A group of First Nations in Western Canada is looking at purchasing the controversial Trans Mountain pipeline and a University of Saskatchewan professor says this is good news for advocates of the project.
The proposed pipeline expansion has been in limbo since last August when a Federal Court of Appeal ruled Ottawa has not done enough consultation with affected First Nations to move the project forward.
Now a group of First Nations, which are part of the 134-member Indian Resources Council of Canada, is looking at buying the pipeline from the federal government.
Ken Coates, who teaches at the Johnson Shoyama School of Public Policy, says the move shows not all First Nations are opposed to the pipeline project and a number of prominent players have a vested interest in seeing it does get built.
“This is a serious conversation,” he says. “Doesn’t mean it’s going to happen tomorrow, doesn’t mean it’s going to happen at all but it’s actually a very serious conversation started by a group of First Nations who produce millions of dollars worth of oil and gas on their lands who are paying a real penalty for the fact that there is no pipeline through to the West coast.”
The federal government purchased the pipeline from Kinder Morgan Canada last summer for roughly $4.5 billion and Coates says the First Nations certainly have the financial wherewithal and management ability to take over the project.
However, he says where things still remain complicated is the politics of actually getting the pipeline expansion built.
“The other question is whether they could break through sort of the political frustrations that have bedeviled this project all the way along and that’s a harder one to know. I don’t think the First Nations on the coast, who are not as opposed to pipelines as they are shipping, will actually change their point of view just because First Nations are in charge of the pipeline.”
The First Nations met just outside Calgary on Wednesday to discuss a potential pipeline purchase proposal.
The proposed pipeline expansion would increase the amount of oilsands bitumen shipped from Alberta to the B.C. coast.
(PHOTO: Ken Coates. File photo.)