Environment Committee on Oct. 27th, 2011

[Brenda Kenny]

Any consolidation is helpful because it focuses attention. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, most of our members would prefer to see consolidation, meaning that the National Energy Board is asked to take the lead. That is a routine approach, and the results have been very positive in terms of results in pipelines. We believe that's a great avenue to ensure that environmental protection is solidly a part of every project design.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Centre-North, AB]

Further consolidation could occur by providing the agency with more authority to deal with what are now larger screenings, and providing the minister with more authority with respect to major projects. In effect, this would remove the two-step decision-making process after a comprehensive study where the minister takes an environmental assessment decision, followed by responsible authorities' environmental decisions.

Would this further consolidation make environmental assessments more predictable and straightforward for your membership?

[Brenda Kenny]

Yes. Removing multiple steps is certainly helpful.

Again, if the focus is on environmental protection, you have to ask, do these extra steps result in a better outcome? In our experience, generally the answer is, flatly, no.

[The Chair, Conservative, Mark Warawa]

Time has expired. Thank you very much.

Mr. Hyer is next, at seven minutes.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Hi, Mr. Lindgren. Welcome.

[Richard Lindgren]

Thank you.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

I have a lot of questions for you, so I'm going to try to be quick, so how about your trying to be time-effective and see if we can get them all in.

First, you underscore that public participation is critical. You seem to imply it's inadequate, so who should we...? There's the question of CEAA, and then there's also our committee. Do you have any suggestions on who this committee should call as witnesses in addition to you?

Is it worthwhile for this committee to travel, and if so, where and how? Should we take this on the road?

Particularly, do you have any ideas for us or CEAA relating to first nations?

In a concise statement, could you deal with all of that?

[Richard Lindgren]

Well, certainly I would recommend that this process be as open and as inclusive and as accessible as possible. If that means taking this committee out on the road to hear directly from affected first nations, environmental groups, and others who would like to see a rigorous environmental assessment process or who may have some interesting stories or recommendations to make, I think that would be beneficial, so as to hear directly from all the interested stakeholders and not just the few of us who can make it to Ottawa from time to time.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

One of your five points dealt with the self-assessment model in CEAA. The commissioner and you as well have repeatedly raised the issue of cumulative impacts and how we deal with them, and of the inability so far of the agency to deal with them effectively.

How should the agency ensure that responsible authorities are conducting good-quality environmental assessments, including those with cumulative impacts, which seem so hard to deal with?

[Richard Lindgren]

I could think of a variety of means to beef up the cumulative environmental assessment analysis. First of all, there are some guidelines and policies to provide guidance to practitioners that could be reviewed and probably improved in terms of what we're really looking for.

As well, a number of observers and EA practitioners have recommended that perhaps, at least with respect to smaller projects, the best way to look at cumulative environmental effects is to conduct regional-level assessments of various types of programs and try to get at the issue that way, rather than put the burden on proponents of individual projects or the responsible authorities to try to do it on a case-by-case basis.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

You've led right into my next question. You mention strategic-level environmental assessment for government plans, policies, and programs, whether regionally or nationally. Would you like to amplify that a bit?

[Richard Lindgren]

Well, I think the committee made a great start on this whole issue back in its 2003 report. It made a series of general recommendations on how that should be done and what the parameters should be and how we can build some accountability and predictability into a strategic-level environmental assessment. I think those are grand ideas, and I think they need to be implemented.

I was thinking on the way here about what would be a good example of this. I'm involved in a screening of an ethanol facility that's being proposed for the Oshawa waterfront. It triggered the screening because it wants some federal money to go ahead. There is a federal program available to ethanol proponents to build and operate refineries. We're duking it out with the proponent and the consultants as to whether ethanol really is a good idea.

