Read this eye-opening column by Pete McMartin in The Vancouver Sun on the real world climate impacts of plans to turn BC into a major new carbon corridor to Asia, including up to eleven new ports designed to export coal, oil and gas. (May 18, 2013)

This week — and you may have missed it due to Christy Clark’s coming-out party — something called the Sightline Institute released a study about fossil fuels.

Sightline is a regional sustainability think-tank based in Seattle, and it focuses on regional environmental concerns for what we refer to as Cascadia.

The study was entitled Northwest Fossil Fuel Exports and its author was Eric de Place, Sightline’s policy director.

What de Place tried to do was give a numeric value to the amount of global-warming carbon dioxide that would be emitted by all the energy-exporting projects now in the planning stages in B.C., Washington and Oregon.

They include:

• Five new coal terminals.

• Two expansions of existing coal terminals.

• Three new oil pipelines.

• Six new natural gas pipelines.

Eleven of those 16 proposals are in B.C.

It’s breathtaking, that kind of industrial concentration: Cascadia has suddenly become the nexus of mining and energy companies anxious to get their products off to power-hungry Asian markets. It’s this century’s gold rush. The troubled American coal industry wants a West Coast outlet. Alberta wants pipelines to the Pacific. Our premier sees our future in liquefied natural gas.

De Place sees a different future.

“British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington each enjoy a reputation for leadership in clean energy and environmental policy,” he wrote.

“Yet the new fossil fuel infrastructure planned for the region would eclipse the region’s green reputation, transforming the Northwest from an aspiring climate leader into a carbon export hub of global consequence.”

The final figure that de Place came up with?

Collectively, these new projects, he estimated, would produce a total of 761 million tonnes of CO2.

Annually.

That, de Place noted, is 12 times the total amount now emitted by B.C.

De Place recognized that all these projects might not be built. Some are in direct competition with each other. There was the danger, he admitted, of overstating his case.

But he also said, to give the study balance, he purposely understated many factors that contribute to CO2 production — factors like the mining, processing and transportation of those carbon products. He also left out the vast amounts of energy that would be needed to power projects like B.C.’s proposed LNG plants. He counted only the CO2 emitted by the final user of the fuel.

“There were folks who reviewed this who felt I was being far too conservative with the numbers because I only included the carbon inside the fuel and none of the energy used to extract it or process it. But I wanted something clear and defensible, so I went with the more modest number.”

Of special note, de Place cited research from the B.C. environment ministry showing present provincial greenhouse gas production — at least, our domestic production of GHGs, as opposed to that which we export. Many would be surprised to learn that, according to the government, GHG production fell by almost six per cent between 2000 and 2010, the latest year figures were available.

“I think there’s a lot of evidence,” de Place said, “that we can divorce GHG emissions from economic growth. It doesn’t necessarily have to be one or the other.”

Having gone through the early stages of environmental assessment, the Raven Coal Mine - proposed amid a thriving shellfish industry in Vancouver Island's Fanny Bay - was stopped in its tracks last week by the provincial Environmental Assessment Office. A jubilant John Snyder of CoalWatch Comox Valley - a group formed to deal with the threat of the mine - remarked on the verdict, "A review of the screening comments seems to indicate significant gaps in the Application, some of it having to do with public, First Nations, and stakeholder consultation; hydrology issues; and marine baseline studies." The rejection comes on the heels of a strong opposition campaign, which drew a near-record 5,000 public submissions raising concerns with the company's draft summary document.

Read this op-ed in the Georgia Straight by Eoin Madden and Torrance Coste of the Wilderness Committee on the real and proposed transformation of Vancouver and the Salish Sea into a "carbon corridor" for coal and oil to new Asian markets. (May 8, 2013)

The Salish Sea, stretching from Metro Vancouver to the southern tip of Vancouver Island, is one of the world’s most hospitable and bountiful bodies of water. The region’s mild climate and abundant resources make it an ideal place to live, and it has been home to thriving Indigenous nations since time immemorial. For the same reasons, Europeans and others settled here in great numbers, and the Salish Sea is now one of the most densely populated areas in western Canada.

A key strength of the region is the inherent ease of transportation that’s possible given its geographic and maritime position. But as we see unprecedented industrial and political prioritization of fossil fuels above all else here in British Columbia, this status as an ideal transport corridor poses a problem for the Salish Sea.

Vancouver, the region’s largest municipality, has taken effort to brand itself as the world’s “greenest city,” and civic leaders here seem to understand that we can no longer afford to be so reckless when it comes to industrial development and its impacts on the environment. At the same time, there are proposals on the table from industry to dramatically increase exports of both coal and diluted bitumen—two of the most carbon-intensive fossil fuels—from the Lower Mainland.

