H E R T Z O G

Possible oil exploration raises environmental concerns

Monday magazine, January 9, 2002

Oil and gas exploration off B.C.’s coast has been under a federal and provincial moratorium since 1971, but the issue is about to heat up again.

This Tuesday, a three-member panel headed by former UVic president David Strong will release its review of the science behind a recent report commissioned by the Ministry of Energy. It will look at the viability and safety of drilling for oil and gas in the turbulent, storm-ridden, earthquake-prone and ecologically-sensitive west coast marine environment.

The Ministry of Energy report, released in October, 2001, by British Columbia Offshore Oil and Gas Technology Update consultant Jacques Whitford Environment Ltd., concluded that there’s little reason such exploration and development shouldn’t go ahead.

It stated "no unique fatal flaw issues" rule out exploration and development activities in an area that includes the turbulent waters of Dixon Entrance, Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound.

“While earthquake risks are higher than in most, but not all, oil and gas areas,” the Whitford report stated, ”technology exists to minimise the risks in accordance with generally accepted principals (sic) of sociatal (sic) risk factors.”

“ Some environmentalists are concerned that the scientific review panel’s findings could give the green light to Premier Gordon Campbell, who they expect to announce a lifting of the moratorium at the end of this month.”

But, the authors pointed out, the cost of facilities required to protect the environment “may make the economic justification of exploration and development questionable.”

Some environmentalists are concerned that the scientific review panel’s findings could give the green light to Premier Gordon Campbell, who they expect to announce a lifting of the moratorium at the end of this month.

The Living Oceans Society, based in Sointula at the north end of Vancouver Island, has been fighting the possibility of offshore development. According to campaigner Oonagh O'Connor, any exploration would be of great concern, due to the impact of seismic testing on marine animals and commercial fisheries.

Living Oceans is hoping that one of the panel's recommendations will be for a delay until more information is gathered on the many ecological unknowns around the issue.

“Hopefully, one of their recommendations will be to ask for more information -- but it doesn't mean that the government will listen to that,” O'Connor says.

When the Oil and Gas Task Force, consisting of northern MLAs, recently toured nine coastal communities from Port Hardy north, the majority of people who spoke to the panel were against lifting the moratorium.

“If the Liberal government wanted a way out of this discussion right now, they have it from the results of those hearings,” O’Connor says.

While the government has been in favour of oil and gas exploration and development, the companies who hold the rights to the area have shown little interest in developing the resource, and some have even offered to turn over some of their leases to the proposed Gwaii Haanas Marine Conservation Area.

“But we can't just walk away and say 'industry isn't interested,' because if it's made easy enough for them, which this government has the capability to do, the industry would become interested,” O'Connor believes.