Read this story from the Georgia Straight on First Nations' growing opposition to the proposed Pacific Trails gas pipeline to Kitimat - connected to fracking in northeast BC - and the Enbridge and Kinder Morgan bitumen pipelines. At a recent forum in Vancouver, several First Nations leaders warned of looming conflict over these projects as their concerns are ignored by governments and industry. (Sept. 30, 2012)

During a recent conference against the expansion of oil and shale-gas operations in B.C., an elderly Native woman issued a bold call.

“It’s time to warrior up,” declared Ta’ah George of the Tsliel-Waututh Nation, drawing cheers from an overflow crowd at the Aboriginal Friendship Centre gym in East Vancouver on September 21.

One speaker on the indigenous-women panel left no doubt that her people are up to the challenge. Her name is Freda Huson, a spokesperson for the Unis’tot’en clan of the Wet’suwet’en First Nation in Northern B.C. Huson explained why their struggle against a gas pipeline is connected to the more high-profile battle against the proposed Enbridge tarsands pipeline.

She was referring to the Pacific Trail Pipelines that will transport one billion cubic feet of gas per day from the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, sites at Summit Lake, B.C., to Kitimat. According to her, this pipeline will clear the route for Enbridge and other pipelines headed to the northwestern coast.

“It will make it easier for Enbridge and other companies to come through the route that they decided to go through,” Huson said.

She also related that in 2010, with the guide of a global positioning system, her people built a cabin on the direct path of the gas pipeline. This cabin remains in place. Pipeline construction is expected to begin in 2013, through 2014.

Outsiders, she said, will also need to receive “free, prior, and informed consent” before they can cross a bridge over the Morice River to enter Wet’suwet’en territory.

After the event, the Georgia Straight asked Huson how far she and her people will go. “We built the cabin right smack in the way, so that tells you that there will be no pipeline crossing our territory,” Huson answered firmly. “They did not get our consent.”

Asked if she sees the situation leading to something like the well-known standoffs involving First Nations people in Oka, Quebec, in 1990 and in Gustafsen Lake in the B.C. Interior in 1995, Huson replied: “Well, I’m moving into that cabin to make sure no pipeline will go through.” She added that she will be joined by others.

She said she isn’t fazed by the possibility that a court may issue an injunction order against them. “It’s Wet’suwet’en land, and we said we don’t believe in their law,” she said. “We have our own laws, and if they don’t listen to our laws, why should we listen to theirs?”

When asked how they would deal with the prospect of a violent confrontation, Huson replied: “We’ll do what we need to do.”

Clearing along the Pacific Trail Pipelines route was scheduled to begin this past summer. The 463-kilometre pipeline is expected to be operational by the winter of 2015. As far as the 1,170-kilometre Enbridge oil pipeline is concerned, final arguments for and against the project before a federal review panel will start in April 2013.

The Council of Canadians is organizing a B.C.-wide speaking tour in late October this year in connection with the Pacific Trail Pipelines, the Enbridge project, and the planned expansion by Texas-based Kinder Morgan of its Trans Mountain pipeline from Edmonton to Burnaby.

Read more: http://www.straight.com/article-788661/vancouver/first-nations-stand-firm-against-pipelines

The joke used to be, “How can you tell when a lawyer isn't t telling the truth? The answer is when you see his lips move". Now substitute politician and you've got it right. Premier Clark will just happen to be in Edmonton next week and hopes that the Alberta Premier would like to have a bit of a chat with her about pipelines. At the same time Terry Lake, Minister of Environment, tells us that the only consideration he has re: the Enbridge project will be the environment from which one must infer he means the idiotic standards laid down some months ago by his boss. The question is, Madam Premier, what more do you need to know?

I recently returned from a whirlwind tour across northern BC, one of many legs of filming for a documentary and multi-media project I'm co-directing called "Fractured Land". The people we spoke to along the way, the sights we witnessed and documented finally brought into focus the real story about energy development in BC. It is clear to me that the proposed Enbridge Pipeline, which has been the target of so much activism and media attention of late, is merely one piece of a much bigger puzzle that promises to transform this province like nothing we've seen since the days of colonial, railroad-driven "nation building." The first in a multi-part series connecting the dots between natural gas fracking, the Alberta Tar Sands, oil and gas pipelines, LNG, Site C Dam and myriad mines for coal and metals.

