One year after 24 million cubic metres of mine sludge and water swept into rivers and lakes below Imperial Metal’s Mount Polley mine in B.C., Southeast Alaskans will gather to commemorate the tailings pond breach and bless the Stikine River.

Those at the Aug. 2 gathering in Wrangell, where the salmon-rich Stikine runs into the ocean, will also be looking for ways to ensure there is no Mount Polley-style disaster in the B.C. headwaters of the Iskut River, a major tributary of the Stikine, where Imperial Metals has opened the Red Chris mine.

The ceremony will be hosted by Wrangell Cooperative Association, and tribal administrator Aaron Angerman said he hopes other Southeast Alaskan communities will follow suit and hold their own ceremonies.

“I am frightened to think that what happened at Mount Polley could happen here in our backyard now that the Red Chris mine is operational — that the fish we’ve relied on traditionally for thousands of years could be contaminated or disappear, that the local commercial fishing industry could be decimated and that we could see the local businesses that rely on the industry close doors,” he said.

Red Chris — one of about 10 B.C. mines planned for the transboundary area —  opened for business two days after the first report into the Mount Polley disaster was released.

Despite a recommendation in that report that companies should consider dry stack tailings storage Red Chris is using a tailings dam similar to Mount Polley.

Imperial Metals plans to store tailings in Black Lake, behind a dam. It is estimated that, over the life of the mine, there will be more than 300 million tonnes of mine waste, some of it acidic, that will require water treatment in perpetuity.

Raw footage from the Mount Polley mine spill. Credit: Cariboo Regional District

Lax B.C. Mining Rules Cause Concern

Anxiety about perceived lax mining regulations in B.C and lack of Alaskan input into mine approvals close to salmon-bearing rivers, escalated after the Mount Polley breach. Many Alaskan groups and local politicians are now pushing for the matter to be referred to the International Joint Commission for a ruling under the Boundary Waters Treaty, which says water flowing across the boundary should not be polluted.

The Wrangell ceremony will kick off with a procession through downtown Wrangell followed by a blessing of the waters in front of the Tribal House.

Tribal leaders, government officials, conservation groups and community members will then hold strategy sessions.

“I hope the Aug. 2 ceremony highlights how concerned people are on both sides of the border about major risks to the Stikine River and other transboundary rivers from large-scale and risky mine developments in B.C.,” said Oscar Dennis, Iskut First Nation spokesman.

Speakers will include Jacinda Mack, Northern Shuswap Tribal Council mining team coordinator, who lives and works in the area affected by the Mount Polley breach.[view:in_this_series=block_1]

Mount Polley Spill Impacts Linger as Mine Reopens

On Wednesday the province released its first phase progress report on Mount Polley remediation, but Mack said in a news release that First Nations concerns were not fully addressed before the government allowed a partial re-start at Mount Polley and many are losing faith in the process.

“It appears that it is simply business as usual. There have been no fines, no criminal charges, no approved long-term water treatment and management plan and the company still gets permitted to operate. It’s a disgrace,” she said.

It is too soon to know the long-term impacts, but life around Mount Polley will never return to the way it was, Mack said.

“It was described as a feeling of death in our community when the disaster happened,” she said.

The province has given Imperial Metals a conditional permit to reopen Mount Polley with restrictions. The company must give the provincial government a long-term water treatment and discharge plan by next June.

Mining Accidents Worsening, Finds Report

In another acknowledgement of the Mount Polley anniversary, Washington D.C.-based Earthworks Action has released a report by David Chambers, a mining specialist with the Center for Science in Public Participation and Lindsay Bowker of Bowker Associations Science and Research in the Public Interest, which finds that catastrophic mining spills are increasing in frequency, severity and cost.

The report shows that the Mount Polley failure is part of a global trend of industry and regulators failing to implement best practices to minimize environmental and financial risks.

The analysis finds that half of the serious tailings dam failures in the last 70 years occurred between 1990 and 2009 and says the increasing rate of tailings dam failures is directly related to the growing number of tailings storage facilities larger than five-million cubic metres.

The report predicts 11 catastrophic failures between 2010 and 2019, costing a total of $6 billion, or $543 million per spill.

“More mining waste disasters like Mount Polley are inevitable,” Chambers said, adding that, as most mining companies cannot afford or cannot secure insurance to cover catastrophic failures, damage is often not repaired or taxpayers dollars pay for remediation.

“As a result of the Mount Polley investigation, mining companies and regulators know they have to change mine waste disposal practices to minimize the risk of future disasters,” Chambers said.

“Unfortunately, as evidenced by the recent approval for mines in the Alaska/British Columbia transboundary area, they are failing to do so.”

Image Credit: Cariboo Regional District 

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The Council of Canadians called on the federal government Tuesday to implement regulation of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, in Canada. The process, widely used for unconventional oil and gas recovery in western Canada, is linked to numerous human and environmental health threats and currently faces bans or moratoria in Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, as well as Newfoundland and Labrador. 

“The next Oka in Canadian history is going to be in B.C. and it’s going to be about energy,” indigenous lawyer Caleb Behn said during a press conference in Ottawa addressing the fracking boom in northern British Columbia and other parts of western Canada. 

“I guarantee it. The writing is on the wall. It is just a question of when in my view. That is why the regulators need to step up.”

Behn, who is Eh Cho Dene and Dunne-Za from Treaty 8 Territory in northeastern B.C., and Dr. Kathleen Nolan, co-founder of Concerned Health Professionals of New York, joined the Council of Canadians today in calling on the federal government to safeguard Canadians and their drinking water from the controversial method of releasing natural gas and oil trapped in rock-like shale.

“We need a national water policy that addresses threats to water such as fracking,” Emma Lui, water campaigner with the Council of Canadians, told the press conference this morning at Parliament’s Centre Block.

“With the upcoming federal election, the Council of Canadians hopes to see real federal leadership and commitments to protect our communities, health, water and our water sources from fracking,” she said.

