Group tries to bring Northern Gateway to ‘grassroots level’
In a project with the scope of the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline, it's easy to get lost in the details.
For the Fort St. James Sustainability Group, the best way to digest the reams of information available was to keep a narrow focus.
"It's all about the locals for us," representative Brenda Gouglas said after making her group's final oral argument in front of the National Energy Board's Joint Review Panel. "We just needed to bring it to the grassroots level."
Gouglas and Kandace Kerr phoned in to the hearings in Terrace and used their allotted hour to address some of the specifics of how the proposed heavy oil pipeline connecting northern Alberta to Kitimat would impact their community located on the shores of Stuart Lake.
"We tried to keep it to us and I really we think we succeeded in bringing a face to our community," Gouglas said.
According to Northern Gateway's plans, the pipeline would travel just south of the community and Fort St. James would be home to a pumping station. Kerr, who lives near the proposed station, believes the pumping apparatus could have significant impacts on her and her neighbours due to the lights and sound it would generate.
"Significant means one thing to their scientists and something completely different to a homeowner or rancher," Kerr told the panel.
In its final argument, the company countered that the station is at least 500 metres from any residence and any noise generated would be suitably dampened.
"Based on Northern Gateway's hydraulic design philosophy and the evidence, it is clear that the current proposed location for the Fort St. James pump station is the best location and that the concerns raised have been fully addressed," the company wrote.
Kerr told the panel that due to the opposition to the pipeline in her community, she doesn't believe Northern Gateway has the social license to operate in the region. She urged the members of the joint review panel to consider that in their deliberations before offering recommendations to the federal government later this year.
"The people of Fort St. James will have to live with this pipeline if you approve it," she concluded. "So we ask you, the panel, to help us protect our community."
The pipeline has been a hot button issue in the town for years, but Gouglas said despite concerns raised by residents, she doesn't believe Northern Gateway has spent enough time trying to address those issues.
"There were 25 people that presented their feelings and their thoughts on the project," Gouglas said. "And from what I gather, not one of those people was contacted after about the issues they raised or how Northern Gateway could address them. That's what we needed to show, that they're not listening."
Earlier Wednesday, the District of Fort St. James made its final argument. Gouglas made the case on behalf of the district, having got the ball rolling on the municipality's involvement when she sat on council between 2005 and 2011.
She expressed dismay over Northern Gateway's seeming dismissal of many of the 1,100 oral statements that were made by interested citizens.
"The panel must recognize the misconceptions, misunderstandings, myths and disinformation that were included in so many of the oral statements and letters of comment and give appropriate weight to the statements and comments in the same way as [Alberta and Ontario regulators] did in the cases described above," Northern Gateway wrote in its final argument, citing the lack of expert knowledge from many of the letter writers.
Gouglas said the district was surprised that's how the pipeline company would characterize the public's input.
"It was just a horrible thing to read that in their final argument of what they thought of what they heard from the people," she said.
One of the major considerations the National Energy Board must balance is whether or not the project is in the public interest. Gouglas told the panel that rather than compare the pipeline to a nation-building project like a railway, it's more akin to another Canadian symbol.
"Like the penny," she said, "the project will cost Canadians more than it's worth."