By: CBC News
As hearings get underway on the proposed Energy East pipeline, documents obtained by the CBC's French-language service, Radio-Canada, show the Canadian military has expressed grave concerns about the possibility of an oil spill.
Memos released under Access to Information show officials at the Canadian Forces garrison in Petawawa, Ont., have been demanding answers from TransCanada Corp., the company behind the project, about a section of pipeline that passes through the base. The pipeline, which is already in place, is designed to transport natural gas, but would be switched to carrying oil if Energy East goes ahead.
In a series of emails dating back to 2014, Donald Megrath, the hazardous material officer for Petawawa, lays out his concerns about a potential pipeline breach on the nearby Petawawa River.
"A crude oil spill … is a significant environmental event," he writes in one note.
"What is their emergency response plan to cover, control and respond to this?"
Another email from January 2015 raises concerns about the possibility of "an epic, life, environmental and social altering spill."
The documents detail some of the correspondence between the military and TransCanada. The company wrote a letter in April 2014 to answer a series of specific questions posed by defence officials about what sort of emergency planning TransCanada had carried out to respond to a spill along the pipeline, especially near water sources.
In the letter, the company assures the military its pipeline can be shut down "within minutes" in the event of a breach. In further correspondence, the company clarifies just how close its pipeline would come to other military installations, revealing it would pass within 600 metres of the Canadian Forces base in North Bay, Ont., and just 200 metres from the base in Suffield, Alta.
Common concerns
Tim Duboyce, a spokesman for TransCanada, says the questions raised by the military echo those of other groups and individuals who are concerned about pipeline safety.
"Of course, security and safety is the most important issue, at front of mind for people," Duboyce said.
"It's the most important issue for us as well, as a company."
While Duboyce was not familiar with the documents outlining the military's issues with the proposed pipeline, he confirmed TransCanada has had discussions with officials at CFB Petawawa and will continue to do so if more questions arise.
Duboyce also repeated an argument pipeline proponents have made countless times that pipelines are "the safest way that we have at our disposal as a society to move oil to market."
Public hearings
Opponents of Energy East, however, are not convinced.
"National Defence is asking questions that everyone is asking," said Sidney Ribaux, director general of the environmental group Equiterre.
"Unfortunately, like National Defence, most of us are not getting those answers."
Ribaux accuses TransCanada of trying to push through its project without formulating a proper emergency response plan, calling it "very disappointing but not so surprising."
The National Energy Board launched public hearings on the $15-billion Energy East project in Saint John yesterday. If approved, it will transport diluted bitumen roughly 4,500 kilometres from the Alberta oilsands to refineries in Eastern Canada. The National Energy Board must hand in its report to the federal government by March 2018.
Showing posts with label CBCNews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CBCNews. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Tuesday, May 3, 2016
CBC Exclusive: CF-18 commander describes 'having to take lives' in ISIS bombing mission
Originally Published on CBC News: Exclusive Interview
In a wide-ranging interview with CBC News chief correspondent Peter Mansbridge, a CF-18 commander who flew airstrike missions against ISIS in Iraq and Syria provides a detailed account about being in that arena, some of his bombing missions, and "having to take lives."
"What we're doing is a very very unnatural thing for us. We're going out there and we're destroying, we're destroying things sometimes, sometimes we're having to take lives," said Lt.-Col. David Moar.
"It's an unnatural — it's important that we communicate about that, we talk about that as a unit and that we're firm in our resolve about what we're doing."
During the interview, Moar, the CF-18 detachment commander, reviews video of some of those airstrikes, including one attack against an artillery piece that had been "harassing the Iraqi Security Forces."
"They just hooked it up to a vehicle and started moving it down a road and at that point we elected to destroy it," Moar said.
"And there's no doubt here that somebody died, because somebody was driving that vehicle," Mansbridge said.
Moar said, "One thing I have noticed that you can never, until you see the full picture afterwards, you can never really know what is happening under that smoke."
"And are you around long enough to know?" asked Mansbridge
"It's our responsibility to stick around long enough to know," Moar said.
In a wide-ranging interview with CBC News chief correspondent Peter Mansbridge, a CF-18 commander who flew airstrike missions against ISIS in Iraq and Syria provides a detailed account about being in that arena, some of his bombing missions, and "having to take lives."
"What we're doing is a very very unnatural thing for us. We're going out there and we're destroying, we're destroying things sometimes, sometimes we're having to take lives," said Lt.-Col. David Moar.
"It's an unnatural — it's important that we communicate about that, we talk about that as a unit and that we're firm in our resolve about what we're doing."
During the interview, Moar, the CF-18 detachment commander, reviews video of some of those airstrikes, including one attack against an artillery piece that had been "harassing the Iraqi Security Forces."