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves drilling underground wells 200 to 3,000 metres vertically and another 1,000 metres or more horizontally to penetrate the rock-like shale. Pressurized water mixed with hundreds of toxic substances (including benzene, hydrochloric acid, mercury and formaldehyde) is shot down the well to penetrate the rock and force natural gas or oil to the surface.

A single fracked well consumes anywhere between seven to 23 million litres of water. Poorly constructed or cracked concrete wells have led to the contamination of groundwater with fracking chemicals or methane, a main component of natural gas.

“There are roughly 200 chemicals used in fracking that we know about that have not been assessed by Health Canada or Environment Canada,” Lui explained.

“There is a rapidly emerging body of evidence that shows harms from this activity (fracking) at every stage of the process. With contamination of air, water and social,” Dr. Nolan said.

“People are getting sick.”

Headaches, disorientation, rashes, seizures and asthma are some of the immediate health impacts airborne contaminants from fracking operations can have on people living nearby, Nolan said.

“With water contamination there’s a lag time between the time the contaminants enter the water and then enters the person and then the person gets ill….it could take years or decades before the contaminants reach people,” she said.

“What we are seeing is the tip of the iceberg and that the people who are sick now are basically our biomarkers.”

Behn fears his home territory, which is located in and around Fort Nelson, B.C., and which is at the centre of the Fractured Land documentary, will be destroyed if federal and provincial regulators do not take significant steps to determine the impact fracking operations have on local populations and the environment.

“Absence of proof of harm is not proof of the absence of harm,” Behn said.

A report commissioned and released by Environment Canada last year concluded the potential threat of fracking operations on groundwater “cannot be assessed because of a lack of scientific data and understanding."

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In a stunning and historic move, Alberta elected a majority New Democrat government on Tuesday.

The Progressive Conservatives, which finished in third place, consistently mismanaged the environmental and climate change file.

Ralph Klein, controversial premier from 1992 to 2006, despised the Kyoto Protocol and infamously flipped the bird at an activist who was protesting against a new Al-Pac pulp mill. Subsequent premiers often talked about improving environmental regulations, but seldom acted on it.

It’s yet to be known how different things will be under the NDP, but their win certainly marks a significant shift in sentiment.

“Together, we need to start down the road to a diversified and resilient economy,” newly crowned Alberta Premier Rachel Notley said in her victory speech. “To end the boom-and-bust roller coaster ride we’ve been on for far too long. It won’t happen overnight. But we must start, and we will.”

Notley also noted that she looks forward to working with Prime Minister Stephen Harper and other premiers on a “national approach to the environment and to Canada's energy sector that builds bridges and opens markets.”

Notley has said she won’t continue to promote the TransCanada Keystone XL and Enbridge Northern Gateway pipelines, but is in favour of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain and TransCanada’s Energy East.

“It’s unclear, so far, what the NDP will do with the oil and gas sector, particularly the oilsands which is the fastest growing source of GHGs in Canada,” said Ed Whittingham, executive director of the Alberta-based Pembina Institute. “We’re eagerly awaiting their plan for dealing with it.”

The NDP’s platform was vague when it came to greenhouse gas emissions, saying the party “will take leadership on the issue” and “first steps will include an energy efficiency strategy and a renewable energy strategy.”

Those are both crucial policy points, especially when one considers the PCs have delayed the release of their renewable energy strategy since 2008. The climate change framework — originally intended for release last October — was allegedly being released in June. It’s unclear what the change in government will mean for that, or what the NDP’s plan is for augmenting the current, esoteric carbon levy.

“What we want now is for the new government is to really show the immediacy of the problem and tell the bureaucrats that those plans have to get done,” Whittingham said regarding the framework.

The NDP also committed to phasing out coal-fired power stations (the incredibly polluting fossil fuel is currently used for 43 per cent of electricity generation in the province) and expressed an intention to implement a green retrofitting loan program to help Albertans reduce energy usage via installation of solar and new furnaces, windows and doors.

The NDP also committed to diverting remaining money allocated to carbon capture and storage — a controversial technology former premier Jim Prentice once dubbed a “science experiment” — to public transit.

A more contentious component of the NDP’s platform involves a review of non-renewable resource royalties — called the “Resource Owners’ Rights Commission” — which would examine the amount of money the province makes from its oil and gas resources. While such a review wouldn’t automatically translate to increases in royalties (which sunk former premier Ed Stelmach), it does have energy sector CEOs concerned.

Any money made from “incremental royalty revenue” would be channelled into the Heritage Savings Trust Fund, the province’s sovereign wealth fund, which would then be used to invest in renewables or diversify the economy. That particular idea was critiqued by Andrew Leach, professor of energy policy at the University of Alberta, in a detailed Maclean’s feature on the NDP’s energy policies.

“If the premise is to use resource revenues to provide low-cost capital to otherwise non-viable economic activity in the province today, I’d call that spending and dispense with the need to flow the dollars through a fund,” he wrote.

The NDP’s infatuation with refining raw bitumen is something else that Leach (as well as fellow Maclean’s columnist Colby Cosh) has critiqued. In addition to being potentially uneconomical due to sheer investment costs and lack of comparative advantage (contrasted with, say, Texas or Louisiana), refineries would only increase Alberta’s reliance on petroleum products and services, writes Leach.

A surprising omission in the NDP’s platform was details about oilsands monitoring and regulation, something the PCs were often criticized for. The Alberta Environmental Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting Agency was created in 2014 as a joint agency between the federal and provincial government, with funding from the energy sector.

But in the October 2014 auditor general’s report, it was noted that the agency’s annual report for 2012-2013 was delayed 15 months, “lacked clarity and key information and contained inaccuracies.” As a result, the auditor general suggested the governments could “fail to carry out their plan for monitoring the environmental impacts of oil sands development.”

At this stage, there are more questions than answers about what the NDP will mean for Alberta on the energy and environment file — but one thing’s for sure: those concerned about climate change have more reason to hope today than they did yesterday. 

