Energy East cancellation prompts jubilation and dismay

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This article was published 05/10/2017 (2981 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — TransCanada’s Thursday announcement to cancel its Energy East pipeline project left Manitoba environmentalists declaring victory, business groups mourning local construction contracts and a Winnipeg politician handling Ottawa’s trickiest political issue.

Energy Minister Jim Carr, who represents Winnipeg South Centre, insisted Thursday that his government can balance Indigenous rights, environmental concerns and the economy.

“Canada is open for business” Carr told reporters in Ottawa. “We offer a stable and predictable investment climate, world-class energy reserves, proximity to global markets, a skilled workforce and enabling services and technology.”

He chalked up TransCanada’s pullout as a response to low commodity prices.

But last month, the National Energy Board said Energy East’s environmental assessment would look at greenhouse-gas emissions spanning all stages, from extracting oil to its end use. That’s when TransCanada put its application on hold, before withdrawing it entirely Thursday.

“Nothing has changed in the government’s decision-making process,” Carr stressed. “Ultimately it’s not up to me to explain why TransCanada made this decision.”

The news came just a week before a massive, two-day summit Carr is hosting in Winnipeg on the future of Canada’s energy sector.

Spanning Wednesday, Oct. 11, and Thursday, Oct. 12, the Generation Energy Forum will bring an expected 500 people to the RBC Convention Centre, from international experts to Indigenous leaders and youth groups. The conference aims to chart a course in addressing affordable energy and climate change.

But activists say those conversations are moving too slowly.

Nathan Laser, a campaigner with the Manitoba Energy Justice Coalition, said he awoke Thursday to a news alert about Energy East’s cancellation on his phone, “I promptly jumped out of bed and started texting” fellow activists, he said.

“It’s incredibly exciting,” he said. “We shouldn’t be investing crazy amounts of money in these unviable energy projects.”

Chuck Davidson, president of the Manitoba Chambers of Commerce, said industry groups had the opposite reaction to the “extremely disappointing” news. He said projections suggested Energy East would produce as many as 500 construction and maintenance jobs for the province.

“This is another step backwards,” said Davidson, who recounted Canada’s years-long efforts to boost access to tidewater for resources like oil, bitumen and natural gas.

“There was strong support in Manitoba for this going forward,” Davidson said, though limited polling exists. An Angus-Reid survey in March 2016 found 69 per cent among Manitobans for the project, compared with 64 per cent nationwide and 48 in Quebec.

“It’s tough to have a discussion on pipelines,” said Davidson. “What’s going to continue is we’re going to see trains of oil coming through major cities in Canada on a daily basis.”

Laser dismissed the argument, acknowledging that rail is generally seen as a riskier way to transport oil. “It shouldn’t be an either-or; it should be a neither,” he said.

Last September, the City of Winnipeg raised concerns about how closely the pipeline would run parallel to the Shoal Lake aqueduct, saying a pipeline failure could “pose a significant risk to public health and safety” by contaminating drinking water for 700,000 citizens.

The Water and Waste Department later noted online that the pipeline would cross two metres below the aqueduct and follow it “in close proximity … for several kilometres along its length.”

It also said a spill could disrupt the Brady Road landfill, which handles methane gas and sewage biosolids. The department applied to be an intervenor in the NEB hearings, and hired a consultant to track potential impacts and plot safer alternatives.

The city did not respond by deadline to questions about how much it spent on the consultant, how far the intervenor application got and whether these concerns are now solved.

Laser said the Shoal Lake issue concerned environmentalists, as did the pipeline’s proximity to the Assiniboine and Red Rivers.

Activists have now turned their eye to the Enbridge Line 3 upgrade of a pipeline that crosses southwestern Manitoba, from Cromer to Gretna. The line is under construction in Alberta and Saskatchewan, and Laser said locals are seeing pieces of pipe arriving along the Manitoba route, ahead of spring construction.

Premier Brian Pallister wouldn’t say Thursday how much Ottawa was responsible for Energy East’s pullout.

“I have some very real sympathies for my friend Jim Carr, in respect of some of the challenges that he has to face, striking the right kind of process balance,” he told reporters, saying it’s hard to merge thorough processes with reasonable timelines.

Pallister lamented the loss of “massive investments” for Canada, saying it’s “always disappointing when you see that potential opportunity set on the backburner”.

TransCanada declined an interview Thursday.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca