Approving Teck mine unacceptable
Our federal government is currently deciding whether to approve the giant Teck Frontier tarsands mine in northern Alberta.
It will be the first climate test for them and if they go ahead with Teck, it will blow out of the water the carbon emission targets the Liberals had set themselves in 2015 at the Paris climate conference.
I’m one of the two-thirds of Canadian voters who voted for increased climate action in the last election. And Teck is a carbon bomb: if constructed, the new mine would lock in six megatonnes of carbon emissions (CO2e) per year until 2067, well after the Trudeau government’s 2050 timeline for Canada to be carbon-neutral. By the way, six megatonnes is about equal to the emissions produced by all private vehicles in B.C.
The mine would also result in “significant adverse effects” on Indigenous rights and in irreversible environmental damage. Among the species threatened by this project are caribou, lynx, the last remaining free roaming wood buffalo herds and the critically endangered whooping crane.
Finally, the project’s finances are built on false assumptions because, like everyone else in Western Canada’s oil country, Teck is thinking the price for Canadian tarsands oil will rise again. With the U.S. currently producing vast amounts of fossil fuels that price rise is unlikely to come about.
In the midst of a climate emergency, approving this mine is unacceptable.
Liz Newton
Shawnigan Lake