Transport Committee on April 2nd, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to the eleventh meeting of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, with our orders of the day pursuant to the order of reference of Wednesday, February 25, 2009, Bill C-3, An Act to amend the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act.

Joining us today in the first hour from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans are: René Grenier, Jaime Caceres, Michel Desparois, and Larry Trigatti. From the Department of National Defence, we have Casper Donovan. From the Department of the Environment, we have Robert Allin, Michael Wilson, and Linda Porebski.

Welcome. I hope you've been advised that you have roughly five minutes to make a brief presentation. Then the members will have questions for you. I don't know if anybody wants to take the lead.

Perhaps I'll start with Mr. Donovan. Do you have any opening comments?

[Captain, N) Casper Donovan (Director, Maritime Strategy, Department of National Defence]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I welcome the opportunity, but I did not prepare an opening statement, mostly because of the amount of time I had to prepare for today's appearance.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Absolutely. We appreciate that.

Mr. Grenier.

[René Grenier, Deputy Commissioner, Maritimes Services, Canadian Coast Guard, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Neither did we, because I was told just this morning that we were going to appear here. We had to scramble together some notes. But we are happy to be here, and hopefully we'll be able to answer all your questions or be helpful.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Wonderful. That's kind of how we operate in this committee, so it works very well.

Mr. Wilson, do you have comments?

[Michael Wilson, Executive Director, Environmental Assessment and Marine Program, Department of the Environment]

We actually have two short opening statements, so we'll make up for it.

I'll speak briefly on Environment Canada's mandates on marine Arctic protection.

Robert Allin is from the enforcement branch. He'll speak of the enforcement program that we have there, because I understand that was of interest in some of the discussions you've had recently.

I'm going to speak to Environment Canada's mandate for protecting oceans from pollution, to give you a context to our work.

Like a number of departments, we have a mandate for environmental protection and conservation in the Arctic marine environment. We use several legislative instruments to realize this mandate. I'll quickly go through each of those legislative mandates.

One of the main ones is under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, which gives us disposal at sea provisions. These provide that no person shall dispose of substances from a vessel or other structure at sea without a permit. Environment Canada manages a permitting program, a monitoring program, and an enforcement program. These programs are designed to prevent marine pollution. These provisions are consistent with our international obligations under dumping conventions and under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. They apply in all Canadian marine waters out to the 200-mile zone limit of the exclusive economic zone. Generally this program is used to prevent dredged material from being deposited in unauthorized sites or prevent dangerous materials from being deposited in the ocean from dredging.

Environment Canada also administers the Migratory Birds Convention Act. Under this act, no person or vessel shall deposit a substance that is harmful to migratory birds, or permit such a substance to be deposited, in a water or area frequented by migratory birds. This act also extends to the 200-mile limit of the exclusive economic zone.

Third, other parts of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act and the Fisheries Act give us quite a broad range of authorities to prevent different forms of pollutive activities, including pollution into water. These would tend to be used to control land-based sources of pollution. We have regulations under these authorities that control liquid discharge from mining operations or pulp and paper operations. They tend to be closer to coasts than would be necessary for the 200-mile limit provisions. We also administer the pollution prevention parts of the Fisheries Act, which is a general prohibition against depositing deleterious substances into water frequented by fish.

The last piece of legislation that is pertinent here, the Species at Risk Act, provides that no person shall kill, harm, harass, capture, or take an individual of a wildlife species that is listed as extirpated, endangered, or threatened. This applies in Arctic waters as well as on the land, but only to a 12-mile limit.

The last mandate area I wanted to talk to, keeping in mind that Robert will talk about our enforcement program, is emergency response and cleanup.

Environment Canada is a primary resource to the Canadian Coast Guard. We have the capacity and mandate to provide scientific and technical information and advice for environmentally sensitive areas, information on weather and sea state, and emergency response and cleanup in the marine environment.

You can see that Environment Canada has a number of important roles to play in protecting the Arctic marine environment, but they're by no means comprehensive. The Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act plays a key role as well.

