Canada’s environment minister Peter Kent confirmed last week that the stalled Bute Inlet Hydroelectric Project will remain subject to the highest possible level of environmental assessment, if and when plans go ahead.
Vancouver’s Plutonic Power (TSX:PCC) and General Electric, partners in the massive private “green” power development, have shelved immediate plans but continue to claim Bute Inlet is in their sights.
Friends of Bute Inlet and West Coast Environmental Law were concerned about downgrades to the environmental assessment processes and had recently appealed to the minister to ensure that the federal review panel appointed for Bute Inlet would continue.
Although the current review panel has been disbanded, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency issued a statement confirming the environment minister will appoint a new panel should the Bute project proceed at a later date.
“We’re happy that minister Kent has done the right thing and made sure that if this massive hydro project comes back, it will get the strongest possible environmental assessment available under the law,” said Josh Paterson, lawyer at West Coast Environmental Law, which assisted the Friends of Bute Inlet in advocating the review panel be maintained.
“This project has a huge potential impact and its wider, cumulative effects on the whole region need to be studied.”