The federal government has given its final approval for the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion project, which would triple the capacity of the existing pipeline. In 2018, the federal government bought the Trans Mountain pipeline with taxpayer money from Kinder Morgan for more than $4.5 billion, an amount that did not include the costs of the expansion, which could increase the total cost to more than $13 billion.
A decision that is INCOHERENT with the current climate crisis
"The expansion of the Trans Mountain Pipeline, by increasing take-away capacity to export one of the most carbon intensive sources of energy, is incoherent with the climate emergency motion adopted in the House of Commons yesterday. It will contribute to the climate crisis, and is contrary to Canada’s commitment under the Paris Agreement," states Annie Bérubé, Director of Government Relations at Équiterre.
The heavy bitumen from Alberta’s oil sands, transported by the Trans Mountain pipeline, is one of the most polluting types of energy in the world: it creates up to 37% more greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) per barrel of oil than conventional oil. The Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion project would triple the transportation capacity of the existing pipeline to about 900,000 barrels of oil per day, resulting in an additional 13.5 to 17 megatons of GHG emissions per year (which is equivalent to adding 3 million cars on the road).