That leads to the last point I wanted to make in my opening remarks. Because of the complementary roles Environment Canada’s legislation and the AWPPA play, we were consulted as the legislative amendments were being developed. We were briefed at the officials level, and we expressed no concerns or reservations about what was proposed there. It's consistent with where Environment Canada has gone on pollution prevention legislation that's used to control marine pollution.

Those are my statements.

Before we go further, perhaps Robert Allin could give a short statement on enforcement programs.

[Robert Allin, Director, Strategic Policy, Planning and Coordination, Enforcement Branch, Department of the Environment]

Thank you, Michael.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the opportunity to speak to you today.

Environment Canada's enforcement branch is responsible for enforcing a number of important environmental laws, such as those my colleague has mentioned: the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, the pollution prevention provisions of the Fisheries Act, and the Migratory Birds Convention Act, all of which, of course, apply to the Arctic as well. However, Environment Canada does not enforce the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act. This is a Transport Canada responsibility.

Much of our compliance verification work in the area focuses, as Michael has said, on sectors such as operating mines, advanced mineral exploration sites, and federal facilities. Under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act,we enforce regulations pertaining to PCBs, halocarbons, disposal at sea permits, fuel storage tanks, and these sorts of things, mostly land-based.

We currently have six enforcement officers stationed in the Arctic, with five in Yellowknife and one in Iqaluit. We'll soon be adding another four in Yellowknife, bringing our total to ten, and twelve if you include the two officers we have in Whitehorse.

We have strong partnerships with the other federal organizations active in the area, such as Transport Canada, Indian and Northern Affairs, the RCMP, colleagues from the coast guard, Fisheries and Oceans, and, of course, the territorial governments.

We're members of the key environmental protection and enforcement bodies such as the Northwest Territories/Nunavut Spills Working Agreement, which is a single window for reporting spills and dispatching information to the appropriate agency. We also participate in the Arctic security interdepartmental working group, which is focused primarily on security, but every session always has an element on the environment.

Our partners serve as additional eyes and ears in northern communities and also provide us access to important assets such as ships and aircraft for transportation and surveillance. As examples, Transport Canada provides us with information from their daily surveillance overflights of Arctic areas, and the RCMP make watercraft available to us when needed. Territorial enforcement officers are also designated, under federal wildlife enforcement laws such as the Migratory Birds Convention Act, to add further reach to the federal powers.

With respect to marine incidents specifically, the coast guard, of course, is the first responder for spills. Follow-up investigations are conducted either by Transport Canada or by Environment Canada, or by both, depending on the nature of the spill, and in accordance with a memorandum of understanding between our two departments that sets out the respective roles and responsibilities. In a typical year, we may respond to between two and three marine incidents.

Although the Arctic is vast and challenging, our officers and our partners work in concert to enforce environmental laws in this important and sensitive region.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Volpe.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Thank you, Chairman.

Thank you, gentlemen and lady, for coming and sharing some of your views with us.

I realize this will probably come out in the questions and answers. Some of the members of this committee were concerned about the overall implications on policy in various departments as a result of some of the witnesses who came forward.

I'm going to limit myself to one very brief question. It emanates from what the Minister of Transport said in this committee on March 24:

For Canada to truly exercise effective management in the Arctic, we need to put in place a strong and proactive regulatory framework for marine transportation and we need to back that up with real action. We're very much being proactive in this regard, not waiting for next year, or 10 years, or 25 years from now for an accident to happen and for us to regret not taking more proactive measures.

Can any of you tell me--perhaps I might start with you, Captain--what measures you have to enforce Arctic sovereignty and for the environment today, and what measures you'll have in place if this bill becomes law? To paraphrase myself, aside from being consulted, were there extra funds expended for you to better equip yourself for the task at hand?

[Capt(N) Casper Donovan]

Thank you, Mr. Volpe.

I'd preface my remarks by saying, representing the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces, that we do not have an actual mandate to enforce the laws and regulations of which you speak. However, we're working day in and day out with the various government departments that do have those mandates.

