Natural Resources Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2011

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

So if you could go ahead, I think you have three colleagues who want to ask questions as well.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Chair.

The questions I want to ask are associated with your map on page 7 of the current and proposed protection in the Northwest Territories.

What does this map mean? Is this map the only one available for the north of 60 area? Are the same types of maps available for other parts of the country, including the provinces? Can we get a map like this for the other territories? Do you lay your potential future areas for development over these protected areas to determine just what your process is going be going forward in terms of how things will be developed in those areas?

[Anil Arora]

Your question is whether there are maps with the areas delineated as such south of 60. The answer is yes, those maps are available.

And to your second question of how one balances these with the resource potential of an area, my department and sector participate in a process--a MIRA or resource assessment--that looks at the mining and energy potential of an area when government decisions are made about setting aside particular areas for parks, or for the conservation of a particular species, or what have you. We certainly take part in that process.

We do a full assessment of current and future potential. It is ultimately the responsibility of the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Developmentto consult with our department and Parks Canada and others before a decision can be made that an area is off limits, if you like, to further exploration.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

If I heard you correctly, then these maps are available for the other provinces as well? Would it be possible for you to table those with the committee?

[Anil Arora]

I am just mindful of....

Which department would we refer that to, Patrick?

[Patrick O'Neill]

We can certainly get the one for Nunavut. The Nunavut Planning Commission is undergoing a large regional planning process to come up with the colours that you see here, the areas that would be open for development and those that would be closed. It would be a bit of a treasure hunt to come up with all of the provincial maps, but they must exist.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

I asked because I'd be interested in them in regard to northern Quebec, and for some of the other provinces, including New Brunswick.

It makes me wonder. I would expect that because of jurisdictional issues, that might be a partnership between Natural Resources Canada and the provinces, and maybe the geomapping outfit or some other facility within NRCan is responsible for coming up with these.

[Ginny Flood]

There are various maps around and we'll check for them. Environment Canada is doing a lot of land use planning with a number of provinces that are interested in that, so they probably have some.

We'll check and verify that those maps are available.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

That would be wonderful.

[Ginny Flood]

I'm not sure they overlay the resource potential, though, but would very much be for protected areas.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Fair enough. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Allen.

Mr. Lizon, for about three minutes.

[Wladyslaw Lizon, Conservative, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

I want to continue with the earlier question I was going to ask.

We were talking about the challenges of infrastructure and transportation. For the proposed projects, especially when it comes to metal ores, whether it's iron ore or copper, are there some plants planned in the proximity of the mine that would refine the product? Instead of shipping the raw product, the iron ore, are they planning on refining it on-site before shipping it out?

[Anil Arora]

Generally, no. Especially in the north, you generally wouldn't see the kind of infrastructure required to put up a plant or the kind of energy required to operate a plant of that nature. Many companies have smelting and refining facilities in other parts of Canada, and it's a business case for them to look at where it makes sense to do that. In some cases they do ship the product to Newfoundland or various other parts of the country. In other cases, given the infrastructure, there is no business case for them to do so, in which case the raw material is shipped out. We do play in the free market.

I do know that some provinces have said, and others are thinking about saying, that if you find something, it has to be refined within the same province. Some provinces have put on some restrictions. There are pros and cons to putting restrictions on where the product can be processed.

[Wladyslaw Lizon, Conservative, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

That was quick. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

All right.

I'll go then to Monsieur Lapointe for about three minutes.

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I asked earlier whether it would be possible to provide a recent study on the cost of closing a mine in order to see how the matter is handled. Would there be a relatively recent study available, one that does not go back 15 years, for example?

[Patrick O'Neill]

My understanding is that the Ekati diamond mine in the Northwest Territories has somewhere between $240 million and $280 million in posted security. That could be in a bond, a promissory note, or that kind of thing—but essentially it's a claim against the company. It's still under way.

Another thing I would like to clarify is that most modern reclamation and remediation regimes have built in this idea of progressive reclamation. As a company is winding down its operation through its life cycle, it undertakes the work as it goes, if you will, so that the final price tag associated with closing the mine after production has stopped is less than its full potential cost. It would be very different for proprietors to walk away from a project mid-production; you would have maybe a $300 million price tag. As they wind down their operations, they may only have $60 million left and they will do that as part of their corporate and social licence to do another project.

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

In other words, there is no available report describing a complete cycle. There is no document we could consult setting out how closing costs were assessed and how a mine closure was managed.

[Patrick O'Neill]

No, you can access the documents. Again, I can only speak to my experience, but certainly in the process in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, all of the documents associated with those environmental assessments are posted on their web pages, and you would be able to find estimates of mine site reclamation through those organizations. As well, though the NOAMI process that my ADM spoke about earlier is slightly different, it would have estimates of the costs associated with governments having to take control or management of an abandoned site and to deal with reclamation. So they are available.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Lapointe.

Mr. Calkins, and finally, Mr. Anderson.

If we can wrap it up in four minutes or so, that would be great.

Mr. Calkins for three minutes.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Mr. Chair, I think I have an outstanding question from my first round that is still to be answered. It's about the agreement. We, the Government of Canada, invest; we have this information in our systems; we provide it for the private sector. What do we get back as taxpayers for that investment other than the obvious economic development that ensues?

My second question is about your information systems. With the Government of Canada going forward with its open data, open information initiative—and not only that, but also consolidating government information systems from the current widespread and massive number of information systems we now have—how is that going to affect the information systems you have? I'm assuming you're using GIS technology for all of your mapping, and so on, and I'm wondering what the effect on that will be.

Also, could you explain to me the royalty structure? If you're collecting on behalf...how does that rebate system work with the territorial governments? I'm curious as to how that works. What departments and what agencies are involved, and is there some way we could get some clarification on this?

If you could do that in four minutes or less, that'd be great.

[Anil Arora]

Yes, yes, no, no, maybe.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!