Uhm. I may be wrong, but they have 100% not starting building the Northern Gateway. Last time I checked the review panel set up by the NEB was hearing from intervenor's followed by oral comments from citizens at various hearings. Because so many people signed up to speak, the date they wanted to start building at if the project was approved will be pushed back most likely.
I believe this to be the case - anyone and their dog can get standing to speak in front of the NEB. I'm pretty sure the Ottawa rotary club has speaking time.
Northern Gateway crosses thousands of streams a rivers, and the company that is building it (Enbridge) has an average of 50 pipeline leaks or spills a year.
Enbridge operates lines in Alberta. Here is a map of the pipeline networks in Alberta and BC.
As you can see there are a ridiculous number of lines and... oh, wait, shit, that doesn't actually show light pipelines.
So... yeah... there might be a couple of spills in a network that size every now and again. The thing is, lines like Gateway and Keystone, if properly built, are significant enough and high-priority enough for the spill likelihood to be relatively low and the response mearsures to a spill to be pretty significant, so it makes sense to work on ensuring that's the case. Doing so is good for the environment AND the oil companies.
In the route that they will ship the tankers through, a BC Ferry sank in 2006
I think the ferry sinking was pilot error wasn't it? I'm pretty sure the captain was found to be at fault, which no one was surprised about as he was reportedly a fuck-up.
Also, this pipeline is not to ship the oil we are currently producing from the tar sands out, but to make room for expansion, which will make it impossible for Canada to reach their energy goals.
Why is expanding our energy production capacity a bad thing??? Increasing exports of our most valuable natural resource is a positive step for the economy which will allow us to maintain the high standard of living Canadians are used to while working on improving aspects of our society we're not so pleased with, like health care wait times and standards. Maybe we can afford to pay teachers more. Provide tax incentives for alternative energy production (hell, we already incentivize wind farming like no tomorrow). Yknow, all that fun stuff that an expanded tax base and a spend-happy consumer population lets governments do.
Every single native group along the coast of the tanker route is opposed to it.
Yes, and every single one will end up signing off. The key for bands is to use whatever leverage they have at their disposal to get the best possible deal out of this that they can. They'll eventually be bought, for money or infrastructure or whatever ends up greasing the wheels. This is how things are done, which is fine because they have that negotiating position for a reason. It's their land.
Reasons why it's ridiculous, and if people have any sense, not going to happen.
There are points against it. You've made a few. Even for a second seriously believing that it's not going to happen, though, is not sense. It's the opposite of sense. It's going to happen. Delaying the inevitable is contrary to everyone's interests.