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I don’t think anyone in Canada expects our good country to meet its climate target — even with the imminent pressure of the UNFCCC meeting in Paris later this year weighing down on our collective shoulders.

We have no reason to harbour that expectation given that our own federal government via Environment Canada has been telling us for years that Canada is running off the climate track and — because of growing emissions largely from the oil and gas sector — we are getting farther and farther away from meeting our government's self-imposed climate targets.

Because of that climate failure, Canada is holding all of us back from prosperity, jobs and better health.

That’s according to a new study of benefits from international emission pledges made in the lead up to December’s UN climate summit.

Developed countries around the world — with the exception of Canada and Japan — are unveiling their individual climate plans, which are due today.

By missing the deadline, Canada will miss out on a lot more than just respect, according to the new study, released by the New Climate Institute, which based its analysis on data from the International Energy Agency.

Europe, which has pledged to cut emissions by 40 per cent by 2030 from 1990 levels, will enjoy 70,000 new full-time jobs, cut €33 billion in fossil fuel imports and prevent around 6,000 deaths from pollution, The Guardian reports.

If Europe ups its emissions reduction to 55 per cent, the benefits skyrocket. Under that scenario the study predicts Europe would see 420,000 new full time jobs, $173 billion in fuel savings and save 46,000 lives.

Limiting the planet’s temperature increase to only two degrees Celsius — the target agreed to by international climate experts and policy makers — would save more than a million lives in China and create nearly 2 million new jobs.

But tackling the issue of climate change would have massive positive benefits here at home as well.

Taking meaningful climate action would mean increasing green infrastructure, prioritizing sustainable cities and investing in renewable and low-carbon sources of energy.

It would also mean slowing the rate of expansion of oil and gas projects including the oilsands which would eventually put a stop to new pipeline projects. That would come with the added benefits of respecting the rights of local municipalities fighting pipelines and First Nations actively engaged in legal battles against both the provincial and federal governments for industrial incursions on traditional territory.

These are called co-benefits. They’re something the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change highlighted in a recent report, saying climate action comes with a host of “co-benefits, synergies and tradeoffs” that naturally result from responsible and practical long-term thinking.

In general, countries getting serious in the fight against climate change are setting themselves up to enjoy all sorts of co-benefits that Canada might miss out on, like energy efficiency, clean energy, pollution reduction, water conservation, greener cities, increased recycling, sustainable agriculture, forest preservation, healthier communities, stronger human rights practices, better protection for indigenous peoples and their way of life, cleaner oceans, more democratic and collaborative politics and more.

The list really goes on and on.

But instead of taking a pro-active approach to climate, Canada is, rather embarrassingly, getting called out for failing to do even the most basic thing: discussing climate with the provinces. 

What is worse, Canada has no federal climate legislation and recently Prime Minister Stephen Harper said regulating emissions from the oil and gas industry would be "crazy" after he adamantly rejected putting a price on carbon. Environment Commissioner Julie Gelfand released a scathing critique of Canada in October after she found the nation has no plan in place for reaching its climate targets and has "no climate vision" whatsoever.

So Canada is missing out on a lot more than today’s UN climate pledge deadline: we’re missing out on leadership, on collaboration across the nation, and, maybe most tragically, on all those benefits that come with smart decision-making.

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When a CN train carrying crude oil derailed and caught fire last weekend near Gogama, Ontario, it became the fifth loaded oil train to leave the tracks in North America in the past two months — and it's raising new questions about the volatility of diluted bitumen from Alberta's oilsands.

In the March 7th accident, several cars slid into the Mattagami River and ignited, leading local officials to issue a drinking water warning for the Mattagami First Nation.

The accident comes less than a month after another CN tanker train carrying crude derailed in the same region, about 200 kilometres north of Sudbury, spilling an estimated more than one million litres of diluted bitumen into local waterways. Twenty-nine cars left the tracks, causing an explosion that left fires burning for six days.

Officials are still scrambling to clean up the oil, which has spilled into a nearby creek, pond and section of Kasasway Lake, before spring thaw.

Gogama Village Inn owner Roxanne Veronneau told the Toronto Star, “People here are on pins and needles. The tracks run right through town … I’m sure that there’s going to be a lot of talk afterward that this shouldn’t be in the middle of our town.”

“It’s frightening and nerve-wracking, especially after what happened in Quebec.” 

The recent accident near Gogama is the third CN Rail derailment in Ontario in the last month and the fifth tanker train derailment continent-wide.

CN Rail experienced another tanker train derailment on March 5 near Horneypayne, Ontario. No oil spilled as a result of the derailment.

On February 16, a tanker train carrying fracked shale oil from North Dakota derailed in West Virginia, causing a spectacular explosion and forcing the evacuation of two towns. At least one of the derailed cars fell into the Kanawha River, a source of drinking water for two counties.

On March 6 a BNSF train carrying Bakken crude oil derailed south of Galena, Illinois. Twenty-one cars left the tracks and five cars ignited causing a large fireball and plumes of black smoke. Emergency responders spent three days working to bring that fire under control.

Growing Concern Over Volatility of Diluted Bitumen

The spate of recent tanker train explosions in Canada has raised concerns about the volatility of diluted bitumen, which contains highly flammable light hydrocarbons. Although the explosive qualities of Bakken oil — which was central to the tanker train disaster in Lac-Mégantic that left 47 dead — is well-documented, similar attention has not been paid to diluted bitumen, as DeSmogBlog recently reported.

As Railway Age reports, “before CN’s first Gogama wreck Feb. 14, there was a widespread and comforting belief among railroaders, regulators and, yes, even railroad reporters, that tar sands bitumen was much safer for transport by rail than light or conventional crude oils.”

“We now know, thanks to Gogama 1 and Gogama 2, that neither dilbit nor synbit, the synthetically diluted variant of tar sands oil, are safer than untreated Bakken crude.”