Read this story from the Globe and Mail on the rush by Asian and European state and publicly owned energy players to scoop up Canadian oil and gas assets in advance of anticipated tightening of regulations on foreign direct investment. (Sept. 21, 2012)

A number of foreign companies are flocking to Canada’s oil patch in search of acquisitions and investments as Ottawa weighs the $15.1-billion takeover of energy company Nexen Inc. by China’s CNOOC Ltd.

While it is not unusual for companies to circle the oil patch, interviews with a dozen industry sources and deal makers over a month have revealed a picture of an industry set for a massive influx of foreign capital while the window to foreign investment remains open.

Industry executives and advisers say offshore buyers are currently in discussions or touring the operations of a wide variety of Canadian oil sands, conventional petroleum, natural gas, oil service and refining operations.

Some of these potential acquirers include state-owned entities such as Korea National Oil Corp. (KNOC) and others from China, Malaysia and Kuwait, sources said. A handful of private-sector oil and gas giants are also on the hunt, including France-based Total SA. Joining these suitors is a new class of Asian buyers believed to include privately held Chinese companies and one of China’s largest cities, Tsingtao.

The takeover interest has been sparked by a combination of recent declines in oil and gas prices and a perception in some international circles that Canada favours foreign investment to help finance production, particularly in the oil sands, where the cost of development is expected to crest $100-billion over the next decade.

“If you think Nexen is something of a big deal, you ain’t seen anything yet,” said Wenran Jiang, a special adviser to Alberta’s Department of Energy on Asian energy markets. “The new trend is large-scale Chinese private capital that will come into the Canadian market.”

A wide variety of international acquirers are looking for investments in the oil patch. France’s Total has been searching for – and making – oil sands deals for a few years. According to people close to the Nexen negotiations, Total was a bidder for the Calgary company, but stepped out of the race after CNOOC tabled an offer with a rich premium of more than 60 per cent above the Calgary company’s stock price. Sources said Total is still seeking a Canadian acquisition. A spokesperson for the company did not return calls.

State-owned KNOC is also on the hunt for a multibillion-dollar acquisition to expand its holdings in the oil sands, according to sources. Its search comes three years after it acquired Harvest Energy Trust in 2009 for $4.1-billion. A Calgary-based official with KNOC said he was unaware of any acquisition plans.

Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/foreign-suitors-circle-oil-patch-as-ottawa-weighs-nexen-deal/article4558270/

Read this story from The Prince George Citizen on a new survey that suggests younger generations are significantly more likely to oppose the proposed Enbridge pipeline than other British Columbians. (Sept. 10, 2012)

Young British Columbians are significantly more likely to oppose the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline than the rest of the population, according to a survey by Abacus Data.

According to data from a survey conducted last month, just one per cent of millennials -- which Abacus defines as people born between 1980 and 2000 -- strongly support the plan by Calgary-based Enbridge to build a heavy oil pipeline from Alberta's oilsands to Kitimat. An additional seven per cent from the demographic somewhat support the plan.

Among respondents of all ages in B.C., eight per cent of people strongly support the $6 billion project and 20 per cent somewhat support it.

"[Millennials] were much more likely to strongly oppose the pipeline: almost half, 46 per cent said they strongly opposed and less than one per cent said they strongly supported the pipeline, indicating a trend among millennials, and particularly those living in British Columbia, away from support for the pipeline," Abacus social media co-ordinator Jamie Morrison wrote on the company's website.

The trend wasn't limited only to B.C. Abacus found just six per cent of millennials nationwide strongly support the pipeline, compared with 11 per cent of the overall population. Addtionally, 14 per cent of Canadian millennials somewhat supported the megaproject, compared with 22 per cent of the rest of the survey sample.

Read more: http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/article/20120910/PRINCEGEORGE0101/309109968/-1/princegeorge/pipeline-a-non-starter-for-the-young

The NDP are getting a free ride - at least they certainly are on the energy file. I must ask again: Why are they not condemning the proposed twinning of Kinder Morgan's Trans Mountain Pipeline from the Alberta Tar Sands to Vancouver? All the arguments that prevail against the Enbridge line apply to Kinder Morgan, so to say that you’re waiting for the Kinder Morgan application to be filed is flimsy excuse which waters down their general position on energy. On matters such as natural gas "fracking", LNG and the proposed Site "C" Dam, the NDP is either supportive of these questionable initiatives or has yet to make its position clear.

