Two First Nations in northwest B.C. are taking the federal government to court to quash a decision approving the Ksi Lisims floating natural-gas facility and marine export terminal near Prince Rupert.
The Lax Kw’alaams Band and the Metlakatla First Nation filed separate judicial reviews in Federal Court earlier this month, alleging the B.C. minister of environment and climate change ignored their concerns about the adverse impacts of the massive LNG project.
The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada announced last month that the minister had given the green light to the facility off the northwest coast of B.C.
Federal Energy Minister Tim Hodgson hailed the decision — just hours after B.C. issued an approval — as an example of the federal government’s “one project, one review” system in which it relied on the province for its assessment.
But the Metlakatla First Nation says in court documents that the decision relied on “speculative economic concepts” to justify the project’s adverse impacts, while ignoring “mounting evidence” that it’s not economically feasible.
The Lax Kw’alaams Band says in court documents that the project is to be located in its traditional territory, and threatens to displace its Aboriginal rights and title in “perpetuity.”
Both applications say the Metlakatla First Nation and the Lax Kw’alaams Band have outstanding Aboriginal title claims for the Mylor Peninsula in B.C. Supreme Court, where construction of a transmission line is needed to power the natural gas facility.
Neither the government nor the Ksi Lisims project team have responded to the claims in court yet.
The project to build two floating facilities off Pearse Island in northwest B.C. is huge, designed to process two billion cubic feet of gas per day and export 12 million tonnes of LNG per year.
In September, two other legal challenges were filed in British Columbia claiming that a pipeline to supply the project had not been “substantially started,” contrary to a decision made by the provincial government back in June.
The “substantially started” assessment meant that the environmental assessment certificate approving construction of the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission line, issued in 2014, remained valid.
Kathy Clay, president of the Kispiox Valley Community Centre Association and Chief Councilor Kolin Sutherland-Wilson of the Kispiox Band explain their concerns about the proposed pipeline.
In September, the Gitanyow hereditary chiefs failed in a bid to challenge the project in court, unsuccessfully arguing that they had not been appropriately consulted.
The project is being developed in partnership between the Nisga’a Nation, Rockies LNG Limited Partnership and Western LNG.
However, documents show the project’s assets will be constructed, owned and operated by wholly owned subsidiaries of Western LNG, based in Houston, Texas.
