Adam Prudhomme
Beaver Staff
Protesters made their opposition to the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline known locally on Monday, brandishing signs outside the Napanee office of Hastings-Lennox and Addington Liberal MP Mike Bossio.
The group, which totalled seven in number, was drawing a steady amount of honks from cars that drove along Richmond Boulevard.
“We’re hoping to show that there’s opposition across Canada,” said Lori Borthwick, who helped organize the protest. “350.org organized this and there’s protests across Canada from now until May 9. Kinder Morgan has a big shareholders’ meeting on May 9 so we’re hoping to show the company and shareholders that this pipeline won’t be built. There’s deep resistance across all of Canada, not just in B.C.”
At the heart of the issue is the proposed 980-km expansion to the pipeline, which would run parrallel to existing pipes and increase the output from 300,000 barrels a day to 890,000.
“The Trans Mountain Pipeline from Alberta to B.C. already exists, right now it isn’t carrying bitumen,” said Borthwick. “They want to really expand the capacity of the Trans Mountain Pipeline and bitumen, I don’t think a lot of people realize, it’s like chunks of sandy oil. In order to get it through the pipeline they add a number of toxic chemicals to make it a liquid. It’s a very corrosive liquid and very dangerous. Often it breaks through the double hulled pipelines which happened in Alberta just a few days ago.”
Also taking part in the protest was Steven Moore, a professor of sustainability at Queen’s University.
“We don’t support our government poisoning the planet in order to make a buck,” said Moore. “A lot of people say this will help the people of Alberta and that is a really good sentiment and we’re all in favour of that. Unfortunately the people of Alberta only get a single digit percentage of the profits that come out of the tar sands. All the rest goes to international oil companies, in this case Kinder Morgan out of Texas.”
“Alberta has the best renewable energy sources, wind and solar, in the country,” added Moore. “If that money (proposed to be spent on the pipeline) were spent on renewable, it would provide seven times more jobs than that same dollar amount spent on this pipeline.”
Members of the group also expressed support for the First Nations members of B.C. who have not given consent for the pipeline to pass through their territory.
Bossio, who was in Ottawa during Monday’s protest, has scheduled a meeting with the group on Friday.
“The whole notion of this conversation is far more complex than just saying we shouldn’t be building that pipeline out there because it’s going to destroy our planet,” Bossio told the Beaver from his Ottawa office.
“I’m saying there are a lot of things that we need to think about when you’re approaching this issue. The petrochemical industry represents $160 billion of GDP in this country and tens of thousands of jobs. That’s just straight impact, that’s not economic impact which is typically four times that amount. It’s so integrated to our economy that we can’t just blow up that sector.”
Bossio says the Liberals still plan to honour the promises they made to help reduce climate change.
“We are an exporting nation,” said Bossio. “We are a very large country with a small population that has achieved a very high degree of services that we deliver to our citizens. And how do we deliver that if we don’t have the economic inputs to do so? If we’re not investing in increasing our productivity? If we’re not ensuring that we can be competitive in certain markets? Are we competitive at any cost? No….You have to be able to find that balance.
“There’s no silver bullet in trying to deal with climate change. There is no one solution or one size fits all when dealing with any environmental issue. You need to attack it from many different fronts. For example putting a price on carbon, investing into public transit, increasing our emissions standards.”
Bossio added that they plan to continue to negotiate with First Nations groups who are yet to sign an agreement to give consent for the pipeline to be built on their territory. He says there’s been progress made on that front, with many tribes in favour of at least parts of the proposal.
“There’s a multitude of different Indigenous communities that want the pipeline to go through that have signed agreements,” said Bossio.
“Then you’ve got the group that are opposed to it. Even when you’re going through a negotiation process you agree on a broad number of perspectives or aspects of an issue but there’s a couple that may you may not agree with.”
He says he hoped the government would continue to work toward a compromise that would satisfy as many groups as possible, though noted it’s likely there will be some who aren’t completely in favour of any ultimate outcome.
As for the local protests, he says he was glad to hear it took place, though regretted he wasn’t scheduled to be in Napanee that day. Though he was out of town at the time, his staff encouraged protesters to come inside their office for a rest and refreshments if they needed to get out of the sun.
“We’re not enemies,” Bossio said of the protesters, noting he’s spoken with members of the group on numerous occasions.
“We have to respectfully agree that people have differences of opinions and different outlooks on how we need to deal with things. I want to see people protest for what they believe in. That’s the only way you’re going to push government to do better.”