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Kinder Morgan meets critics head-on Asks Canadian government for full environmental review of Trans Mountain expansion plan, acknowledging level of public concern Gary Park For Petroleum News
Rather than wait for the inevitable, Kinder Morgan has decided it would sooner tackle all of the expected opposition to its planned Trans Mountain pipeline expansion at the same time.
In filing a formal project description of the proposed C$5.4 billion project to raise the system’s capacity to 890,000 barrels per day from 300,000 bpd, it pre-empted other moves by asking the Canadian government to order the highest level of regulatory review.
Project leader Carey Johannesson said Kinder Morgan wants the regulatory hearing to be covered by both the National Energy Board Act and the Canada Environmental Assessment Act.
In a letter to the National Energy Board, Ian Anderson, president of Kinder Morgan’s Canadian operations, said the company “believes (the expansion) should be a designated project, subject to rigorous environmental review (under the NEB Act).”
Anderson also said Kinder Morgan has launched a two-year “grassroots campaign” in an effort to win over British Columbians, adding there is “value-based opposition and opinion-based opposition, and where we have our work ahead of us is to understand where that opinion lacks information and lacks clarity.”
Northern Gateway delayed That opposition parallels resistance from affected communities, environmentalists and First Nations, who have managed to delay approval by more than a year of Enbridge’s rival Northern Gateway project, planned to export 525,000 bpd of crude bitumen to Asia and California and import 193,000 bpd of condensate.
The Trans Mountain and Northern Gateway proposals are strongly backed by Asian interests, notably China’s Sinopec and CNOOC, which collectively have invested C$36.3 billion over the past two years in Canadian pipeline, oil sands and natural gas assets.
Chinese investors have expected all along that Canadian crude from the oil sands would be delivered to China, said Wenran Jiang, an advisor to the Alberta government on Asian investment.
Environmental groups led by Ecojustice have filed lawsuits to stop the Trans Mountain and Northern Gateway projects, accusing the Canadian government of not performing adequate environmental impact statements, while several First Nations have threatened litigation and, if the projects go ahead, civil disobedience.
Johannesson told reporters that Kinder Morgan has assumed from the outset that the Trans Mountain application would face a comprehensive assessment. “So let’s just clear it all up (although) we are jumping the gun a bit in asking for (the hearing) designation,” he said.
Anderson said Kinder Morgan intends to satisfy all conditions the British Columbia government has insisted must be met before any heavy crude can be transported across the province, including First Nations consultation, improved marine and land oil spill response measures and a “fair share of fiscal and economic benefits” for British Columbia.
He said the company has already held hundreds of meetings with municipalities and affected communities, including First Nations.
Johannesson said a full environmental review would deal with issues such as “odors and vapors” from the storage tanks at Kinder Morgan’s Westridge terminal at Burnaby in the Greater Vancouver area and “what kind of technologies we would need to meet air-quality standards.”
Application this year The British Columbia government’s Energy Ministry said it expects Kinder Morgan to submit its complete application in late 2013.
“British Columbia has informed Kinder Morgan of our expectations for safety and environmental protection,” the ministry said. “We are continuing to closely monitor the company’s proposal.”
One of the strongest critics is Andrew Weaver, a university climate scientist and now the first Green Party member elected to the British Columbia legislative assembly.
“The grassroots pressure on this project will be so enormous there’s no way it will go through,” he said. “The big concern is tanker traffic on the Pacific coast. You see what happened with (Northern Gateway)? Just wait.”
Kinder Morgan, according to documents obtained by Greenpeace, has told the Canadian government its project is a “more economically viable, less environmentally risky alternative to Northern Gateway.”
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