These two objectives are in direct contrast. Vancouver cannot be both a green city and one of the world’s biggest fossil fuel exporters; it just doesn’t work. If efforts to become sustainable don’t apply to exports, we are simply shipping away our impact on the climate, which isn’t a solution at all.

With regard to coal shipments, proposed port expansions at Fraser Surrey Docks—combined with an approved expansion at the Neptune facilities in North Vancouver and recent upgrades at Delta’s Westshore Terminal—would increase the Salish Sea’s export capacity to the equivalent of around 90 million tonnes of carbon emissions per year. That amount of climate-changing pollution is equal to almost six years’ worth of emissions from every vehicle on the road in B.C.

The Salish Sea is also facing a massive increase in tar sands exports. Texas-based corporation Kinder Morgan plans to build a new pipeline alongside its existing Trans Mountain pipeline, which terminates in Burnaby. The proposed increase from 300,000 to 890,000 barrels per day means a jump from around 80 to over 400 tankers full of dangerous tar sands bitumen per year in the Salish Sea—a further 100 million tonnes of carbon exports.

So what does this mean?

Well, if all current proposals go ahead (coal port expansions and the Kinder Morgan pipeline), the Salish Sea will be transformed into a global carbon corridor. Green initiatives undertaken at the municipal or regional level will essentially be nullified by the fact that they all exist within a climate change superhighway.

We believe many people who live here want to find innovative solutions and more sustainable ways to operate our economies. If we become a carbon corridor, we’ll be clinging to an archaic and destructive system, and contributing to the climate crisis like never before.

Fossil fuel apologists tirelessly push the “if they don’t get oil/coal from us, they’ll get it somewhere else” argument. This thinking is worn out, uncreative, and cowardly. North America holds major fossil fuel reserves—leaving them in the ground is simply better for our future.

Increasing carbon export capacity is about more than just expanding trade opportunities, it’s a major long-term investment in an unsustainable and harmful system, one that will compromise the health of our communities and our global climate.

Instead of subsidizing the fossil fuel sector (currently $1.4 billion per year in federal subsidies), we should be supporting jobs in sustainable sectors, including increased processing in our timber, agriculture, and fishing industries.

Additionally, directing revenue from a smarter, more efficient carbon tax towards green initiatives like the expansion of electrified public transit and freight transport, as well as the construction of energy efficient buildings, will help speed up the transition to a green economy.

Read more: http://www.straight.com/news/379386/eoin-madden-and-torrance-coste-salish-sea-risk-becoming-global-carbon-corridor

Read this opinion piece by blogger Laila Yuile, arguing against increased US coal exports through terminals on BC's coast. (April 7, 2013)

Occasionally, I can’t help but wonder how much the global economy takes advantage of British Columbia’s reputation for being easygoing and complacent.

Case in point is the recent application for Fraser Surrey Docks to develop a direct coal transfer facility. The idea of coal expansion has people up in arms — rightfully so — particularly south of the Fraser River and along the Sunshine Coast.

The heart of the controversy is centered on taking so-called “dirty” coal mined in Wyoming and exporting it from Canadian ports, specifically from ports here in B.C. This new proposal involves shipping thermal coal, which is the kind of coal burned only for energy, to Fraser Surrey Docks, where it would be loaded onto barges and taken to Texada Island to a storage facility. From there, it would be loaded onto freighters to be shipped overseas. It’s a controversial move that some in B.C., and elsewhere, say we should halt immediately.

I agree. There should be no expansion to ship coal to Texada, and for good reason. We already ship far too much of it without regard for the environment or the people who live along the rail routes that take the coal to our ports. The coal dust coming off open rail cars coats furniture, homes and our lungs. It impacts air quality, in particular with the increase in diesel exhaust resulting from increased train traffic.

Local ports are already the starting point for a large portion of the coal shipped overseas and the new application from will increase the amount of coal travelling through our communities substantially, bringing a stark question forth to the public.

Why is B.C. exporting U.S. coal? Why isn’t this coal simply being shipped out of U.S. ports instead of being transported to Canada for shipping overseas? The simple answer is U.S. ports don’t want it. Many American authorities up and down the U.S. coast have decided the risk and opposition of communities is too great to allow any further coal export expansions. In the face of strong opposition, they are saying “no” time and time again.

Read more: http://vancouver.24hrs.ca/2013/04/07/us-coal-export-a-dirty-job-so-let-the-us-do-it-themselves

Read this story from The Vancouver Sun on the call from Voters Taking Action on Climate Change for Port Metro to reverse its recent decision to allow a doubling of coal traffic through the Neptune Bulk Terminal in Vancouver. (Feb. 14, 2013)

Port Metro Vancouver should rescind its decision to allow North Vancouver-based Neptune Bulk Terminals to double its coal capacity because it misrepresented both the public support for the expansion and the opposition to it, an environmental group says.

