H E R T Z O G

Scientists warn about offshore development

Monday magazine, May 8, 2002

It took the mayor of Port Hardy leaking the contents to a local radio station to pry it loose, but last week the B.C. government finally released the long-awaited report of its Scientific Review Panel on B.C. offshore oil and gas development.

The three-member panel, chaired by former UVic president David Strong, now a professor at UVic's school of Earth and Ocean Science, actually delivered the report to B.C. energy minister Richard Neufeld on January 15. But the Liberal government sat on it until last week.

The report details the many environmental, jurisdictional, economic and regulatory issues that hang over efforts to lift a 1972 federal moratorium and open B.C. waters to oil and gas exploration.

It points out most of the obvious dangers that might occur--earthquakes and tsunamis, sudden and intense storms, huge waves--and details how they would contribute to the ever-present possibility of disasters like a natural gas blowout or a massive oil spill in the pristine waters off Haida Gwaii.

“ The report highlights the huge knowledge gaps in offshore science, explaining that there is little known about exactly which species live in this last unspoiled stretch of nearshore ocean.”

The report also highlights huge knowledge gaps in offshore science, explaining that there is little known about exactly which species live in this last unspoiled stretch of nearshore ocean, and how there is a lack of understanding about the effects of chronic, long-term pollution on this fragile ecosystem.

But despite the scientists’ concerns, they appear to believe there is no reason to maintain the moratorium.

"There is no fundamental inadequacy of science and technology, properly applied in a appropriate regulatory framework, to justify a blanket moratorium on such activities," the report concludes.

Without offering evidence, the panel even tries to pin the blame for decades of government neglect of marine research on the moratorium itself.

"The blanket moratorium has set back our understanding of the coasts and oceans of British Columbia," the report claims.

The contradiction has not impressed opponents of offshore development. Haida Nation Council president Guujaaw says it’s "extraordinary that the panel can conclude that there are risks to the environment from drilling, even potential catastrophes, but [that] the risks are acceptable."

On releasing the report, B.C. Energy minister Richard Neufeld announced a $2 million grant for the University of Northern British Columbia to put together a work plan on how the offshore exploration will be implemented, and federal natural resouces minister Herb Dhaliwal has promised to look for matching federal funding.

The next step is more research leading to a full federal and provincial environmental review.