Read this article by Max Paris of CBC about MP Nathan Cullen's unsuccessful attempt to ask questions of federal bureaucrats at the joint review panel looking into Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline proposal. Audio clip included. (August 29, 2012)

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/08/29/pol-cullen-gateway-pipeline-hearings.html

We are now seeing the public relations world at work. I know something about the philosophy behind Public Relations companies and their siamese twin, the advertising company. If you want to observe the the ethics of the industry, go to a Third World Country and look at their advertisements for tobacco companies. It will remind you of North America in the 50s with the modern equivalent of “More Doctors Smoke Camels Than Any Other Cigarette”. Take a look, for example, at Shell Oil ads, then remember their record in Nigeria where they have the government bought and paid for and are generally believed to have had Ken Saro-Wiwa, the activist and journalist, murdered by the state.

"Dilbit" is a contraction of "diluted bitumen", a little word loaded with controversy that has recently entered the English vocabulary. This is because "bitumen", a word in long existence, has entered popular use as the peanut butter-like concentrate extracted from Alberta's tar sands. Since bitumen is too thick to move through pipelines, it is diluted with benzene, naphtha, hydrogen sulphide and other proprietary ingredients — "diluent" — to make the bitumen fluid enough to be pumped. The result is dilbit, usually about 70 percent bitumen and 30 percent diluent. Although often compared to crude oil, it is categorically different.

Read this story from the Vancouver Sun on evidence that despite his feigned commitment to "listen to science" on the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline, Prime Minster Stephen Harper has "disembowelled" the science budget for the pipeline review. (Aug. 20, 2012)

VANCOUVER - While Prime Minister Stephen Harper says the fate of Enbridge's proposed pipeline from the Alberta oilsands to tankers on the British Columbia coast will be based on science and not politics, documents show some of that science isn't forthcoming.

And critics say there is no time for the science to be completed before a federal deadline for the environmental assessment currently underway.

Documents filed with the National Energy Board show the environmental review panel studying the Northern Gateway project asked Fisheries and Oceans Canada for risk assessments for the bodies of water the proposed pipeline will cross. The pipeline is to traverse nearly 1,000 streams and rivers in the upper Fraser, Skeena and Kitimat watersheds.

The department didn't have them.

"As DFO has not conducted a complete review of all proposed crossings, we are unable to submit a comprehensive list as requested; however, this work will continue and, should the project be approved, our review will continue into the regulatory permitting phase," DFO wrote in a five-page letter dated June 6, 2012.

The response went on to say there "may be differences of opinion" between the company and the department on the risk posed by the pipeline at some crossings. It provided two examples of crossings of tributaries to the Kitimat River where Enbridge rated the risk as low but Fisheries rated it medium to high.

DFO said the federal ministry will continue to work with the company to determine the risk level and level of mitigation required.

"DFO is of the view that the risk posed by the project to fish and fish habitat can be managed through appropriate mitigation and compensation measures," said the department's response.

"Under the current regulatory regime, DFO will ensure that prior to any regulatory approvals, the appropriate mitigation measures to protect fish and fish habitat will be based on the final risk assessment rating that will be determined by DFO."

Earlier this month, Harper told reporters in Vancouver that "decisions on these kinds of projects are made through an independent evaluation conducted by scientists into the economic costs and risks that are associated with the project, and that's how we conduct our business."

He went on to say "the only way that government can handle controversial projects of this manner is to ensure that things are evaluated on an independent basis, scientifically, and not simply on political criteria.''

But the federal government recently sent letters to 92 habitat staff members within Fisheries and Oceans in B.C., telling them that their positions will be cut. Thirty-two of them will be laid off outright.

The cuts will mean the department in B.C. has half the habitat staff it had a decade ago.

All but five of the province's fisheries field offices will be cut as part of a $79 million — 5.8 per cent — cut to the department's operational budget, including the offices in Prince George and Smithers that would have had the lead in monitoring pipeline effects.

The marine contaminant group that would have been involved in a spill in B.C. has been disbanded and the fisheries and environmental legislation gutted, said Otto Langer, a retired fisheries department scientist.

"He (Harper) says the science will make the decision. Well he's basically disembowelled the science," said Langer. "It's a cruel hoax that they're pulling over on the public."

Former federal Liberal fisheries minister David Anderson agrees.