The hazardousness of crude oil blends is determined by its ignitability, which is determined by the blend’s most volatile component, Railway Age reports. Thus for diluted bitumen, the volatility of light hydrocarbons used as diluents is a critical factor in determining how fuel will respond in a tanker car accident.

Oil Change International recently calculated an average of 100,000 to 150,000 barrels of dilbit is loaded onto tanker trains at Alberta terminals each day.

“As it takes on average around nine days for a train to reach its destination, this means that at any given time there are between 18 and 27 trains carrying dilbit through the continent loaded with some 900,000 to 1.4 million barrels of dilbit,” Oil Change International’s Andy Rowell reports.

“Together with the roughly one million barrels per day of light, tight crude oil loaded in the Bakken and elsewhere around the continent the threat is enormous.”

Lessons Learned in Lac-Mégantic Not Enough

After the disaster in Lac-Mégantic, Transport Canada ordered all Class 111 tanker cars be upgraded to new standards. The new CPC-1232 standards required cars to be enhanced with half-head shields, fitting protections and normalized steel.

The enhanced cars were meant to prevent another accident like Lac-Mégantic from occurring.

However, as the Toronto Star reported, the Transportation Safety Board’s investigation into the first derailment near Gogama showed the new CPC-1232 cars “performed similarly to those involved in the Lac-Mégantic accident.”

The cars exploded upon impact even though they were travelling at nearly half the speed of the cars involved in the Lac-Mégantic incident.

“The TSB has warned (Transport Canada) that this standard was not sufficient and that more needed to be done to provide an adequate level of protection,” the board’s investigation update states.

“Preliminary assessment of the CPC-1232-compliant tank cars involved in (the first Gogama derailment) demonstrates the inadequacy of this standard given the tank cars' similar performance to the legacy Class 111 tanks cars involved in the Lac-Mégantic accident.”

Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner Keith Stewart told the Toronto Star he’s worried more deaths will occur before the federal government revisits the tanker standards.

“The safety authorities have been warning that even the newer cars are not safe, and we have to wonder where the federal government is in this,” he said.

Image Credit: Transportation Safety Board of Canada

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Worried Alaskans who fear lucrative fisheries and tourism industries are at risk from lax B.C. oversight of mine safety are meeting with state officials next week to ask the U.S. State Department to push for more input on mine development along the border of northwest B.C. and southeast Alaska.

“We are calling for an equal seat at the table. We want equal representation on the part of Americans and Alaskans when it comes to how these watersheds are developed,” said Heather Hardcastle, a commercial salmon fisher based in Juneau.

“We take all the risks and the costs and get none of the benefits.”

Hardcastle is a member of a coalition of Alaskan mayors, First Nations, businessmen and fishers who were horrified by the Mount Polley tailings pond collapse last August. Their concerns were exacerbated by last week’s provincial government report that found a weak foundation and design were responsible for the failure that saw an estimated 25 million cubic metres of waste water and toxic sludge flood from the copper and gold mine’s tailings pond into rivers and lakes.

Although the unidentified glacial layer under the dam and design changes that resulted in overly steep slopes on the embankment were pinpointed as the main causes, the report refers to multiple problems, ranging from over-topping to questionable safety margins.

The picture of failure  – and the seeming inability of provincial or company inspectors to identify the problems – is raising already elevated apprehensions in Alaska, where the Red Chris Mine began operating Tuesday.

Red Chris, also a copper-gold mine, is 80 kilometres south of Dease Lake, close to the headwaters of the Stikine, one of the area’s most important salmon rivers. It is owned by Imperial Metals, the same company that owns Mount Polley. Adding to the unease of critics, Imperial Metals and Mount Polley Mining are major contributors to the ruling B.C. Liberal party.

After learning through the media that Red Chris had started operations, the Alaska-based group Salmon Beyond Borders put out a statement saying B.C is pursuing large-scale mining at all costs, regardless of the enormous risks to Alaska's downstream communities, fisheries and tourism.

"News that the B.C. government allowed Red Chris to begin operating before the ink was even dry on the Mount Polley report, and without even the courtesy of letting Alaskans know, is appalling," said the news release.

"The public needs to send a message loud and clear that Alaskans will not stand by and allow its waters to be threatened in such a disrespectful manner."

Screenshot from the Salmon Beyond Borders website. The group advocates on behalf of transboundary rivers.

More Mines Being Fast-Tracked Despite Mount Polley Disaster

Hardcastle was hoping recommendations in the Mount Polley report for a move to best practices and modern technologies would slow down B.C.’s surge of mine development, but then came the news that Red Chris was on the verge of opening.

In another decision, despite objections from both sides of the border, the Canadian federal government approved Kerr-Sulphurets-Mitchell (KSM) in December. The massive mine project is 30 kilometres upstream of the Alaska border, where there are fears that an accident could result in toxins leaching into the transboundary Unuk River.

In addition to numerous exploration projects, there are 10 advanced mine development projects in northwest B.C., according to a Ministry of Energy and Mines spokesman.

Among other planned developments are Kitsault, Silvertip, Tulsequah Chief, Arctos Anthracite, Brucejack and Kutcho.

“What happened to that cautious approach? We don’t have any assurances that B.C. is going to do anything differently,” Hardcastle said.

“They are all being fast-tracked because of Premier (Christy) Clark’s pro-development agenda.”

However, the province asserts that the Mount Polley report has provided recommendations that will prevent a similar failure in the future.

All operating mines will be required to establish Independent Tailings Dam Review Boards that will provide advice on design, construction, operation and closure of tailings storage facilities, said a ministry spokesman.

A code review will look at how to implement other recommendations made by the panel including adoption of best available practices and technologies. Mines with dams will be asked to provide a letter by the end of June confirming whether foundation materials similar to those at Mount Polley exist below any of their dams.

So far, inspections of tailings storage facilities, ordered by the Chief Inspector of Mines following the failure at Mount Polley, have not identified any immediate safety concerns, said the spokesman.

