Arctic Marathon

Arctic pipeline schemes are as bold as the aurora borealis that dances across the northern sky. But there is a difference. The northern lights are pure inspiration. Arctic pipelines alternately tempt and then torment those they once beguiled

By Sydney Sharpe

February 01, 2009

Timeline

The pipelines are in view again. The vision still inspires official imaginations in Ottawa, where high hopes are pinned on the Mackenzie Gas Project. Stephen Harper’s Conservatives returned from the Oct. 14 election telling Canadians it is worth waiting for regulatory approval for a $16-billion production system and delivery route that would carry gas from the Beaufort Sea coast through the Mackenzie Valley corridor to Alberta.

But it has been a long time coming. The Mackenzie pipeline first leapt into the public consciousness during the 1970s when Thomas Berger traveled throughout the North, assessing the impact on peoples and communities. In May 1977, the Berger Commission recommended a 10-year project moratorium. Three decades later, the delay continues, although desire blooms anew.

The National Energy Board finished year-long hearings into the economic and technical feasibility of the pipeline project in December of 2006. In addition, parallel but longer hearings by the Joint Review Panel of federal, Northwest Territories and aboriginal authorities examined the environmental and social implications. Nothing can be done before the panel reports to the NEB and everyone, including the regulator, is waiting for the JRP document.

In December, JRP chairman Robert Hornal set the target date for the report back to December of 2009 in the latest in a series of postponements. The delay ignited protests from the Mackenzie Delta, where the Inuvialuit and Gwich’in are mostly keen supporters of the project, to industry headquarters in Calgary.

But the panel refused to be rushed into making final conclusions on more than 5,000 submissions and thousands of recommendations received during 230 days of hearings in 27 communities along the 1,220 kilometers of the route proposed for the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline. The report will be completed in “an efficient yet comprehensive and responsible manner, considering the amount of information submitted to the panel,” said a statement on the schedule by Hornal.

“We understand that there is tremendous interest in the panel’s findings, but we are required and committed to base our findings on a full and fair review of the evidence,” the JRP chairman said.

instead of ending the regulatory marathon, the long-awaited panel report will kick off the final stages. “We’re ready to go,” says Kenneth Vollman, chairman of the NEB tribunal that held the board’s hearings on the Mackenzie project and is responsible for final decisions on approval and conditions.

It will take three months for JRP recommendations to wind through myriad government departments and agencies then land at the door of the federal cabinet. The NEB will hold a final argument phase of the project hearings only after it receives the JRP report and that will also take a calendar quarter. Then the board will write, translate and publish the decision in both official languages, a task which requires another half year.

“It will be a good late-2010 before the final decision, a year after the JRP report is released,” says Vollman. He stepped down as chairman of the NEB in June 2007 when his seven-year appointment expired and he was approaching retirement age. He stayed on as chairman of the Mackenzie review panel to finish the Arctic gas review as the board’s biggest unfinished piece of business.
When the initial northern hearings were held in 1976 and 1977, Vollman was an NEB staff engineer. Although not involved, he was familiar with the Berger report.

“Not much happened after they decided to put the pipeline on hold, until year 2000. That was when proponents began thinking that the project down the Mackenzie Valley had found its time.” By then, Vollman was NEB chairman.

He worked to ensure the regulatory system was ready, especially since it wasn’t the only one with crucial stakes. When the dust settled, the NEB identified about a dozen boards and territorial governments, especially First Nations agencies, as participants in the northern regulatory process.
“The area is unique from the point of view of being pristine and largely untouched by oil and gas development,” Vollman adds. “I’ve been involved in a number of large hearings and most raise complex issues. It’s an educational forum as much as an adjudicative one.”

The regulatory process has changed dramatically in the generation since the Berger Commission. When Vollman started his NEB career, the public and consumers didn’t play as significant a role.

Pages: 1 2 3 4

Issue Contents

Arctic Marathon

Related Posts

Unlimited Magazine

Custom Magazines

Think: A new idea of Alberta