This week The EcoCentric has THE wrap-up of our interviews with Nelson-Creston election candidates with the Libertarians’ Terry Tiessen.
In September, the NDP government released its own 2-scientist report on logging of old growth trees and announced an old growth tree plan. Local Nelson forest scientist Rachel Holt gives us her review of the report: it’s good, and the government plan: keep cutting as usual.
Last month over 200 Canadian scientists and policy experts sent a letter to the Prime Minister and cabinet: reconsider the TransMountain $12 billion pipeline investment because of market changes. We have Simon Fraser University professor Dr. Tom Gunton who explains any business case for the pipeline has gone down the tube.
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Environment News for the week of October 20th, 2020
In the September throne speech, the federal government said it plans to fund the development of new nuclear reactors (SMRs) as part of its climate action plan.
Last week federal Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan put dollars to that : $20 million from ISED’s Strategic Innovation Fund for the company Terrestrial Energy to develop its prototype small reactor in Ontario.
At the announcement Minister O’Regan confirmed that the new reactor will take more than a decade to develop and will contribute nothing to Canada’s 2030 target for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
The 2020 World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR) also noted that developing new nuclear energy is too slow and uneconomical to address the climate crisis compared to deploying renewable energy technologies.
SMRs have been proposed as a solution for remote communities and mining sites currently relying on diesel fuel but new research has found the potential market is too small to be viable.
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Five people including a Secwepemc hereditary chief and his daughter have been arrested after standing against construction of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project on Secwepemc territory near Kamloops, B.C.
The Sacred Woman’s Fire Council said a group was arrested near a work site on Mission Flats Road where pipeline crews are preparing to tunnel underneath the Thompson River.
The Secwepemc delivered a Cease and Desist letter to TMX Pipeline corporation for the second time. The Secwepemc people said the Elder’s Council note the land has never been ceded or surrendered and no consent has ever been given for the colonial government or the Trans Mountain pipeline to enact the violent authority and jurisdiction they claim.
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John Horgan was campaigning in Kamloops on Oct. 17 and was asked about recent arrests of Trans Mountain protesters. Horgan said, “If you have a point to make, make the point and galvanize people to your position. But disrupting other people’s activity only alienates, quite frankly, and creates discord in the community,”
Horgan restated his opposition to the pipeline project and said he had done his part as premier to try to make the case against it.
“The supreme court rejected our regulations and the project is proceeding. I believe it’s appropriate that we follow the law, issue permits and ensure the company is living within their environmental assessment restrictions — and so far they have been,” he said.
The first arrest came on Sept. 3, when a woman chained herself to a gate near a pipeline construction site at Kamloops Airport.
Two other incidents occurred on Oct. 15 and Oct. 17, with nine people arrested in total.
Two protest camps have also been established. The first was part of a four-day summer vision quest and fast at a site on the south side of the Thompson River along Mission Flats Road. On Oct. 3, that site was re-established by Secwépemc protesters as a permanent protest camp.
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