But Alaskans remain skeptical.

Waste from the Imperial Metals Mount Polley tailings pond floods the Hazeltine Creek and pours into Quesnel Lake near Likely, B.C. Photo by Farhan Umedaly, Vovo Productions, for DeSmog Canada.

After what Alaskans saw at Mount Polley, there is nothing that the B.C. or Harper government can say to restore confidence, said Rob Sanderson Jr., co-chair of the United Tribal Transboundary Mining Work Group and vice-president of the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.

“As a tribal leader I have absolutely no trust in the Canadian environmental or mining laws,” he said.

It is essential to protect the pristine waters of south-east Alaska for future generations, Sanderson said.

“We have a right to be consulted on actions that could harm our culture and livelihoods, even if those actions are happening in Canada. This is why we need the State of Alaska and the State department to do all they can to defend our way of life in the face of these threats.”

Sanderson and Hardcastle are optimistic that help will come from Alaska’s newly elected Governor Bill Walker and Lieutenant-Governor Byron Mallott, who spoke out for a stronger Alaskan voice during last year’s election campaign.

But B.C. says it is already working closely with its American neighbours.

“When there are potential transboundary issues with a proposed mine development in B.C., U.S and federal agencies are involved in the Environmental Assessment and permitting processes,” said the ministry spokesman.

That is not sufficient when the health of salmon and rivers are at stake, say Alaskan critics, who emphasize that Alaska is pro-mining, but needs to see it done properly, without environmental risks.

Sitka Mayor Mim McConnell wants a review by the International Joint Commission, established in 1909 as part of the Boundary Waters Treaty. The Commission is charged with resolving transboundary water disputes between the U.S and Canada, but has been in semi-hibernation for about two decades.

The treaty commits the U.S and Canada to not polluting waters on one side of the border causing the injury of health or property on the other side of the border.

“This is part of the treaty and it’s being ignored,” McConnell said.

Companies can make promises, but there is always the possibility of human error and the Mount Polley disaster was a clear sign that B.C. cannot give assurances that transboundary waters and fish won’t be polluted by the province’s aggressive mining agenda, McConnell said.

It is a major mistake to not have all parties at the table when discussing projects of this magnitude, said Clay Bezenek, a Ketchikan-based gillnetter who is frustrated with B.C. fast-tracking projects such as KSM.

“I’m calling on Alaska Governor Bill Walker and on Secretary of State John Kerry to help get us to the table now,” he said.

Image Credit: Red Chris Mine by Mike Fay

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A letter submitted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the State Department gives new weight to concerns the proposed $8 billion Keystone XL pipeline, destined to carry crude from the Alberta oilsands to export facilities along the Gulf of Mexico, will have significant climate impacts.

The EPA letter suggests existing analyses – which downplay the importance of greenhouse gas emissions associated with the project – are out of date and require revision in light of low global oil prices.

Due to the plummeting of oil prices and related market changes “it is important to revisit [the] conclusions” of previous reports, EPA told the State Department.

“Given recent large declines in oil prices and the uncertainty of oil price projections, the additional low prices scenario in the (State report) should be given additional weight during decision making, due to the potential implications of lower oil prices on project impacts, especially greenhouse gas emissions.”

The State Department is due to release a revised analysis of the Keystone XL project and is currently gathering comments from the EPA and other agencies.

A recent report in the journal Nature singled out the oilsands as one of the world’s carbon deposits that must remain in the ground if global temperatures are to remain within the 2 degrees Celsius warming limit recommended by policy makers and scientists.  

Construction of the Keystone XL pipeline is dependent on a steady flow of oil from the estimated 160 billion barrels in the oilsands. Yet the drop in prices has recently led to abandoned projects and major cuts to the workforce. Suncor, the oilsands’ largest operator, recently announced it will eliminate 1,000 jobs, Shell Canada will cuts its workforce by 10 per cent and Cenovus Energy confirmed its investment in the area will drop by 25 per cent.

A Republican-led Congress is attempting to force approval of the Keystone XL pipeline with new legislation, although President Barack Obama has been clear about his plan to veto any bills that would allow construction to begin.

In 2013, Obama indicated his final decision on the pipeline will come down to the project’s climate impact, saying “our national interest will be served only if this project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution.”

In its letter to the State Department this week, the EPA said carbon emissions from the pipeline — which has the capacity to carry 830,000 barrels of oil per day — would add up to the equivalent of 5.7 million new passenger vehicles on the road.

“Over the 50-year lifetime of the pipeline, this could translate into releasing as much as 1.37 billion more tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere,” the letter states.

Alberta premier Jim Prentice travelled to Washington, D.C. this week to lobby Congress and the Obama administration to approve the pipeline.

Prentice recently told NPR that Alberta “has the most exacting standards around in terms of carbon emissions, the regulatory framework that surrounds industrial emissions.”

When it comes to the venting and flaring of gasses with high warming potentials like methane, Prentice said, “in all these areas, I think we’re world class.”

Yet the EPA seems to have come to its own conclusion regarding Alberta’s greenhouse gas regulations, stating, “until ongoing efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with the production of oil sands are more successful and widespread…development of oil sands crude represents a significant increase in greenhouse gas emissions.”

Canada currently has no regulation to limit emissions from the oil and gas industry, and recently Prime Minister Stephen Harper said it would be “crazy” to introduce such rules.

The EPA letter notes “oil sands crude has significantly higher lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions than other crudes” and that the use of oilsands crude creates emissions 17 per cent greater than the use of crude refined in the U.S. on a well-to-wheels basis.

Premier Prentice argued Canada will continue to move crude to the U.S. with or without the Keystone XL pipeline, suggesting rail will pick up the slack. In its letter the EPA appears to agree with this point, suggesting oilsands producers would likely stomach the high cost of rail transport.

