But from the northwest coast of British Columbia to the House of Commons, the tanker spill is being debated anew.
Could it happen here?
Not a chance, says the country’s natural resources minister, Joe Oliver.
Opposition leaders and critics from the west coast say Oliver is making a claim of enhanced maritime safety that is all spin and little substance.
And British Columbia’s Coastal First Nations marked the anniversary with a dramatic television ad, complete with Simon and Garfunkel sound track and radio transmission from the tanker, airing explaining what would happen if a Valdez-style tanker spill occurred in this country.
Meanwhile, the Conservative government continues to blanket the airwaves with an ad of its own, part of a $9 million natural resources advertising campaign to tout its environmental record, featuring a mother and son walking along pristine coastline.
It is all part of Canada’s other pipeline battle. While the Keystone XL is attracting the most media and political attention at the moment — including a White House intervention Tuesday by Los Angeles Kings coach Darryl Sutter — the $6.5 billion Northern Gateway pipeline is the Conservative government’s route to Asia, via supertankers, from Kitimat, B.C.
Oliver is adamant that an Exxon Valdez-type spill can never happen in Canadian waters.
“It cannot happen here,’’ he told me, flatly.
“The factors which led to the Exxon Valdez spill off the coast of Alaska cannot be repeated in Canadian waters. Our rules require that all tankers be double-hulled, have pilots on board, be escorted by tug boats, possess advanced (and working) navigation equipment and rely on up-to-date charting and GPS.
“None of those factors were present with respect to the Valdez accident.’’
He also says his government is building a world-class emergency response system and maintains there has never been a major tanker spill in this country.
The latter assertion conveniently ignores the 1970 Chedabucto Bay spill in which 9,370 tonnes of fuel were spilled, coating 120 kilometres of the Nova Scotia coast line, albeit more than 40 years ago.
The Exxon Valdez spill cost Alaska nearly $2 billion in clean-up costs, but the spill also depleted the salmon, herring, sea otter and other wildlife populations, badly damaged the tourism industry and took a toll on First Nations who relied on fishing for their livelihood.
The Coastal First Nations, citing a study by former provincial environment official and Simon Fraser University professor Tom Gunton, say a spill could cost British Columbia taxpayers $21.4 billion and cost 4,300 tourism and fishing jobs.
Oliver, fresh from a West Coast visit to tout tanker safety, cites a number of factors that led to the Exxon Valdez spill: it was single-hulled, there was no pilot on board, no tugboat, the radar equipment was not on, the third mate was asleep, the captain had been drinking and the tanker was too close to the shore.
“It was every possible screw-up imaginable,’’ he says.
He also says any clean-up bill would be the responsibility of vessel operator so Canadian and British Columbian taxpayers were not on the hook.
That would have to be enshrined in law, his critics say.
They have other issues with Oliver’s abiding faith in the double hull.
Art Sterritt, the executive director of the Coastal First Nations, says the terrain around the B.C. inland waters is so foreboding that if a tanker hit the granite shores, “it would rip the vessel apart whether it is single-, double- or triple-hulled.’’
Green Party leader Elizabeth May said double-hulled vessels have been the global maritime rule for 20 years, an agreement for newly constructed vessels spurred by the Exxon Valdez disaster.
“This is like saying, ‘We have good news, we’re going to put seatbelts in cars.’ ”
There is no doubt a double-hulled vessel reduces the risk of an oil spill, but study after study agrees they are no panacea and there have been numerous double-hulled spills over the past 20 years.
This is not a theoretical debate. The joint review panel recommendation on the Northern Gateway is due in December.
The battle is being waged right now over the environment, but don’t expect this to be fully resolved by 2015. That’s when British Columbia voters will pronounce, and with 42 seats up for grabs, they will have a lot to say.
Original Article
Source: thestar.com
Author: Tim Harper
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