Canadian Appeals Court Rejects Permits for Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion Project

Canadian Appeals Court Rejects Permits for Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion Project

Ruling puts pipeline in legal jeopardy

WASHINGTON, D.C. – A Canadian federal appeals court today ruled that the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project, which Kinder Morgan recently sold to the government of Canada, would need a far more extensive environmental review and First Nations consultation before it could move forward.

The court’s decision on the pipeline project — which would have tripled capacity to carry tar sands oil to the Pacific coast and would significantly increase the risk of an oil spill in Southern Resident killer whale critical habitat and Tribal and First Nations fishing areas in the Salish Sea — states that the project must now return to the drawing board. Friends of the Earth U.S. was the only national U.S. nongovernmental organization to intervene in the Canadian federal government’s approval process.

In response to the decision, Marcie Keever, Friends of the Earth’s director of the Oceans and Vessels program, issued the following statement:

The Trans Mountain project ignored the catastrophic threats to marine species, Tribal communities and ecology in the Salish Sea. For more than 8 million people, including 29 tribes and First Nations, who would be impacted by an expanded pipeline, today’s decision is a great victory toward protecting our environment from a Big Oil boondoggle.

The government of Canada now owns this dirty pipeline project and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau must decide between a community- and climate-destroying tar sands oil project or protecting the environment and people of the Pacific Northwest in the U.S. and Canada. The decision by the appeals court is a victory for people and the planet. Friends of the Earth U.S. will continue to act to preserve our communities and environment for future generations.

Expert contact: Marcie Keever, (510) 900-3144, [email protected]
Communications contact: Patrick Davis, (202) 222-0744, [email protected]

Related News Releases