“Ever since they took control of the Transmountain Pipeline and Westridge Terminal in 2005 Kinder Morgan has worked to quietly increase tar sands oil exports through their pipeline and onto to tankers in Vancouver Harbour,” said Ben West, Healthy Community Campaigner with the Wilderness Committee.

“Now that they are set to announce their plans to twin their pipeline we have decided to beat Kinder Morgan to the punch with our own report on the impacts of this expansion,” said West.

The Wilderness Committee has published a new report entitled ‘Do You Want To Help Stop An Oil Spill?’ (the full report is available here). This report explores the Kinder Morgan proposal in the context of the high profile fights against the Keystone XL Pipeline, and the Enbridge Pipeline as well as other tar sands export proposals. 

Kinder Morgan has publicly stated that by the end of March they will apply to the National Energy Board (NEB) of Canada to expand their Trans Mountain pipeline that runs from the Alberta tar sands to the Burnaby Westridge terminal on Burrard Inlet. This proposal would see the pipeline’s capacity increase from 300,000 barrels of oil/day to as much as 700,000 barrels/day. This would mean a potential increase from 22 tankers in Burrard Inlet when Kinder Morgan bought the pipeline, to 280 tankers if their plan is allowed to proceed. 

"The export crude oil from the Alberta tar sands via new pipelines and oil tankers is meeting a rising wave of public opposition,” said West. On Monday, nearly 2,000 people join a daytime rally in downtown Vancouver against tar sands pipelines and tankers. 

"Both of these pipeline proposals in BC are all about exporting crude oil from the tar sands, which means billions of dollars for Big Oil executives and unacceptable risks for our coast that no amount of money could replace" said West. 

"Ultimately these pipelines would undermine our responsibilities to the global community to do what we can to stop global warming, and this alone should trump all other considerations,” said West. 

Although an aggressive public relations effort is under way with the explicit support of Prime Minister Harper and his ministers, opposition to more pipelines and tankers off the BC coast is stronger than ever. Public opinion polls of residents in the vecinities of the proposed pipelines have shown that a majority of residents oppose both of these proposals. 

Over 130 First Nations chiefs have signed the historic Save the Fraser Declaration making it clear that they will not allow tar sands exports through their territory. 

“There’s a unbroken wall of opposition to these oil pipeline and tanker schemes, and nothing is going to be able to change that,” said West. "We published this new report as an organizing tool for the thousands of Canadians opposed to these projects. It doesn't matter which pipeline proposal we face, we will not allow these projects to proceed," said West.

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Contact:

Ben West, Healthy Communities Campaigner, Wilderness Committee - (604) 710 5340