VANCOUVER — Critics of the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline and tanker proposal welcomed today’s announcement by B.C.’s Official Opposition that there must be a “made in B.C.” decision on this project.

The provincial Opposition said today that B.C. should go its own way in reviewing the Enbridge proposal and committed to crafting a tailored assessment process, rather than using the standard B.C. Environmental Assessment Act approach.

VANCOUVER, B.C. ─ In a poll released today by Living Oceans Society, B.C. residents living along the proposed Kinder Morgan pipeline route ranked pipeline and tanker issues virtually neck-and-neck with the economy as the most important issue facing the province today and more important than health care, which took the number three spot.

Tofino, B.C. – Environmental groups have written an angry letter to Premier Christy Clark for allowing the approval of a new salmon farm site in Clayoquot Sound on the West Coast of Vancouver Island while never addressing serious concerns about diseases from farms impacting wild salmon.

On October 3rd the Province offered Mainstream Canada a 55-hectare salmon farm tenure on the shores of Meares Island, near Plover Point, in the Clayoquot Sound UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.

Vancouver, B.C.— The Coastal Alliance for Aquaculture Reform (CAAR) is appalled to learn that on October 10, DFO quietly issued a new aquaculture licence to Mainstream Canada for another open net-pen salmon farm in Clayoquot Sound. The new site is located in Fortune Channel near Plover Point on Meares Island.

VANCOUVER – Living Oceans Society today released documentation showing that the controversial ocean dumping of iron sulphate, conducted by Old Masset Village and Russ George this summer, was presented to the Credit Union financing the project as a scheme to sell carbon credits, rather than a serious science project.

Vancouver, B.C.— Living Oceans Society is pleased to hear a number of the Conservation Coalition recommendations were adopted by the Cohen Commission, reinforcing the concerns of DFO’s mismanagement and the serious threat of net-pen salmon farms on the British Columbia coast. The Cohen report is further proof that a transition away from an open-net pen salmon farming to closed containment is needed immediately.

VANCOUVER, B.C. ─ A report released today by four environmental groups warns that Kinder Morgan’s new Trans Mountain Pipeline proposal represents an exponential increase in the risk of a major marine-based oil spill affecting the Salish Sea’s most populous region, including the Cities of Vancouver and Victoria and the Southern Gulf Islands. The report analyses the insurance available to pay for spill response costs and damages caused by such a spill and concludes that Canadian taxpayers could be on the hook for as much as 90 percent of the cost.

VANCOUVER—A report released today by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development supports Living Oceans Society’s contention that the federal government is failing to live up to its international commitments on effective marine protected areas (MPAs) and has left taxpayers exposed to enormous liabilities for oil spills in Canada’s oceans. The report responds to a petition filed by Living Oceans.

VANCOUVER, B.C. ─ Diluted bitumen won’t exactly sink most of the time but it won’t exactly float all of the time, either, according to new evidence filed with the Joint Review Panel hearing the Enbridge Northern Gateway application in Prince Rupert. In cross-examination by Ecojustice counsel Karen Campbell today, Enbridge consultants admitted that tank test evidence filed this week found dilbit did submerge beneath the surface of the water, although none was found to have sunk to the bottom of the tank.

OTTAWA -- Wild salmon advocates from Canada’s east and west coasts are in Ottawa today, and welcome the tabling of the long-awaited Fisheries and Oceans Standing Committee Report on Closed Containment technology. The report has the potential to help foster change in Canada’s salmon aquaculture industry and offer much-needed protection for Canada’s wild salmon, coastal fisheries and the communities that depend on healthy oceans.