Kinder Morgan's spawning deterrents
Kinder Morgan has placed seven illegal fish spawning deterrents in BC rivers.
Georgia Strait Alliance
As you may have seen in the news, Kinder Morgan has been caught illegally starting construction on their pipeline. They’ve placed seven fish spawning deterrents in BC rivers. The purpose of these deterrents is to take away spawning habitat from chinook salmon, the primary food source of our iconic southern resident killer whales, and other fish species. Chinook are the key species to saving this population from extinction. Chinook stocks are at historic lows, and southern residents are literally starving to death.
Shockingly, they went on to ask the National Energy Board, the federal agency regulating this pipeline, to exempt them from the rules. Only after our friends at the PIPE UP Network raised the alarm did the NEB order them to stop further installation. But, to date, the NEB has not issued any penalties. The technique used is unproven: the professional biologist overseeing the installation of the deterrents has said that “this is a relatively new science, without a body of supporting evidence for its success.” Taken together, this is deeply concerning, and indicates that there simply isn’t enough oversight on this project by the NEB.
The provincial government, founded on an agreement that commits them to “employ every tool available to the new government to stop the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline”, has an opportunity and a responsibility to act here. They have the power to amend the BC environmental assessment certificate to pause the issuing of permits until this matter is thoroughly investigated. We need to know how this happened, and what can be done to make sure that Kinder Morgan doesn’t do this again. Find out more here.
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