 Environment - February 27, 2008 |
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| Province ignores lobby |
By Kevin Ma
Staff Writer
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Ten major forestry and oil companies want the province to temporarily stop oilsands development around Fort McMurray, but the provincial government has refused.
Last month, the Cumulative Environmental Management Association, or CEMA, sent a letter to the province asking for an immediate halt to the sale of new leases in three zones near Fort McMurray. CEMA, a non-profit group of 48 industry, government, environmental and aboriginal organizations, had identified those zones as candidates for conservation and wanted them protected until it finished studying them this summer.
Alberta Energy spokesman Jason Chance said the province would not make a decision on the group’s request until it received its full report this summer. It has already sold some leases in the areas concerned, he said, and had not received any more requests for leases.
This means the province has effectively said no, argued Simon Dyer of the Pembina Institute, a member of CEMA. "They can argue they haven’t made a decision, but clearly they have made a decision in favour of development."
Protection request
The letter, sent Jan. 16, is a non-consensus motion from CEMA supported by 22 of its members that asks the province to stop granting resource leases in three zones around Fort McMurray until Jan. 1, 2011.
Combined, the three zones total some 10,560 square kilometres, said spokesperson Corey Hobbes, or about 15 times the size of Edmonton. "We’re talking about a massive chunk of land here." The letter warned that granting more leases in this area would further erode the province’s conservation options.
CEMA had been asked by the province to identify regions around Fort McMurray it should protect from development. The group had picked these three zones because they had little potential for oil and gas development and were some of the last patches of undisturbed forest in the region. The province had already leased some 2.8 million hectares of land in the area and was leasing more every two weeks, so the group wanted to protect these zones just in case they were leased before it made recommendations this summer.
This was probably the first time the group had ever made a non-consensus motion, says spokesman Corey Hobbes. "We wanted to give the government the heads-up."
Industry split
This could be the first time a group of oilsands companies has ever asked the province to rein in oilsands development, Dyer said. "It’s quite unique to see industry being this forceful."
Most of the group’s voting members, including Environment Canada, Petro-Canada, Suncor Energy and eight other oil or forestry companies supported the motion. Imperial Oil suggested the province protect an even larger area so as to link up with Wood Buffalo National Park, according to its letter to the province on the subject. Shell and Total E&P (which plan to build oilsands upgraders near Fort Saskatchewan) conditionally supported the motion, but suggested tweaks to the precise area protected.
Four companies opposed the motion. UTS Energy, a partner in Petro-Canada’s Sturgeon County upgrader, wrote in its letter on the motion that there was already plenty of protected land in the region and that this moratorium would restrict oil and gas development. Canadian Natural Resources said the proposal was made in haste and needed more discussion. EnCana and OPTI/Nexen also opposed the motion.
CEMA’s studies suggested that about a quarter of the Wood Buffalo region needed to be set aside for conservation purposes, Dyer said. Now, 8.2 per cent is protected. "That’s completely inadequate," he said. "We’re on a very dangerous path in terms of impacts unless we set something aside."
The province would wait until CEMA submitted its full report on the region this summer before making any conservation decisions, Chance said. |
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