A natural gas and an oil pipeline owned by Pembina Pipeline Inc cross the Pine River
By Heather Scoffield, The Canadian Press
Posted: 02/20/2013 1:00 pm EST | Updated: 02/20/2013 2:16 pm EST
OTTAWA – When the Harper government included a radical overhaul of the Navigable Waters Protection Act in the last omnibus bill, outsiders scratched their heads and wondered out loud where that idea had come from.
Documents obtained through the Access to Information Act show it came, in part, from the pipeline industry.
The Canadian Energy Pipeline Association met with senior government officials in the fall of 2011, urging them not just to streamline environmental assessments, but also to bring in “new regulations under (the) Navigable Waters Protection Act,” a CEPA slide presentation shows.
A copy of the Oct. 27 presentation made to then-deputy minister of trade Louis Levesque was obtained by Greenpeace Canada and shared with The Canadian Press.
