Nothing to stop petroleum exploration in Lancaster Sound, analysis contends

Randy Boswell
POSTMEDIA NEWS

The environment group that joined this summer with Inuit leaders to block the Canadian government’s proposed seabed survey of Lancaster Sound says a new legal analysis of the ecologically sensitive Arctic water body shows petroleum exploration could proceed in the area unless federal agencies take protective action.

“The federal government should act now to impose an unambiguous moratorium on oil and gas development in Lancaster Sound,” said Chris Debicki, Nunavut director for Oceans North Canada, a marine conservation campaign backed by the U.S.-based Pew Environment Group.

“There are easy and effective steps that the federal government can take to start protecting this biologically rich region that is central to the Inuit way of life,” he added.

Oceans North worked this summer with the Qikiqtani Inuit Association — which represents several communities at the north end of Baffin Island where Lancaster Sound is located — in halting a planned seismic survey by a German research ship hired by the Canadian government to map parts of the sea floor.

The opponents argued that the explosive blasts used in seismic surveys could harm marine mammals in the area.

They also objected to what they called inadequate public consultation by federal officials, and claimed that the surveys represented the first step toward eventual oil and gas exploration in Lancaster Sound — the same waters recently earmarked by Environment Canada to become a national marine conservation area.

In August, a Nunavut judge granted an injunction sought by the project’s opponents, preventing the ship’s survey and forcing the government to rethink its approach to conducting research and developing resources in Canada’s North.

Now, Oceans North says it consulted University of Calgary law professor Nigel Bankes about whether Lancaster Sound — because it has been designated a potential federal marine park — is legally safeguarded from petroleum extraction.

His report, provided to Postmedia News, concludes that “there is no legal moratorium in place” to prevent the Canadian government from issuing oil and gas rights throughout Lancaster Sound.

Bankes notes that the federal government “has, for the last number of years, excluded the Lancaster Sound area” from areas listed for potential petroleum exploration leases.

But he adds “there is no evidence” the government “is doing this on the basis that there is a legal moratorium in place.”

Bankes’ report identifies several ways in which the federal government could formally exclude Lancaster Sound from oil exploration, including the official delisting of the area under provisions of the Canada Petroleum Resources Act.

Both federal Natural Resources Minister Christian Paradis and Environment Minister Jim Prentice — who has described Lancaster Sound as the “Serengeti” of the Arctic because of its impressive biodiversity — had insisted that the summer seabed scan was not a prelude to petroleum exploration nor a danger to the narwhals and beluga whales that inhabit the area.

First reported by Postmedia News in April, the controversy over Lancaster Sound later prompted Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff to accuse the Conservative government of “rushing ahead with oil exploration” while touting plans to create a marine wildlife sanctuary “in exactly the same place.”

After the August court ruling scuttled its plans for the seabed survey, the federal government issued a statement saying, “Natural Resources Canada remains committed to the goal of its geo-mapping program, which is to increase our knowledge of the geology of the north.”