Tuesday August 26 2014
The
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Leader
COAL OK’D TO ROLL
▶ PORT METRO VANCOUVER GIVES
GREEN LIGHT FOR EXPANDED COAL TRANSFER FACILITY AT FRASER SURREY DOCKS The go-ahead for a new $15-million facility will allow thermal coal brought from the U.S. to travel by train through White Rock and Surrey to Fraser Surrey Docks, where it will then be barged to Texada Island for shipment overseas. FILE PHOTO
RICK KUPCHUK & ALEX BROWNE
Fraser Surrey Docks will soon be shipping coal overseas. Port Metro Vancouver announced this morning it has approved a proposed coal transfer facility at Fraser Surrey Docks. It would take at least four million tonnes per year of U.S. coal by train through White Rock and Surrey and send it by barge down the Fraser River to Texada Island for reloading to ocean-going ships. Environmentalists, residents and other groups opposed to the project had raised concerns about the terminal’s potential harm on the environment and air quality. Climate change activists believe U.S. coal might stay in the
ground and not be burnt overseas if new coal terminals aren’t built in Metro Vancouver or along the U.S. west coast. Port Metro Vancouver was aware of the opposition to the facility, but said “all public, municipal, agency, First Nations and other stakeholder concerns and questions” were addressed, adding that “should there exist any risk of adverse impacts of the proposal…those impacts could be mitigated to acceptable levels.” Some opponents were not surprised the project received the go-ahead. “I knew it was coming,” said Paula Williams, co-organizer of the grassroots South Surrey-based network Communities and Coal, which has been sharply critical of the Fraser Surrey Docks expansion project and potential
Some choices are hard.
health impacts since being formed last year. “So it’s not necessarily a surprise. I’m disappointed, yes, but not surprised.” She said that Golder Associates Ltd., which did a review of the project – and is described by Port Metro Vancouver in its releases as “an independent environmental consultant” – has a business relationship with the Macquarie Group, parent company of Fraser Surrey Docks. “They have gone into business together in different partnerships to bid on projects, including an airport tunnel in Toronto and a construction contract in Alaska,” she said. “I’m not sure of the definition of an independent third party reviewer (that Port Metro Vancouver is continued on page 3
Some are easy.
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