Tag Archives: Port of Vancouver

Federal ministers sued over lack of action on endangered orcas

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

For a second time, the world watched as Tahlequah, an endangered southern resident killer whale, struggled to keep her dead newborn calf afloat in the Salish Sea.

But with Ottawa failing to take urgent action to protect the 73 remaining orcas, a coalition of environmental groups is suing two federal ministers to push them to assume their legal responsibility and recommend an emergency order to save the West Coast icons.

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Feds urged to use emergency order to save endangered orcas

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Emergency protections for endangered southern resident killer whales are urgently needed because of increased oil tanker traffic from the expanded Trans Mountain (TMX) pipeline, says a coalition of conservation groups.

Six environmental organizations are formally petitioning Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault and Fisheries and Oceans Minister Diane Lebouthillier, urging them to recommend that cabinet issue an emergency order under the Species at Risk Act (SARA) to save the remaining 74 whales, said Margot Venton, nature program director of Ecojustice, a legal charity working for the environmental groups. 

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Union Fears Robots Will Kill Jobs in Controversial Port Expansion

By  Zak Vescera, The Tyee, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The B.C. dockworkers’ union wants the federal government to block the $3.5-billion Roberts Bank container port project to protect members’ jobs.

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union says the port expansion will introduce technology and automation and set the stage for job losses at other West Coast ports.

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B.C. will soon decide the fate of four projects with big climate and biodiversity impacts

By Matt Simmons, The Narwhal, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

B.C. Premier David Eby’s newly appointed cabinet is about to decide the fate of a handful of proposed projects,  each of which comes with a slew of implications to biodiversity and  climate. 

While provincial ministers wrestle with the decisions, delegates from across the country and around the world are gathered at COP15,  the United Nations biodiversity conference in Montreal. The aim of the  conference is to secure government commitments to slow the global  biodiversity crisis underway — the crisis is sometimes referred to as  the sixth mass extinction and is the first to be human-caused.

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Portland’s Oil-By-Rail Resolution Passed 4-0

By Roy L Hales

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Two and a half hours were allotted for this meeting, but there was not enough time for everyone to testify. More than a hundred signed up to speak. The crowd spilled into two overflow rooms. Only one of the two proposed fossil fuel resolutions was voted on. Commissioner Amanda Fritz proposed adopting policy opposing any increase in the amount of crude oil being transported by rail through the city of Portland and the city of Vancouver, Washington. Portland’s Oil-by-rail Resolution Passed 4-0 .

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