"They just hooked it up to a vehicle and started moving it down a road and at that point we elected to destroy it," Moar said.
"And there's no doubt here that somebody died, because somebody was driving that vehicle," Mansbridge said.
Moar said, "One thing I have noticed that you can never, until you see the full picture afterwards, you can never really know what is happening under that smoke."
"And are you around long enough to know?" asked Mansbridge
"It's our responsibility to stick around long enough to know," Moar said.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
CAF unable to account for all lost weapons
By Brigitte Bureau and Giacomo Panico, CBC News
Canada's military is unable to track whether weapons recorded in public accounts as "lost" are actually missing, or were removed from inventory for some other reason.
Public accounts records released in December 2015 tracked financial losses for individual departments, but don't detail how or why certain items — in the case of the Defence Department, a range of weapons and related equipment — disappeared.
So while the records show a total financial loss of 1,128 weapons and weapon accessories between April 1, 2014 and March 31, 2015, DND is unable to differentiate between items that are actually missing, and those that were damaged beyond repair in training exercises, for example.
The revelation came after Radio-Canada submitted an access to information request asking for a breakdown of the types of weapons that were lost.
One month after the request was made, DND replied that it needed more time to tabulate the data, since it does not maintain a central registry of its lost weapons.
'I am shocked'
A DND spokesperson explained by email that while individual units within the military collect specific data on lost weapons, there's no master list to track those numbers nationally.
That absence of information is cause for concern, according to lawyer and retired Canadian Forces colonel Michel Drapeau.
Michel Drapeau, a retired Canadian Forces colonel, says the absence of a central registry is alarming. ( ICI Radio-Canada)
"I am shocked by it. If a unit happens to have a higher share of what you would expect for a unit to lose, and if you have no national control over it, maybe a unit, or two or three could account for 50 per cent of the losses. That should drive, at the national level, to say, 'Just a second, there is something going on here,'" said Drapeau.
Among the weapons listed as financial losses last year are one rifle, one handgun, 29 bayonets and one missile launcher — which DND was able to confirm was destroyed when a military aircraft crashed.
But the reasons other weapons were recorded as losses are not known at the national level, something Drapeau says needs to change.
'Are they really lost or have they somehow fallen into the wrong hands? We need to know.'- Retired colonel Michel Drapeau
"It's important that we know exactly at any given moment, who has these weapons … and if they are lost, are they really lost or have they somehow fallen into the wrong hands? We need to know."
The DND spokesperson said the department treats the security of its resources very seriously, and any theft or loss of any public asset is investigated by the chain of command, ministry officials or military police.
Canada's military is unable to track whether weapons recorded in public accounts as "lost" are actually missing, or were removed from inventory for some other reason.
Public accounts records released in December 2015 tracked financial losses for individual departments, but don't detail how or why certain items — in the case of the Defence Department, a range of weapons and related equipment — disappeared.
So while the records show a total financial loss of 1,128 weapons and weapon accessories between April 1, 2014 and March 31, 2015, DND is unable to differentiate between items that are actually missing, and those that were damaged beyond repair in training exercises, for example.
The revelation came after Radio-Canada submitted an access to information request asking for a breakdown of the types of weapons that were lost.
One month after the request was made, DND replied that it needed more time to tabulate the data, since it does not maintain a central registry of its lost weapons.
'I am shocked'
A DND spokesperson explained by email that while individual units within the military collect specific data on lost weapons, there's no master list to track those numbers nationally.
That absence of information is cause for concern, according to lawyer and retired Canadian Forces colonel Michel Drapeau.
Michel Drapeau, a retired Canadian Forces colonel, says the absence of a central registry is alarming. ( ICI Radio-Canada)
"I am shocked by it. If a unit happens to have a higher share of what you would expect for a unit to lose, and if you have no national control over it, maybe a unit, or two or three could account for 50 per cent of the losses. That should drive, at the national level, to say, 'Just a second, there is something going on here,'" said Drapeau.
Among the weapons listed as financial losses last year are one rifle, one handgun, 29 bayonets and one missile launcher — which DND was able to confirm was destroyed when a military aircraft crashed.
But the reasons other weapons were recorded as losses are not known at the national level, something Drapeau says needs to change.
'Are they really lost or have they somehow fallen into the wrong hands? We need to know.'- Retired colonel Michel Drapeau
"It's important that we know exactly at any given moment, who has these weapons … and if they are lost, are they really lost or have they somehow fallen into the wrong hands? We need to know."
The DND spokesperson said the department treats the security of its resources very seriously, and any theft or loss of any public asset is investigated by the chain of command, ministry officials or military police.
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