But the letter goes on to point to the additional risks associated with transporting large quantities of bitumen, which “can have different impacts than spills of conventional oil.” A recent government-commissioned study in Canada acknowledges there are large gaps in existing knowledge when it comes to the effects of bitumen spills.

Concerns over the pipeline route, especially in Nebraska, requires greater spill preparedness and a clear commitment from TransCanada that the company will assume responsibility for any spills and remediation should a release occur. Spills remain “a concern for citizens and businesses relying on groundwater resources crossed by the route,” the EPA letter notes.

Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, called the letter a “damning report” and said with it, “the president’s got every nail he needs to finally close the coffin on this boondoggle.”

Image Credit: Kris Krug

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David Hone, Shell’s top climate advisor told an audience at the COP20 climate negotiations underway in Lima, Peru today that the company enjoys its relationship with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a contentious corporate ‘bill mill’ known for its climate change denial and aggressive efforts to counteract emissions reductions and regulations.

More than 90 companies have parted ways with ALEC since 2012, according to the Center for Media and Democracy, after ALEC’s contentious position on climate science drew the ire of shareholders, citizen groups and unions.

Perhaps most famously, Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt accused ALEC of “literally lying” about climate science and publicly announced the company’s decision to forego renewing its ALEC membership. The decision prompted a ‘tech exodus’ from ALEC which saw companies like Microsoft, Facebook, Yelp, Yahoo!, and AOL cut ties with the free market group.

Other notable companies that have left ALEC include Amazon, Bank of America, Coca-Cola, General Electric, General Motors, McDonalds, and Walmart among many others.

Even oil and gas companies like Alliant Energy, Occidental Petroleum and ConocoPhillips have severed ties (although ConocoPhillips returned this year as a director-level donor of the ALEC annual conference under the name of Phillips 66).

Speaking on the topic of carbon capture and storage, Hone was asked by Peter Frumhoff, director of science and policy and chief scientist of the Union of Concerned Scientists, when Shell expected to part ways with ALEC.

Hone responded: “we remain a member of ALEC. We remain a member of many organizations that hold many different views on many different issues.”

“We clearly value what our relationship with ALEC offers. We can talk to state legislators, not necessarily about climate, but on a range of issues,” Hone said, adding that Shell enjoys the benefits of being a member of the lobby group even if they diverge on climate science.

Frumhoff said Hone’s answer points to a deep inconsistency with Shell’s position on climate: “Shell has really spoken out forcefully about the risks of climate change, the acceptance of findings of the IPCC, the need for emissions reductions. In some ways Shell is doing some good things on climate.”

On the other hand, Frumhoff continued, “they are a long-standing active funder and participant with the American Legislative Exchange Council which in the United States is a highly influential lobbying organization that is both outspoken on denying climate science and the serious risks as highlighted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and outspoken in its efforts to create model legislation aimed at avoiding regulation of greenhouse gas emissions at a state level and also at a federal level in the U.S.,” he said.

ALEC has 2,000 legislative members and over 300 corporate members that may vote on ‘model’ bills and resolutions that are crafted to advance corporate interests.

ALEC has produced thousands of corporate-friendly bills that state legislators have advanced to argue for cheaper and easier access to tobacco, suppress tort legal action and increase private education profits — not to mention the extremely controversial Stand Your Ground gun laws and voter identification laws that have been compared to poll taxes — yet there is still very little transparency surrounding the bill writing and voting process.

Image Credit: David Hone via IPCC_CH on Twitter

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Few Canadians think about public policy, though it touches our lives in innumerable ways every day. Our collective safety and security, well-being and prosperity do not appear out of thin air. They are, in large measure, the outcomes of a vigorous public policy process.

Charities have a long history of playing important roles in that policy process. Here are just 10 examples of policies that have been shaped by the work of Canadian charities.

1) Laws against drunk driving. Mothers Against Drinking and Driving (MADD) Canada has long played a leading role in advocating for stronger policies against impaired driving. MADD Canada emerged in 1989 from an Ontario-based anti-drinking and driving group that was one of several early pioneer organizations that advocated against drinking and driving.

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2) Regulation of tobacco products. The anti-tobacco lobby in Canada dates back to at least the middle of the twentieth century, when the National Cancer Institute of Canada declared there may be a link between lung cancer and smoking. In the subsequent decades, dozens of charities have contributed to the effort to limit the sale and use of tobacco products.

3) Removal of bisphenol-A from baby bottles. In 2000, the Canadian Environmental Law Association turned its attention to the issue of toxins and human health. In the years following, dozens of charities — many of which joined forces in the Canadian Partnership for Children’s Health and Environment — developed a sound research base and engagement strategy that contributed to a 2008 Health Canada ban on the use of bisphenol-A in baby bottles.

4) The effective provision of mental health services to youth in Ontario.  Starting with careful planning in 2004, Children’s Mental Health Ontario informed the development of a Child and Youth Mental Health and Addictions Strategy for the province. The organization worked for eight years to move the issue of children’s mental health up the provincial health agenda, and in late 2011 was rewarded for its efforts when the provincial government pledged significant funding to help support kids with mental health and addictions issues.

5) The Registered Disability Savings Plan. By the late 1990s, Al Etmanski and his wife Vickie Cammack had concluded that the charity they founded — Planned Lifetime Advocacy Network — needed to focus some of its energy on changing the policy framework to permit families of children with disabilities to better prepare for their children’s financial future. After years of developing credible research and building a constituency, they were rewarded with success. The Registered Disability Savings Plan was announced in the 2007 federal budget.

6) Increases to Alberta's Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped. Each year between 2005 and 2009, the Government of Alberta made increases to the monthly benefit under the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped program. By 2010, charities on the front line serving Alberta’s disabled community believed a further increase was warranted. Dozens of charities — many of which coordinated their efforts through the Alberta Disabilities Forum — continued to make the case until the province announced an additional increase in 2012.