But we're doing it on a site-specific or project-specific basis. I think it would have been really great, before the federal government instituted the program making funding available for such projects, to take a look, at a broader, more strategic, or national level, at whether or not ethanol is where we want to be. That, I think, would have made it easier for project proponents to get through the process, because some of the big-ticket questions about whether this a good idea or whether there are better ways to get at it would have been answered in another process.

That's a good, concrete example of areas in which we could probably get at some of these bigger questions and fundamental issues through higher-level environmental assessment.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

And you've led again into my next question.

The commissioner felt that screenings were not being done well. Would you agree? And is it a problem within the act? Do we need to change something in the act to make it more effective, or is it just poor coordination by the agency in terms of how they're administering the act now, or both?

[Richard Lindgren]

I think the act is fine in terms of the content requirements for screenings. But sometimes there's a disconnect between what the act requires and what responsible authorities are generating in the form of screening. There is an opportunity for perhaps better outreach and educational and professional development that could be delivered by the agency, so that responsible authorities and the proponents and others know exactly what's expected of them when they're trying to complete a screening.

I would also say in fairness that the quality of screenings has been mixed. I agree with the commissioner that there have been screenings of questionable quality—let's put it that way. But I've seen some good screenings, too. This identifies a need for perhaps better outreach and better education for people who are doing the screenings, so that they fully understand their legal obligations in terms of environmental content.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Do I have time for one more question, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Mark Warawa]

Yes, you do.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

The commissioner also recommended that CEAA should deal better with coordination between various agencies concerning scoping and various things. You're not going to be able to do this in the next minute, but you have indicated in your brief that you're probably going to send us more material later. You may want to comment now, but I hope you'll give us some advice on just how we would go about improving ministerial discretion in scoping when there is more than one authority.

How could better coordination occur? How can we best resolve these jurisdictional disputes in some cases, or just inadequacies in other areas?

[The Chair, Conservative, Mark Warawa]

You have 20 seconds.

[Richard Lindgren]

I will certainly undertake to address those issues and others and write a report. I can't do it in 20 seconds.

[The Chair, Conservative, Mark Warawa]

Thank you so much, Mr. Hyer.

Next is Mr. Lunney.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I thank both witnesses for being here today. It's an important discussion we're having. I note that Ms. Kenny started by commenting that she'd been around as a regulator on these issues for most of her career.

Mr. Lindgren, I noted that you commented that you have been around the table on these particular discussions for some time. You mentioned that you had a little more hair when you started. I identify with that remark. I've been around the table a little while myself. I think you've done a better job of holding onto your hair.

Having established that, my question is actually directed towards CEPA.

CEPA was one of nine signatories to a letter on June 30, 2011, to the Minister of Natural Resources. That letter noted improvements to the coordination of federal environmental assessment as a result of the Jobs and Economic Growth Act passed by the government. CEAA is now responsible for most comprehensive study-level environmental assessments.

Could you please elaborate on the position that CEPA took at that time in support of improvements coming out of the Jobs and Economic Growth Act?

[Brenda Kenny]

We found that it was important to achieve what clarity was possible in some of those kinds of fixes. The coordination was critical. We need to be able to simplify EA and focus efforts on things that matter most.

Our central belief is that you have to be focused on outcomes rather than process. Process is important, but outcomes matter most. Consolidation allows you to exercise better focus and also allows you to learn from experience and exercise it. We just heard in the last comment that sometimes, for example, screening quality can be mixed. Consolidation can help with it.

We remain of the view that best-placed regulators are the way to achieve this. There certainly are many important functions for the agency to pay attention to in cases in which there may not be a best-placed regulator, but where there are best-placed regulators, leverage them, because they will deeply know what's going on with those projects day in day out and will be able to deliver the best possible outcomes.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you for that.

CEAA is triggered when there is a federal decision about a project.

[Brenda Kenny]

Yes.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

But there are projects that have environmental effects in areas of federal jurisdiction but that do not require an EA because there's no associated federal decision.

Should there be authority to require an EA based on the potential for environmental effects upon matters within federal jurisdiction?