divert resources from the electrification efforts that truly curb global warming, Green said. 

“Any progress we’re making is largely because we’re electrifying the economy by adopting heat pumps and EVs or making homes more energy efficient,” he said. 

“But, if we don’t have electricity for all that because we’re giving it to LNG, we’re going to face challenges.” 

Political pressure on NDP government

Jeremy Valeriote, BC Green Party MLA for West Vancouver-Sea to Sky, said the province needs to show more political courage and vision to address climate change effectively.  

The boom in renewable technologies such as solar panels, which are increasingly affordable, as well as the uptake of EVs worldwide, is disrupting the myth that shifting to a clean economy is unaffordable. 

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“Conservative operators might continue to try and use [that narrative] but it’s going to be much more difficult,” Valeriote said.

The province needs to do more to demonstrate the savings and advantages tied to the long-term life cycle costs of EVs or heat pumps over gas-burning cars and furnaces, which appear cheaper due to their initial cost, he added. 

In addition to continuing their fight against LNG and the proposed Alberta oil pipeline, the Greens will be pushing the NDP to start accounting for the long-term social and economic costs associated with carbon pollution and new oil and gas projects, including rising insurance, food, health-care, housing and infrastructure expenses, he said.

“Liabilities associated with some of our fossil fuels are going to come back to bite us,” Valeriote said. 

“People talk about fiscal responsibility, and I really think it’s important to remember that the best fiscal responsibility is avoiding some of these catastrophes.” 

Green agreed. The government’s decision to weaken climate policies despite the economic benefits of climate action is disappointing, he said. 

“One thing I don’t think the government is taking to heart anymore is that climate action is good for affordability. It’s good for jobs, good for quality of life,” he said. “It’s discouraging that despite all these good reasons to continue the course, we have a government that’s lost interest.”

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