7) The development and delivery of high-quality early childhood care. The charities that have tirelessly devoted their energy to early childhood development and care are too numerous to mention. Canada’s public discourse on this issue is populated by a broad network of universities, service delivery agencies, think tanks and other charities whose most recent success is the emergence of child care as a central issue in the 2015 federal election campaign.

8) The Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement. While our governments at all levels are the central institutions of public governance, decisions made in the public interest don’t necessarily require government involvement. The Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement emerged from a long negotiation between the 19 member companies of the Forestry Products Association of Canada and seven leading Canadian environmental non-government organizations.  It aims to ensure sustainable forestry practice in more than 73 million hectares of public forests.

9) The measures that eliminated acid rain. The Canadian Coalition on Acid Rain was formed as a charity in 1981 by 12 member groups. By 1990, when the coalition achieved success with the passage of amendments to the US Clean Air Act, there were 58 member groups, all of whom had contributed to the research, advocacy and education that contributed to ultimate success.

10) The emergent green economy. Dozens of charities in Canada are contributing research, convening, organizing and education elements to a broad-based movement that aims to shift our economy to a more sustainable footing. With any luck, we’ll be able to look back in ten years time and easily identify some big wins.

The list could go on and on, and it’s as varied as the concerns Canadians have for their society, and the hopes they have for its future.

While the list of successes is long and should be celebrated, there is an even longer list of false starts, blind alleys and clear failures in the space between policy decision makers in government and policy advocates in the charitable sector.

No policy advocate can expect success all the time, but as a sector, and as a society, we can do better. And given the complexity of many of the challenges before us — both at home and in our relations with the globalized world — there is good reason to try.

Three Reasons Canadian Charities Are Vital to Creating Public Policy

There are at least three arguments in favour of Canadian charities engaging with governments in the public policy process.

The first invokes deeply held Canadian democratic values. The quality of a democracy depends on considerably more than citizens turning out to vote in elections. The extent to which elections are informed and motivated by citizens engaging with each other on issues they care about is an indicator of the overall health of our political system.

Many Canadian charities are elemental expressions of citizen aspirations to participate in caring for each other and governing ourselves. As such, these groups are an important platform for engagement between citizens and the elected officials and public servants who act on their behalf.

The second argument is that charities often have good policy advice to give. It is expressed very well in Canada Revenue Agency’s Policy Statement on Political Activities (CPS-022):

Through their dedicated delivery of essential programs, many charities have acquired a wealth of knowledge about how government policies affect people's lives. Charities are well placed to study, assess, and comment on those government policies. Canadians benefit from the efforts of charities and the practical, innovative ways they use to resolve complex issues related to delivering social services. Beyond service delivery, their expertise is also a vital source of information for governments to help guide policy decisions. It is therefore essential that charities continue to offer their direct knowledge of social issues to public policy debates.

The third argument is that governments need good advice. Much has been written about the diminishing capacity of governments in Canada, whether municipal, provincial or federal, to do the kind of policy development necessary to respond to the challenges they face.

At the same time as their resources are shrinking, governments are facing heightened scrutiny and expectations from an electorate that is increasingly diverse. Canadian charities can help in a range of ways, including bringing front line knowledge to bear, convening stakeholders, facilitating and informing dialogue, delivering and assessing demonstrations and pilots, and providing neutral spaces for engagement.

But most of all, charities serve a vital purpose in bringing the public interest to the forefront of public conversations. Without years of lobbying by Canadian charities, we may well lack many societal features Canadians now cherish.

While charities’ work can have enormous payoffs in the public policy sphere, it’s seldom an easy path, and an arcane regulatory environment leaves many would-be advocates unclear how aggressively charities can lobby for policy change.

This article originally appeared in The Philanthropist.

Image Credit: David Precious via Flickr

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The European Union has reached a new legally-binding climate change agreement that would see greenhouse gas emissions drop by at least 40 per cent of 1990 levels by 2030.

The agreement, signed off in Brussels two weeks ago by the EU’s 28 member nations, is designed to ensure Europe meets its objective of cutting emissions by at least 80 per cent by mid-century.

It also puts Europe in the lead position to help persuade other nations trailing far behind the EU’s emissions-reduction goals to reach a long-sought global climate change accord next year in Paris.

The 2030 climate and energy plan also calls for the share of renewable energy to increase to 27 per cent of 1990 levels while seeing a 27 per cent increase in energy efficiency.

In an official statement, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso said the 2030 package is very good news for the fight against climate change.

“No player in the world is as ambitious as the European Union when it comes to cutting greenhouse gas emissions,” Barroso said.

“Indeed, the proof that it is ambitious is that we are now going from a goal of 20 per cent cut by 2020 compared to 1990 to 40 per cent by 2030, so, doubling the effort.”

Connie Hedegaard, Commissioner for Climate Action, said she was pleased the 28 EU leaders, despite economic uncertainty and other severe international crises, agreed to the package.

“The EU leaders’ decision . . . is an ambitious and important step forward,” Hedegaard said.

“Important not only to Europe and the Europeans, but also to the rest of the world. We have sent a strong signal to other big economies and all other countries: we have done our homework, now we urge you to follow Europe’s example.”

Bold climate leadership

A DeSmogBlog posting recently noted that Europe is already a world leader in emissions reductions. By way of comparison, under the Copenhagen Accord, Canada, the U.S. and other nations only committed to reducing domestic greenhouse gas emissions by 17 per cent from 2005 levels by 2020.

Global greenhouse gas emissions grew astronomically between 1990, the year Europe’s climate targets are based on, and 2005, the year the Copenhagen’s Accord’s targets are based on — making the European targets far more meaningful than those of Canada and the U.S.

The new agreement will drive continued progress towards a low-carbon economy, according to the official statement.

“It aims to build a competitive and secure energy system that ensures affordable energy for all consumers, increases the security of the EU’s energy supplies, reduces our dependence on energy imports and creates new opportunities for growth and jobs,” a statement accompanying the report said.

The New York Times noted the new accord makes the European Union the first major global emitter to put its position on the table ahead of the important United Nations climate meeting in Paris at the end of 2015.

