The Northern Gateway project received conditional approval Thursday from a panel conducting an environmental assessment of the pipeline, but proponents and opponents agree the battle is not over yet.
The project to connect Alberta's oilsands to Kitimat has been controversial for years and Thursday's report by a federal joint review panel is just the latest step in the process. The three-member panel ruled the $6.5-billion project is in Canada's interest and that the risk of serious environmental harm is very low.
However, the panel also recommended 209 conditions be imposed, ranging from the technical design of the pipeline to studies that must be completed prior to construction taking place.
Enbridge, the company behind the plan, has said the project is needed to give Canadian oil producers access to Asian markets and reduce dependence on selling to the United States, which is ramping up its own domestic production.
Yet opponents have vowed to keep up the pressure on governments to reject the plan they believe has the potential to harm wildlife and infringes on First Nations' rights.
"We believe that in order for this project to proceed it would require First Nations approval and social licence - neither of which it has at this point," Sea to Sands Conservation Alliance spokesman Josh DeLeenheer said.
Enbridge president and CEO Al Monaco said despite the positive recommendation from the panel, his company plans to continue to reach out to opponents in the coming months to both listen to them and teach them about the company's view of the project's safety.
"It's hard to expect you're ever going to get full support with this kind of project," Monaco said during a conference call. "I think we've seen that dynamic play out in our history in Canada for many years around projects that are nation-building like this."
The panel touched a number of hot button issues in its report, but no topic received more attention in the proceedings than the fate of diluted bitumen in water. In the event of a pipeline spill near fresh water or a tanker spill off the north coast, clean up crews need to understand how the product will react.
The panel acknowledged the differing views on what it would take for dilbit to sink and determined more studies are required.
Ecojustice lawyer Barry Robinson, who represented a coalition of environmental groups at the hearings, found it curious that the panel could recommend project approval without fully understanding how the content that will be shipped through the pipeline will behave if spilled.
"What's the most basic question? Does diluted bitumen float or sink in the marine environment if there's a spill and panel still doesn't have an answer to that question," Robinson said. "If we don't have an answer to the most basic question, how do you assess the risk of the project?"
Just what would happen during an off-shore spill was also on the mind of Coastal First Nations executive director Art Sterritt as he reviewed the report Thursday. He pointed to condition No. 169, which calls on Northern Gateway to conduct a research program at least three years prior to the pipeline commencing operations on the behaviour of heavy oil.
"What they've done, when you get down into the details, the conditions they put on Enbridge are pretty onerous, they're pretty serious conditions," Sterritt said.
Monaco agreed the conditions are tough, but said on first glance the company believes it will be able to comply with all of them.
"Overall, I would have to say, at least on our first look and given our knowledge of the draft conditions there are no real major surprises, but I caution that's subject to looking through them in quite a bit more detail," he said.
While the panel determined the risks were low during construction and routine operations, and that the impacts of a spill would be temporary, it did find the project could have significant adverse effects to caribou and grizzly bears, but said the damage could be mitigated and the impact is justified based on the benefits of the pipeline.
The panel also found that despite the concerns raised by a host of aboriginal groups, the pipeline would have no long-lasting adverse effects on those groups.
That finding raised the ire of Sterritt, who sparred with the panel members regularly during the hearings.
"That's a bit paternalistic," he said. "They should recognize what they might be consider to be significant and what we consider to be significant to be two different things."
Anyone who believes the panel made an error in law in their recommendations has 30 days to make an application to the federal court, but First Nations have a longer window to issue a legal claim. Among the groups contemplating legal action is the Lake Babine Nation from Burns Lake, who say the finding that the pipeline could harm grizzly bears could impact their traditional way of life.
Now that the report has been filed, the federal cabinet will spend a few months reviewing it. A decision on whether or not a certificate should be issued is expected to come in July.
In the meantime, DeLeenheer is calling on opponents to redouble their efforts to have their voices heard.
"I think it's time, really, for people to engage in this in a true democratic process and make known their opinion publicly," he said. "Be that showing up so they can be seen or making their voice heard through any number of communications, contacting their MLA, MP or editor."