As you can imagine, the Canadian Forces and the department have a variety of assets, whether they be satellites or access to satellites, aircraft, ships, and personnel—for example, the Rangers in the Arctic—that can all be used in concert with the assets that other government departments use to understand what is going on in the Arctic and to determine whether there is an incident or situation in which some enforcement may be required.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

So nothing beyond what you currently have.

Mr. Grenier?

[René Grenier]

I'm the deputy commissioner of the coast guard. I brought these gentlemen with me because we didn't really have time to prepare. But we're here on behalf of the coast guard.

I'm sure you're all aware that we have money for a new polar icebreaker. It's not going to be an addition, but rather a replacement for the Louis St. Laurent, which is quite old. It's going to be a ship that is probably much more powerful and able to stay in the Arctic much longer than the Louis St. Laurent. We also—

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Those funds were allocated before the bill was proposed.

[René Grenier]

Yes.

We will also start two NAVAREAs in the Arctic. Canada has been asked by the IMO to be the one to transmit notices to mariners in the Arctic. That's something we'll be starting in January of next year. Also, the long-range identification tracking system that's going to be in place will help us track ships up north as well as within 1,000 miles of our coasts.

Those are the enhancements, if you will, that we're looking at besides our ten icebreakers in the Arctic and the traffic stations we have, which I'm sure you know about.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Bagnell, you have three minutes.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you.

This is probably for Environment Canada. We had the Beaufort project representatives here, and a couple of professors made the point that there's no technology at the moment to clean up oil spills under the ice. The minister talked about the importance of development of oil and gas in the north and about the huge reserves. Some 25% percent of the world's remaining reserves of oil and 33% of gas are found there.

I'm wondering what work Environment Canada is doing—what research it's funding, etc.—to deal with this lack of technology that would hinder the minister's objective of developing the oil and gas in the north.

[Michael Wilson]

It's a good question. I don't have information on the technology or research programs that we're involved in for technology development. I can certainly, through the chair, get that information back to the committee, but we're not from the technology section of Environment Canada. I'm sorry.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I'll think of another question.

The minister said that you have responsibility for monitoring this, but he didn't know how many planes and boats you had. Considering that this new responsibility, as Mr. Volpe said, starts more than 100 miles offshore, what types of...? He also said that Environment Canada has a responsibility. How many boats and planes do you have to discharge it?

[Robert Allin]

We have very limited assets in the area. We're based out of Yellowknife, because that's where our regulatory agenda puts us, as the best base of operations.

Remember that a lot of our focus is on, I'd say, the resource extraction industry and on federal facilities subject to our regulation. We're not primarily focused on the marine environment. That being said, we have agreements with partners such that, at any time we need to respond to a spill, we have access to their assets. In most cases, we're responding with partners who have those assets—for instance, Transport.

[Michael Wilson]

To make sure we're clear, this bill doesn't create new regulatory responsibilities for us that we would be enforcing.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Okay.

To all the panellists, basically we've added an area the size of Saskatchewan, with new responsibilities, as Mr. Volpe said, but no one has confirmed that there are any new resources. Normally when you do a bill that has some ramifications, you also do a study on the resources to implement a bill.

Do any panellists want to comment?

[Capt(N) Casper Donovan]

Sir, if I might, one part of the answer I didn't get to with Mr. Volpe was that the navy and the Department of National Defence are pursuing the project to acquire Arctic offshore patrol vessels. Those vessels are being designed to be far more capable than our current fleet in operating in Canada's north. So there will be some additional assets in the future in that regard.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

They can go in a metre of ice. That ice can be more six metres thick, so it leaves a lot of the year and a lot of area still not covered.

[Capt(N) Casper Donovan]

That is true. They're being designed to go through first-year ice, and I believe it's about a metre thick. However, the thicker the ice gets--and I am not an expert in Arctic navigation, per se--the fewer vessels you have transiting those waters. You have those waters to enforce the regulations on, but there are far fewer vessels capable of transiting those waters when the ice gets far thicker. They go hand in hand.