Hi All,
Yesterday afternoon, the National Energy Board released it’s decision regarding the List of Parties at the Trans Mountain Toll Application. The Board decided that only commercial parties and governments who had sought to intervene will be parties at the hearing in February in Calgary.
This is disappointing, but not shocking. The Board is carefully guarding it’s mandate likely because pipeline issues are so very controversial now. Interestingly, the Board not only denied intervenor status to landowners and landowner groups, they also denied this status to the MPs who sought to intervene, the Communication, Energy and Paperworkers Union, and to the Tsleil Waututh First Nation.
Here is an excerpt from the ruling:
“As for the other intervention requests, the Board is of the view that they have not sufficiently justified their interest in the issues to be tried in this case. The issues to be decided in this case relate only and exclusively to the commercial aspects of a potential future expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline system, that include the toll methodology, the terms and conditions for oil transportation service, the allocation of capacity on the system, the appropriateness of the Open Season and specific filing requirement exemptions related to financial regulation.
As well, in the BoardÂ’s view, these other persons and groups have not sufficiently demonstrated how the BoardÂ’s decision could impact their rights and interests.
For these reasons, the Board does not grant Intervenor status to Mr. Kennedy Stewart M.P., Mr. Peter Julian M.P., The Communication, Energy and Paperworkers Union, Ms. Lynn Perrin/Pipe Up Network, Mr. Mohammed Janief, Burnaby Residents Opposed to Kinder Morgan Expansion, Burnaby Residents Along the Pipeline Route, and the Tsleil-Waututh Nation.”
This entire decision can be viewed at:
http://www.neb-one.gc.ca/fetch.asp?language=E&ID=A48729
Ecojustice has been representing the Burnaby Residents along the Pipeline Route. I expect that we will be filing a Letter of Comment by the November 8th deadline on behalf of this group, but I will be checking with them. My own sense is that this process is a reminder that Kinder Morgan will always put its corporate interest ahead of the public interest wherever it can.
Karen