Battling the odds
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Backers of First Nations-led Eagle Spirit pipeline rallying support
Gary Park for Petroleum News
Support is quietly gathering momentum among indigenous communities in British Columbia and Alberta for a First Nations-led pipeline project to move crude bitumen from the oil sands to an export terminal in the northern B.C. coast, but formidable obstacles have yet to be cleared.
Calvin Helin, president of Eagle Spirit Holdings, told the Globe and Mail he has 100 percent backing from chiefs along the British Columbia right of way after three years of talks with 35 of those leaders, along with solid backing from those communities in Alberta, plus the endorsement of Alberta Premier Rachel Notley.
Support for the initial C$12 billion phase that would carry 2 million barrels per day for export to Asia is especially strong among communities in the B.C. interior that have no other viable economic industries.
Those who have shaped the project say it is “a leading example of achieving reconciliation through economic empowerment” by opening the door to the first large-scale indigenous-led infrastructure undertaking in Canadian history
It would terminate at a new export terminal about 20 miles north of Prince Rupert and just a few miles from the Alaska border.
For now, Helin will not say whether he has secured any funding or marketing commitments, although Eagle Spirit may have an opening to acquire a storage facility near Fort McMurray in the oil sands region, which is backed by a C$545 million bond issue led by the Fort McKay and Mikisew Cree First Nations.
Edge over other projects Eagle Spirit’s edge over other pipeline ventures such as Enbridge’s Northern Gateway, TransCanada’s Energy East and the expansions of the Keystone and Trans Mountain systems is the time it has invested in winning over First Nations.
“You can’t build a project like this without the First Nations on side,” Helin told the Globe and Mail. “Even our so-called reconciliation Prime Minister (Justin Trudeau) is learning that with Trans Mountain.”
Chief Isaac Laboucan-Avirom from the Woodland Cree First Nation in Alberta reinforced that thinking by making a case for improving environmental standards on traditional aboriginal lands.
“We don’t need to kill all of our economic opportunities,” he said. “We just need to be more innovative.”
Proposed federal legislation Helin and Laboucan-Avirom both say they will file complaints under the United Nations Declaration of Rights of Indigenous Peoples if federal legislation to ban tankers capable of carrying 12,500 metric tons from an area that extends from northern Vancouver Island to the Alaska border becomes law.
Bill C-48, which has already been ratified by the House of Commons, is now before the Canadian Senate in what would normally be the final stage of the legislative process.
A spokeswoman for federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau said the minister has already gained endorsement for Bill C-48 from political leaders and First Nations chiefs.
But Laboucan-Avirom is planning a pre-Christmas visit to Ottawa along with several other chiefs, to register their concerns with the government, undeterred by the failure of their coalition to mount a legal challenge against the tanker ban.
Notley has also called on Trudeau to stall the tanker ban and amend another piece of legislation, Bill C-69, which will drastically rework the regulatory process for handling pipeline applications.
“The federal government is telling First Nations to park their plans and park their economic ambitions. Really, is that the message we want to send?” she told a business audience in Ottawa in late November.
Having failed to obtain federal money for her plan to buy 80 new locomotives and 7,000 tanker cars to boost crude shipments from Alberta, Notley has stepped up her opposition to the planned tanker ban.
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