Carney Government Trims Environmental Review Requirements for Major Energy Projects

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government is reducing the scope of a key environmental review process to “simplify” the framework put in place by the Trudeau administration.

The change excludes several energy projects from the federal impact assessment process and assigns the task of reviewing them to a single federal regulator, according to amendments published this week in the Canada Gazette, the official newspaper and journal of record for the federal government.

The government announced in a Sept. 9 press release that it would remove certain energy projects like pipelines, power lines, and certain offshore renewable energy projects from the oversight of the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada (IAAC), its environmental review agency.

Some oilsands extraction projects and fossil fuel-fired power generating facilities are also being excluded from the roster of projects that will undergo review by the IAAC, the press release said. Instead, all future assessments of major projects will be exclusively managed by the Canada Energy Regulator (CER).

Energy and Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson described the change as a way to increase efficiency and reduce duplication.

“To make it easier to build major projects, we’re not lowering standards, but raising competence so we can catalyze investment, unlock our abundant resource base, create good jobs for Canadians and strengthen Canada’s economy at a time when economic competitiveness matters more than ever,” Hodgson said in the press release.

The newly announced amendment will also have repercussions for the reviews of other large projects that do not receive this status, however, and some environmental advocacy groups are criticizing the change.

Environmental Defence associate director Julia Levin voiced concern about the quiet publication of the changes in the gazette, saying in a release that the government’s decision was made “in stealth” and will “gut Canada’s environmental safety net.”

She called the change an “attack” on the country’s environmental rules and said the new framework “threatens Canada’s environment, waters, and rarest and most vulnerable species.”

Environment Minister Julie Dabrusin said in the government press release that protecting the environment remains a priority of the Liberal government.

“As Canada builds, our government will continue to deliver the rigorous review and meaningful consultation that Canadians count on,” she said.

The newly announced changes come a week ahead of  the Canada Investment Summit hosted by Carney in Toronto next week. The federal government has said the summit will serve as a platform to secure substantial infrastructure investments in Canada as part of its goal to target $1 trillion in new funding over the next five years.