Valentine’s Day came early for the National Energy Board.
Some anti-pipeline protesters figured Wednesday, Feb. 13 was a good day to deliver Valentine’s cards to the regulator at its downtown Vancouver office. The protesters weren’t exactly lovestruck, though, saying their displays “depict a broken planet resulting in broken-hearted children.”
The NEB has until Feb. 22 to deliver a redo report looking at the impact of oil tanker traffic resulting from the proposed expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline.
Members of Burnaby Residents Opposed to Kinder Morgan Expansion said they will also be delivering Valentine’s Day cards to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale, Natural Resources Minister Amarjeet Sohi and various MPs from Metro Vancouver.
The cards include a 2015 report from Dr. Tim Takaro, a physician and Simon Fraser University professor who researches environmental medicine.
Takaro wrote to the NEB about the potential health impacts of the pipeline project: “Any risk assessment of a fossil energy project must consider the upstream and downstream contribution to mortality and morbidity due to climate change of wildfires, heat events, air pollution, sea-level rise, flooding, water contamination, drought, food shortages, shifting infectious diseases, illnesses and injury from extreme weather events, mental health impacts, forced migration and related conflict, as well as the risks that climate change poses to healthcare structures and health-related supply chains.”