The NYT story added that German Chancellor Angela Merkel said the new target “will ensure that Europe will be an important player, will be an important party, in future binding commitments of an international climate agreement.”

The Guardian newspaper noted that a clause was inserted into the agreement text that could trigger a review of the EU’s new targets if other countries do not come forward with comparable commitments in Paris.

Still not enough clean energy emphasis

Despite praise, some point out the agreement not only provides a back-out clause but remains non-binding while failing to provide concrete steps for moving to clean and renewable sources of energy.

The new 40 per cent emissions-reduction target falls far too short of what the EU needs to do to pull its weight in the fight against climate change, Natalia Alonso, Oxfam International’s deputy director of advocacy and campaigns, said.

“Insufficient action like this from the world’s richest countries places yet more burden on the poorest people most affected by climate change, but least responsible for causing this crisis,” Alonso said.

EU leaders had an opportunity to shape a smarter, fairer, more sustainable future through a clear shift towards renewable energy and energy efficiency, she said.

“Instead, they have been held back by the fossil fuel industry and their friends, settling for an underwhelming response that keeps the EU stuck in the energy and climate crisis.”

Brook Riley, climate justice and energy campaigner for Friends of the Earth Europe, described the agreement as dangerously irresponsible.

“This deal does nothing to end Europe’s dependency on fossil fuels or to speed up our transition to a clean energy future,” Riley said. “It’s a deal that puts dirty industry interests ahead of citizens and the planet.”

Samantha Smith, leader of WWF’s Global Climate and Energy Initiative, said the new targets are thoroughly inadequate.

“We are facing what is likely to be the warmest year ever, heat waves and flooding are already hitting Europe, and the developing world is experiencing even more dire impacts,” Smith said.

“European countries need to deliver targets that will drive a rapid and just transition out of fossil fuels and into renewables and energy efficiency. Until they have done so, they cannot continue to claim to be climate leaders.”

Right direction for reduced emissions

On Tuesday, the European Environment Agency (EEA) said greenhouse gas emissions in the EU fell almost two per cent between 2012 and 2013. According to an EEA analysis, the EU is likely to cut emissions by at least 21 per cent of 1990 levels by 2020, surpassing its 20 per cent target.

The analysis shows the EU is also ahead of the planned trajectory to hit 20 per cent renewable energy by 2020. Likewise, the EU’s energy consumption is also falling faster than would be necessary to meet the 2020 energy efficiency target.

“Our analysis shows that Europe is on track towards its 2020 targets,” Hans Bruyninckx, EEA Executive Director, pointed out.

“Even against the backdrop of economic recession in recent years, we can see that policies and measures are working and have played a key role in reaching this interim result. But there is no room for complacency. The analyses we are publishing today also highlight countries and sectors where progress has been slower than planned.”

Image Credit: Connie Hedegaard, Commissioner Climate Action via Flickr.

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The European Union will not label fuel from Alberta’s oilsands as highly polluting despite years of efforts to distinguish the crude and other unconventional fuels for their high environmental impacts.

A proposal released Tuesday by the European Commission lifts a requirement forcing refiners to identify when supplying fuel from unconventional sources such as oilsands or oil shale. The commission will lift the requirement even though internal estimates show these fuel sources contain higher carbon emissions than conventional sources.

The dropped requirement within the European Fuel Quality Directive (FQD) comes after years of intense lobbying on behalf of the Canadian and Albertan government.

"The Harper government, in collaboration with the major oil companies, unleashed an unprecedented assault on clean fuels legislation in Europe even as they gutted environmental laws at home,” Keith Stewart, energy and climate campaigner with Greenpeace Canada, told DeSmog Canada. 

“I think the question Canadians should ask themselves is: Do we want our diplomats to operate as a lobbying arm of Big Oil?" he said.

Stewart also noted the federal government's Pan-European Oil Sands Advocacy Strategy labelled oil companies as "allies" while environmental and Aboriginal groups were listed as "adversaries."

According to EU Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard, pressure also came from member states siding with Canada on the issue.

“It is no secret that our initial proposal could not go through due to resistance faced in some member states," she said in a statement.

"The Commission is today giving this another push, to try and ensure that in the future, there will be a methodology and thus an incentive to choose less-polluting fuels over more polluting ones like, for example, oil sands," she said.

Greenpeace EU energy and transport policy director Franziska Achterberg said without strong measures limit heavily-polluting fuels from entering the EU market the measure “will fail to meet the law’s objective of cleaning up Europe’s transport fuels.”

Achterberg added that international trade deals like the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TIPP) are being used to “undermine the EU’s environmental legislation.”

The commission’s report came the same day as a federal audit from Canada’s Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development which confirmed Canada has failed to implement any policies to limit greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas sector.

The report from commissioner Julie Gelfand found it is unclear what role Environment Canada will play in reducing oilsands emissions after 2015 because no long-term plans are currently in place.

Amin Asadollahi, oilsands director at the Pembina Institute, said the EU’s weakened proposal undermines the Fuel Quality Directive. Without measures to list the emissions values of different fuels, the directive will have “lost its original purpose.”

“It will have little influence on the actions of other countries and corporations that seek to supply fuels to the European Union,” Asadollahi said in a statement.

“Regardless of whether or not the latest proposal is adopted, the fact remains that crude from the oilsands is a high-carbon-intensity fuel source. Moreover, the sector’s emissions intensity has not improved significantly over the past decade, even as overall production and emissions continue to grow.”

The Alberta oilsands are Canada’s fastest-growing source of emissions and the sole reason Canada will not meet its emissions-reduction targets under the Copenhagen Accord.

“Canada’s oilsands sector remains exposed to actions by other countries seeking to limit the use of high-carbon-intensity fuels,” Asadollahi said.

“That will be the case until we implement credible policies that directly address emissions from the oilsands.”

Image Credit: Alex MacLean for the Pulitzer Center for Journalism.

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