Environment Committee on March 29th, 2018

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I can. It's parliamentary privilege.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Mr. Amos.

Okay, you're giving your spot to Ms. May.

Ms. May, you're up.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Just a very quick spot. If I can go for 45 seconds, and then it can go back to you, Will. Is that okay?

[William Amos, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

My understanding, Ms. May, is we're able to make it so that I go at the end for my full period, and you get a full—

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

I'm going to add a little more time.

You have six minutes. Go right ahead.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you.

I wanted to address my question to the Mining Association of Canada because earlier you used the term “disproportionate” around what had happened to the mining industry under CEAA 2012. I'll say it right out loud so everyone knows. I've been a colleague of Mr. Gratton and Ms. Laurie-Lean for quite some time because we've been on multi-stakeholder panels when I was at the Sierra Club of Canada. We've worked on EA for a while.

How many years have you worked on the EA process in your role as a representative of the mining industry?

[Justyna Laurie-Lean, Vice-President, Environment and Regulatory Affairs, Mining Association of Canada]

It's 26 years.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Okay, so you have a lot of experience.

I wanted to ask is that, given your experience, on behalf of the mining industry, interacting with several different iterations of environmental assessment law in Canada.... You've experienced the environmental assessment process up to 2012, under the previous CEAA. You've experienced CEAA 2012. I know you haven't experienced Bill C-69 because it isn't in place yet, but from what you're experienced, Mr. Gratton, which would you say was the form of EA that was fairest and easiest to work with from the point of view of MAC?

[Pierre Gratton]

I'll spare the committee from having me breaking into song and singing Cher's If I Could Turn Back Time, but there's this collective view within our membership that the best years of environmental assessment were from 2010 to 2012. If the previous government had stopped in 2010, that was when the regime was the most predictable. Most certainly collaboration with the provinces was best, and the projects that went through in that window—which wasn't very long.... That was the heyday of environmental assessment for our sector.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Following up on that, one of the things that were novel...and I think for a lot of people who are looking at Bill C-69, their only experience was with CEAA 2012. It's not to say that they don't have background and experience, but some people are relatively newer to the process than are some of us who have been through this a few times.

Prior to CEAA 2012 there wouldn't have been the problem for your industry of the National Energy Board, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, or the offshore boards having a role. You worked exclusively with one agency. I don't want to answer the question for you, but what is your experience with the energy regulators' introduction to the process?

[Pierre Gratton]

Go ahead.

[Justyna Laurie-Lean]

It wasn't so much the introduction or non-introduction of the NEB and the CNSC, because they don't affect any of our members' projects other than CNSC for uranium. It was more the introduction of the agency. Prior to 2010 you had the diffuse self-assessment by 40, I think it was, federal authorities. They naturally dragged their heels. They just never started the assessments, whereas the agency, whose job it was do assessments, started the assessments. To us, that was just the best thing ever, that they actually started.

Initially 2012 sounded like it might be an improvement, and we didn't initially see the disproportionate number. I mean, in the first couple of years of CEAA, we were 80% of the projects and we were not 80% of anything.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Please clarify. When you say the first years of CEAA, do you mean...?

[Justyna Laurie-Lean]

I mean CEAA 2012.

So that was a shock. But then some of the other provisions weren't evident and what was envisaged at the time of the passing of 2012 wasn't what was implemented. Some of the problems didn't really become evident until 2015 or 2016.

[Pierre Gratton]

The obvious one was cumulative effects, and I'll just give you an example. There is a mining project in northeast B.C. that reached a conclusion of significant adverse cumulative effects. As a result of that, a decision by cabinet was required. There was an 18-month delay before cabinet actually ruled and justified the project so it could proceed. The issue had to do with the project, which is an underground coal mine with a very small footprint, and its contribution to the cumulative effects on caribou, and the traditional rights of indigenous peoples to hunt the caribou.