Voters Taking Action on Climate Change, described as a group of apolitical volunteers opposed to coal expansion, noted the port said it had received 640 emails and letters from people concerned about possible environmental and health impacts of coal, but that the vast majority of those were sent in “form letters.”

In fact, VTACC said, 378 of the 640 submissions were sent in form letters, and there were five separate letters.

At the same time, VTACC said, the port failed to note that all but 15 of the 375 comments in favour of the project were on identical form letters, and were sent on a single day, Jan. 16 — a week before the port made its decision on Neptune’s $200-million expansion.

As a result, the volunteer organization, which obtained copies of the public comments submitted to Port Metro Vancouver before it made the Neptune decision, claims the port authority “misrepresented the nature of comments both for and against” the proposal.

“There’s a fundamental issue of fairness,” said VTACC director Kevin Washbrook. “The port didn’t make any effort to inform the public. We have this huge unaccountable organization in our midst.”

The group has also asked West Coast Environmental Law to conduct a review of the port’s decision-making process and the Neptune Bulk Terminal’s coal export approval to determine if there is any basis for a legal challenge of the decision.

Washbrook said if the port authority wants to be a good neighbour to Metro Vancouver communities, it should “hit rewind” on the coal export proposal and do a full and transparent public review.

Read this column by Rafe Mair in TheTyee.ca, offering the mainstream media the questions they should be posing relating to the environment to candidates in the lead-up to BC's provincial election this May. (Jan 7, 2013)

This will be, at long last, the year of the environment in B.C. For the first time in my memory, leaders debating in the upcoming election will have to answer questions about the environment.

It will be a strange feeling for those who have slugged it out in the trenches since the 1960s only to be ignored by the media who think that the only issues are those they have acknowledged to be so, and no others.

For decades the media's agenda has refused to reflect the demonstrable public concern that spawned Greenpeace, the Sea Shepherd Society and may others including the Wilderness Committee, the Living Oceans Society, the Georgia Strait Alliance... I'm already getting into trouble because I can't possibly name them all. I especially must mention the great work at sea by Paul Watson, on whose board of advisors I have sat on for some 20 years, and Joe Foy and his colleagues at the Wilderness Committee with whom I have shared many a podium.

For decades the media has had the benefit of the hard information and well-grounded alarms provided by such organizations, and have regularly treated them as "special interests" rather than guardians of all our interests.

Now, however, the environment is so obviously a pressing issue at the heart of nearly all key election issues in British Columbia that any news person worth their salt must take notice. Let me be of help, then. I will make the media's job easier by providing a handy reference of questions that should be posed to every candidate who comes near a reporter's pad or microphone.

Read more: http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2013/01/07/BC-Candidate-Questions/

Watch this presentation by Damien Gillis, co-director of Fractured Land - a documentary in production which examines the industrialization of northern Canada through the eyes of a young indigenous man named Caleb Behn - at the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival.

Check out this story from the Sightline Institute's blog, on a cargo vessel that smashed through the coal terminal at Deltaport recently. (December 7, 2012)

That’s a photo taken this morning of British Columbia’s Westshore Coal Terminal. A cargo vessel smashed through the center of the loading trestle—thus the big gap in the middle—putting it out of commission and dumping coal directly into the Strait of Georgia. The coal contamination is clearly visible as the dark streaks in the water.

CKNW News has the story. Here’s video footage of the scene.

It’s hardly encouraging that Port Metro Vancouver, the same agency that operates this facility, is trying to build new coal shipping capacity on the Fraser River.

Today was a rough day for coal shipments in the Northwest. Also this morning, a coal train broke down on the tracks in the middle of Mount Vernon shutting down local streets for nearly an hour.

See original post: http://daily.sightline.org/2012/12/07/nothing-can-go-wrong-at-coal-terminals/

Roads, dams, logging, mines, fracking, seismic lines, pipelines, transmission lines. The Peace Valley region in northeast BC has seen its share of industrial development over the past half century. Now, a new report from the David Suzuki Foundation vividly illustrates the toll these cumulative impacts have taken on the land. The foundation commissioned scientists from Global Forest Watch Canada to survey 40 years worth of satellite images in order track the increasing industrialization of the land. They found that over that span, more than 65% of the region has been impacted by industry.

Dr. Mark Jaccard, professor of economics at Simon Fraser University and a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his contributions to the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, was arrested on railway tracks near Vancouver for blocking the arrival of a Burlington Northern train loaded with Wyoming coal bound for nearby Deltaport and then Asia. "Putting myself in a situation where I may be accused of civil disobedience is not something I have ever done before," said Dr. Jaccard. He now joins at least another of his august colleagues, Dr. James Hansen, in this distinction.