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British Columbia moves to fast track offshore drilling
Gary Park
A move by British Columbia’s new government to fast track public review of its offshore oil and gas moratorium has stirred petroleum industry interest in the Pacific coast for the first time in 30 years.
Energy Minister Richard Neufeld has promised an early announcement outlining how the new Liberal government “is going to take the offshore oil and gas issue forward in an expedited fashion.” Obstacles include federal government But he cautioned July 17 that the process “is going to take quite a while. Based on what the industry has told me, if we were to lift the moratorium tomorrow, it would be at least eight years down the road before the first well was drilled.”
The obstacles include the federal government, which must agree to lift the ban; Haida Indian of the Queen Charlotte Islands, who insist a land claim for Hecate Strait must be settled before they will agree to exploration; and environmentalists, who oppose any drilling in the earthquake-prone and biologically rich environment.
Even so, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, which told the government it is anxious to access the offshore, is encouraged that the government will get to grips with the issue.
“We’re taking a wait-and-see attitude in order to allow the people of B.C. to decide whether or not they want exploration,” said CAPP vice-president David MacInnis.
“It’s up to the government and the public to get through the discussions on the moratorium. If they want to open the area up, we’ll be glad to come.”
MacInnis said the key leaseholders — Chevron Canada Resources, Shell Canada and Petro-Canada, who have held drilling rights since the early 1970s when the moratorium was imposed — are “interested, but they’re waiting until the process plays itself out.”
The Hecate Strait region covers 4 million acres south of the Alaska Panhandle, and is estimated to have reserves approaching 10 billion barrels of oil and 42 trillion cubic feet of gas and could generate C$4 billion a year in government revenues.
Neufeld decided to accelerate the government’s action plan after largely rejecting recommendations from Northern Development Commissioner John Backhouse, who has weighed the issue for the past two years. No more meetings An 11-page report from Backhouse recommended a process of public consultations, but Neufeld said the report was a leftover from the former New Democratic Party government.
“We’re no further ahead than when (Backhouse) started,” he said. “We don’t need another year and a half of meetings. We need some fairly good, intense meetings with people and some experts and make a decision from there.”
CAPP, in lobbying the government, said the petroleum industry employs 35,000 people in British Columbia and generated C$1.7 billion in government revenues last year, but only a fraction of what it calculated the Hecate Strait area could yield if development was allowed.
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