While this was going on, the NEB approved an energy pipeline whose impact on the same habitat was three times the size of this mine, so you had a very different conclusion from two separate federal agencies. No one, and I'm sure the previous government, would ever have anticipated that would be the outcome of CEAA 2012. We did not foresee the cumulative effects and that, being one of the only ones left standing under CEAA 2012, that would be the outcome, but that is what has happened. Among the issues that changes in this proposed legislation will fix will be, we hope, that particular issue.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you. I really appreciate the time from my Liberal colleagues.

[Liam Mooney]

Sorry, I just want to make one interjection here. I think we would largely agree with some of the sentiments expressed, but we do have the view within the Canadian Nuclear Association that the introduction in 2012 of a single authority to lead both the assessment and the licensing was a positive change for our industry, because it brought to a head some of the questions that Mr. Gratton was talking about with regard to leading and moving matters forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, Deb Schulte]

Thank you very much.

Normally at this point Ms. Duncan would have three minutes, so I'm quite prepared to add three minutes to yours to give you six. You guys would have six and six and then we would be done. That's adding on an extra short round.

Ms. Duncan.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you. We'll just see how it goes. I may not need it all.

I want to thank Mr. Gratton for his intervention saying that there should also be support for the public, indigenous, and so forth—financial support to participate in the regulatory process. We talk about it for the EIA process but we never talk about the parallel. I would encourage him to write a letter of support for the Canadian Environmental Network, which is seeking restoration of the fund that Mr. Baird cut. It was started in 1979 and it was very helpful because then we had constructive input to industry. I would encourage you to speak to the Canadian Environmental Network. Thank you for your intervention on that.

I think it was the Canadian Electricity Association that raised this issue. They were concerned that there's not enough emphasis in this review on the economic benefits. Surely it's equally important that we also identify the economic costs. For example, some development could impact other sectors, like the fishery, or it could impact the traditional harvest or tourism, or it could cause health impacts through air pollution or contamination of water.

Back in the 1980s, my recollection is that we did a lot of work before review panels, not just on the environmental and economic impact assessment but also on the social impact. For some reason, by the time we got to the mid-1990s, that disappeared. Would you not agree that there probably is a lot of expertise out there that we could just bring back? This isn't something new and different that, when looking at the sustainability of a project, we look at a more broad-based....

Is it not also true that the federal government has an international obligation to deliver on the 2030 sustainable development goals, and this is the mechanism to do that?

[Francis Bradley]

Just to preface it, and Terry can talk about some of the specifics, when you're talking specifically about electricity and about the emphasis on costs and impacts, I would just step back and point out that it was noted earlier that, with Canada's greenhouse gas emissions targets, we seem to be stalled, but that's not the case with respect to electricity.

With respect to the electricity sector, over the last 20 years—

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

That's not what I'm getting to.

[Francis Bradley]

That is within the context and Terry will—

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

The specific concern was raised that they thought Bill C-69 does not have enough emphasis on the economic advantages or benefits.

What I'm asking is this. Should we not be doing a balance? My recollection is that, at every hearing I've been at, we hear lots about the economic benefits. The local county comes in, the local towns, and so forth. Should we not also be hearing about the other side, possible economic costs?

[Terry Toner]

In the actual written text of our initial presentation, that section was entitled “Balance”, so balance is what we're hoping to see. We expect, with the wording in the bill and the documents that are prepared around the edges of that—the regulations and so on—that there will be the re-emergence of additional consideration for indigenous, health, and socio-economic. We're concerned that there's not also a bit more information and emphasis on the fact that there are economic benefits in many cases for some of our projects. We expect to see all of those things. We're simply pointing out that it's only mentioned twice in the bill, and we think that others are mentioned in more places.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Maybe I could turn to Mr. Gratton again, because he provided that information about where they have been employing indigenous people in their projects and so forth. Surely it's the job of proponents, in parallel to the review of these projects, to be pursuing economic benefits for the community. Surely that's not just the responsibility of the review agency. It's my impression that, the more work the proponent does up front in working with environmentalists, local communities, and the indigenous people, the better the chances are of getting your project approved and with fewer objections.