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Living Oceans hopes offshore drilling moratorium becomes permanent

Growing Gulf Coast oil spill underlines risks to B.C.

While the most recent proposal to lift the federal government's long-standing ban on offshore drilling and tankers on B.C.'s coastline has met with little public support, the Living Oceans Society believes that the issue will continue to come up until the ban is made permanent.

The recent explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico underlines the risks, says Jennifer Lash, executive director of Living Oceans.

"It's disturbing," she said of the Gulf oil spill. "The last time, in the '80s, when we took a serious look at lifting the moratorium on offshore drilling on the coast, and there was a hot discussion about that, the Exxon Valdez spill happened - and ultimately I think that's why government decided not to proceed.

"It's unfortunate to watch other areas get seriously harmed to educate us and remind us as to what can happen here, but we do need to look at this and learn from it. Of course we'd prefer not to have offshore drilling anywhere and that all coasts were safe."

All of the safety measures designed to prevent against a spill of the magnitude of the one on the Gulf Coast failed, says Lash, who believes that these types of accidents are inevitable no matter what precautions are taken.

The British Petroleum oil rig explosion took place on April 20, killing 11 workers. A mechanism should have capped the flow of oil in the event of an accident but the system failed. Now it's estimated that at least 5,000 barrels of oil and up to 60,000 barrels are leaking from the sea floor every day, and the oil slick could reach land this week as attempts to contain or burn off the spill have failed. The cost of the clean-up has so far been projected at $8 billion, although the combined impact on tourism, shrimp fishing and other coastal injuries could be far higher.

The Canadian moratorium on offshore drilling and tanker traffic off the coast of B.C. dates back to 1972, but the policy has been revisited several times over the decades. Most recently in 2007 the B.C. Energy Plan re-affirmed the province's commitment to offshore oil and gas exploration and development and formalized the province's request of the federal government to lift the moratorium - despite extensive discussions with coastal First Nations that found very little support for drilling.

The federal government has not changed its stance, however, although they have been in discussions over offshore oil development in the Arctic.

Lash believes the issue of lifting the moratorium was already dead at the time of the Gulf spill, and will be hard-pressed to find any popular support for a long time after this latest accident. However, her group is concerned by plans to build a pipeline from Alberta's oil sands to the coast of B.C. to export oil by tanker.

"Enbridge has not filed their papers yet, so they haven't formally applied to the federal government for permission to go ahead with the pipeline - and ironically, that was supposed to happen in April (when the Gulf accident occurred)," said Lash. "Now we're hearing September, but now, at the beginning of May with the oil spill off the Gulf Coast we hope (Enbridge) will realize how catastrophic these plans are and won't file at all.

"If they do the file will go through a review process under the Environmental Assessment Act, and if approved the plan is to have the pipeline built by 2015."

Despite the loss of forestry and fishing jobs along the B.C. coast in recent years, Lash says there is little enthusiasm in her community on the east coast of Vancouver Island to open the Georgia Strait to tanker traffic.

"We would have up to 225 tankers a year going through important fishing areas, by the Great Bear Rainforest and through critical whale habitat," said Lash.

"No matter how strong the safety precautions are that are put into place a spill will eventually happen, whether it's in the form of an oil rig or an oil tanker. And if a company manages to clean up 15 per cent of the spill then it's considered a success, while leaving the other 85 per cent for the ocean to deal with.

"With that in mind the government has no choice to make the ban on tankers and platforms permanent."

Blair Lekstrom, the B.C. Minister of energy, mines and petroleum, said they were watching the incident in the Gulf of Mexico closely and have already offered assistance.

"We need to find out what went wrong there and in the meantime B.C. is offering assistance in the clean-up efforts," he said.

Lekstrom said the decision over whether to allow offshore drilling off the coast of B.C. ultimately resides with the federal government, "and I am sure they will be closely monitoring the situation in the Gulf."

However, Lekstrom said the province's position has not changed.

"Our government has been very clear in our position that we will only proceed with exploration and development of our offshore resources if it can be done in a scientifically sound and environmentally responsible manner.... We have a robust and well-respected environmental process and nothing will ever proceed without meeting the most stringent environmental concerns."

Lekstrom remains optimistic about the natural gas and petroleum industry in B.C. and its ability to benefit rural communities and all British Columbians.

"Having said that I want to again be clear and say that we will not pursue offshore oil and gas development in B.C. unless we are confident it can be done in a scientifically sound, environmentally safe and socially responsible way."