by Peter Ronald, Georgia Strait Alliance
BC Hydro, in partnership with US energy giant Williams, wants to build a natural gas pipeline from the mainland to Vancouver Island to transport fuel for three planned gas power plants. And the Georgia Strait Crossing Pipeline (GSX) partners want to build it through BC's only fully subtidal ecological reserve, Satellite Channel (ER 67). This is not a permitted use for an ecological reserve in British Columbia. Although no political decision has yet been taken on this precedent-setting change, a paper trail shows the government has an appetite and incentive for just such an outcome.
Documents obtained through a Freedom of Information request filed by the Georgia Strait Crossing Concerned Citizens Coalition trace a plan to run the pipeline through the reserve while minimizing public concern. In ongoing correspondence between the proponents and BC's Ministry of Water, Land and Air Protection (WLAP) since July 1999, the discussion eventually turns to an offer to deliver one-half of an estimated $3 million in cost-savings from BC Hydro/Williams to WLAP. Astonishingly, this offer appears to have been well received by senior government staff, pending the Minister's approval.
If the GSX pipeline were to conform to both the spirit and letter of the Ecological Reserve Act and Protected Areas of British Columbia Act (2001), it would skirt the northern corner of ER 67, then climb the southern-most point of Cape Keppel on Salt Spring Island. However, BC Hydro/Williams have made it clear that their preferred routing, both financially and technically, is through the reserve.
Originating at the Sumas WA, gas distribution hub, south of Abbotsford BC, the pipeline would enter the Strait of Georgia near Cherry Point, WA, and traverse Boundary Pass to Swanson and Satellite channels before making landfall near Cobble Hill on Vancouver Island. From there it would continue to a connection with the existing Centra Gas transmission line at Shawnigan Lake and on to the gas power plants.
The pipeline proposal is subject to a federal National Energy Board (NEB) Joint Review Panel hearing, because of its international scope and this interest has invoked the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
The GSX's path to approval has run into a series of delays and obstacles. The proponents have not adequately consulted with First Nations, or answered a great many interveners' information requests. At the same time, an inspiring ground swell of public opposition to the plan has arisen both generally, and with regard to specific matters, such as the suggested route through the ecological reserve.
Satellite Channel ER 67 was established in 1975 as a representative example of level, soft substrate sea floor habitat, and to conserve its rich, highly diverse community of benthic infauna and associated demersal species. Studied before its designation by University of Victoria researchers, the 343-hectare area's protected status has since been ignored and unenforced. Trawl boards have dug scars across much of the reserve. Until the pipeline proposal focused a bright light on this area, the only attention paid the reserve was from the Friends of Ecological Reserves, who expressed concern about a planned sewage out fall nearby.
Any change in the reserve's boundary would need to be authorized by the WLAP Minister Joyce Murray and would require, according to BC Parks staff, "full public consultation." AXYS Environmental Consulting convened one invitation-only workshop in December 2001. The consultant's March 2002 report to BC Parks (no longer available in either electronic or hard copy) was tepid: "(T)his evaluation has failed to identify any appreciable ecological or social benefits to the ER that would result from an approval of the alternative pipeline route."1
Ultimately, the NEB panel will consider the evidence from marine scientists and interveners. Whether the BC Hydro-Williams proponents formally request and win an adjustment to ER 67's boundary from WLAP prior to these as-yet unscheduled hearings remains to be seen.
One thing is crystal clear: this question requires further study.
* Contact the Georgia Strait Alliance at (250)381-8321 or peter@georgiastrait.org or www.sqwalk.com
1 AXYS Environmental Consulting Ltd., "Independent Assessment of Satellite Channel Ecological Reserve #67 With Respect to the GSX Pipeline," Sidney, March 2002
[From WS December 2002/ January 2003]