Above Photo: First Nations members of the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory block train tracks servicing Via Rail, as part of a protest against British Columbia’s Coastal GasLink pipeline, in Tyendinaga, Ontario, Canada February 12, 2020.
The project is also a critical conduit for Canadian oil producers, who have suffered steep discounts on prices for their crude over the last 15 years
OTTAWA — Recent protests and blockades are only the beginning of the civil disobedience that lies ahead as Ottawa pushes ahead with the controversial Trans Mountain expansion project, claims an activist group.
“I really do see this as a taste of things to come,” said Alexandra Woodsworth, campaign organizer at the British Columbia-based Dogwood Initiative.
Woodsworth likened the coming fight to “the War in the Woods, round two,” alluding to a 1993 anti-logging protest on Vancouver Island that led to nearly 1,000 arrests.
Recent protests against the Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline, currently under construction in B.C., have snarled several critical rail lines in Ontario, prompting CN Rail to threaten closure of parts of its network. Protesters have blockaded the B.C. legislature and temporarily barred Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland from entering the city hall building in Halifax.
Those eruptions are sure to ramp up as construction continues on Trans Mountain, the $12.6-billion project that would expand the flow of petroleum products from northern Alberta to Vancouver.
Unlike the Coastal project, TMX would cut through a far more populated region of the country where people can more easily congregate, and potentially bar heavy equipment from operating.
“They’re going to be in the Lower Mainland, they’re going to be in the backyards of a lot of highly motivated people, so I would definitely expect significant resistance of the kind we’re seeing with Coastal GasLink, or larger,” she said.
Trans Mountain has secured agreements with about 120 of the 129 First Nations communities that reside along its route. But a handful of communities have resisted TMX, and have fought Ottawa’s approval of the project through the Federal Court of Appeal.
“I think Trans Mountain is potentially more polarizing than Coastal GasLink,” said Lee Spahan, chief of the Coldwater Indian Band, who appealed the Trans Mountain approval in court.
“The protests also really show that disputes don’t always end in the courts.”
Spahan stopped short of saying his community would resort to civil disobedience to fight the project, and said he prefers a regulatory approach. The band has been at odds with the expansion for years over concerns that it could spoil an aquifer that supplies the community’s drinking water.
“We will do everything in our means to protect our water, including further court and regulatory changes, if our issues cannot be resolved through talking.”
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney on Wednesday called the current Coastal GasLink protests a “dress rehearsal” for what is to come. Kenney has been among the most spirited supporters of Trans Mountain, which he said would bring wealth to the 120 First Nations communities who support it.
The project is also a critical conduit for Canadian oil producers, who have suffered steep discounts on prices for their crude over the last 15 years, due to a persistent shortage of pipeline capacity. The bottleneck has cost taxpayers tens of millions per day in foregone revenues, according to some estimates.
“This is not about Indigenous people,” Kenney said Wednesday. “It’s not about carbon emissions. It’s about a hard-left ideology that is, frankly, opposed to the entire modern industrial economy.”
Ian Anderson, chief executive of Trans Mountain Corp., which operates the pipeline, said the protests represent the most “aggressive” version of the kind of opposition that could face TMX. In a recent interview with Calgary Herald columnist Chris Varcoe, Anderson said he wasn’t sure what level of resistance would meet Trans Mountain, but said it still enjoys broad support.
“The circumstances with Coastal GasLink and the Wet’suwet’en situation are different than us… but it does present that face of opposition that could be more aggressive, and therefore we are watching it and will learn from it, hopefully, and put the right plans in place.
“But it certainly is a representation of how opposition can present itself. We think we’re different, but no doubt we are watching.”
TMX has been met with intense criticism, particularly after the Liberal government under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau purchased the existing pipeline for $4.4 billion, effectively nationalizing it. The expansion, which would nearly triple the pipeline’s capacity, would cost another $12.6 billion, some of which has already been spent.
Unlike Coastal GasLink, which would transport comparatively cleaner natural gas, Trans Mountain has come to represent the expansion of northern Alberta’s oilsands, in the minds of some, and has been intensely opposed on the B.C. coast where the pipeline would terminate. The project is also broadly supported by industry groups and many First Nations organizations.
Coastal GasLink, being built by Calgary-based TC Energy, has signed benefit agreements with all of the First Nations along the route. But hereditary chiefs representing the Wet’suwet’en Nation have opposed the pipeline.
Construction of Trans Mountain resumed in 2019 after a court challenge, particularly in Alberta and at the Westridge Marine Terminal in Burnaby. Other segments of the pipeline have undergone various preparatory work. The project is currently slated for completion around the second half of 2022