Pacific NorthWest LNG project headed for showdown

GARY PARK

For Petroleum News

The Pacific NorthWest LNG project, headed by Malaysia’s Petronas, is becoming even more deeply mired in its dispute with a northwest British Columbia aboriginal community over the proposed site for a liquefaction and tanker terminal.

Members of the Lax Kw’alaams First Nation, representing about 3,200 members and seven allied tribes, has established a protest camp on Lelu Island near Prince Rupert to protect a fish habitat.

A Facebook message from the First Nation said a “protocol has been established to do investigative drilling in aid of determining an alternative site” for the shipment of any LNG from the Prince Rupert harbor.

Joey Wesley, a Lax Kw’alaams member, said his community decided to intervene because Pacific NorthWest was preparing to drill on the island.

“We are exercising our aboriginal rights and title,” he said. “Our intention is to make our presence felt and for however long it takes.”

Wesley said the First Nation has learned that the LNG consortium intends to remove eelgrass from a salmon-rearing habitat to determine if it could be planted elsewhere in the Skeen River estuary.

“If you take away the fish then you take away the people,” said Hereditary Chief Donny Wesley. “It’s as simple as that.”

Lax Kw’alaams Mayor Garry Reece was not available to disclose who has participated in the protocol agreement and British Columbia Natural Gas Development Minister Rich Coleman made no comment.

A Pacific NorthWest spokesman agreed that the partnership has hired two restoration scientists and presented a concept to the region’s First Nations and the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans to transplant eelgrass to partly offset the impact on fish habitat.

The proposed C$36 billion project is the most advanced of 19 LNG ventures currently being floated for British Columbia. Project partners include China’s Sinopec, JAPEX, Indian Oil Corp. and Petroleum Brunei.

Although the British Columbia government has approved Pacific NorthWest, the project is bogged down in a federal review that is focused on concerns about its environmental impact on the area.

The Lax Kw’alaams leadership told its members that if a new site can be found that could remove a significant barrier to the project, but nothing will happen without “extensive community meetings, consultation and a referendum in which all eligible Lax Kw’alaams may vote by secret ballot to approve or reject such a project.”

The First Nation had previously rejected a C$1.15 billion benefits package from Pacific NorthWest and the British Columbia government.

Pacific NorthWest President Michael Culbert told Business in Vancouver in late July that the company was exploring modifications to its Lelu Island site, but not an alternative location.

A SkeenaWild spokesman said Lelu is the worst place for an LNG plant, noting that of the 18 LNG projects proposed for the province’s north coast Pacific NorthWest is the only one opposed by the environmental group.

A spokesman for the Prince Rupert Port Authority, which administers land in Lelu Island, said drilling is needed to provide information for engineering of the project and has been sanctioned by the elected leadership of the Lax Kw’alaams and other First Nations in the area.

He said that work is expected to continue over the next two months.