Category: Environmental Page 29 of 59

By: Sharon Mascher

PDF Version: An Overview of the Environmental and Regulatory Reviews Discussion Paper – Let the Discussion Begin

Document Commented On: Environmental and Regulatory Reviews Discussion Paper, Government of Canada, June 2017

On June 29, 2017, the Government of Canada released a Discussion Paper outlining a series of “system-wide changes” the Government “is considering to strengthen Canada’s environmental assessment and regulatory processes”. The changes are directed at the Government’s commitment to “deliver environmental assessment and regulatory processes that regain public trust, protect the environment, introduce modern safeguards, advance reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, ensure good projects go ahead, and resources get to market” (at 3).

Chronicles of the Canadian High Court of Environmental Justice: Wildlands League v Ontario (Natural Resources and Forestry)

By Shaun Fluker

On July 10, 2017

In Environmental, Protection of Species

By: Shaun Fluker

PDF Version: Chronicles of the Canadian High Court of Environmental Justice: Wildlands League v Ontario (Natural Resources and Forestry)

Case Commented On: Wildlands League v Ontario (Natural Resources and Forestry), 2016 ONCA 741 (CanLII) (leave denied, [2016] SCCA No 549)

In a decision issued May 4, 2017 the Supreme Court of Canada denied the Wildlands League and Federation of Ontario Naturalists leave to appeal a decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal dismissing their application for judicial review on the vires of regulations enacted by the Lieutenant Governor in Council under the Ontario Endangered Species Act 2007, SO 2007, c 6 [Ontario ESA]. The Supreme Court did not provide reasons for denying leave. The applicants seek a declaration from this Court that the regulations are ultra vires the Lieutenant Governor in Council on the ground that the regulations defeat the purpose of the Ontario ESA to facilitate the protection and recovery of endangered species in Ontario.

Announcing a Summer Discussion Series on Recent Developments in Energy and Environmental Law

By Martin Olszynski

On June 22, 2017

In Energy, Environmental

By: Martin Olszynski and Nigel Bankes

PDF Version: Announcing a Summer Discussion Series on Recent Developments in Energy and Environmental Law

Event Commented On: 2017 Energy & Environmental Law Summer Discussion Series

The past year has been relatively busy from a legislative and policy reform perspective, especially with respect to Canadian energy and environmental law. At the federal level, all of the expert panels and parliamentary committees tasked by the current Liberal government with reviewing the Harper-era changes to Canada’s energy and environmental law regime have now delivered their reports: Forward, Together: Enabling Canada’s Clean, Safe and Secure Energy Future (regarding the National Energy Board); Building Common Ground: A New Vision for Impact Assessment in Canada (regarding federal environmental assessment processes); Review of changes made in 2012 to the Fisheries Act: enhancing the protection of fish and fish habitat and the management of Canadian fisheries; and A Study of the Navigation Protection Act. There has also been important litigation at the provincial level, especially the Alberta Court of Appeal’s recent decision in the Redwater litigation: Orphan Well Association v Grant Thornton Limited, 2017 ABCA 124 (CanLII).

While most of these developments have been discussed in this forum (see e.g. posts by Kwasniak, Fluker and Yewchuk, Olszynski, and Mascher with respect to environmental assessment and Bankes on the NEB report and Redwater), the Faculty and the Canadian Institute of Resources Law have decided that it would also be interesting to host a series of panel discussions over the summer to further analyze the issues.

Let’s Shine Some Light into Creative Environmental Sentencing

By Shaun Fluker

On June 21, 2017

In Environmental, Provincial Court

By: Shaun Fluker

PDF Version: Let’s Shine Some Light into Creative Environmental Sentencing

Case Commented On: R v Canadian National Railway Company sentencing order dated June 2, 2017 (ABPC)

On June 12 the Alberta government announced that Canadian National Railway Company (CN Rail) had pled guilty to two offences under the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, RSA 2000, c E-12 (EPEA) with respect to the release of hydrocarbons that occurred in April 2015. The penalty imposed on CN Rail was a total of $125,000, consisting of $15,000 in fines and a $110,000 payment in funds directed to the Edmonton and Area Land Trust to support conservation in the Edmonton region with a focus on aquatic and riparian habitat. This payment of funds to the Land Trust is known as a creative environmental sentence, and this post asks some critical questions about how this increasingly popular form of punishment for environmental offences is being implemented in Alberta.

Can Federal Legislative Jurisdiction Support a Broad, Sustainability-Based Impact Assessment?

By Martin Olszynski

On May 30, 2017

In Constitutional, Environmental

By: Martin Olszynski

PDF Version: Can Federal Legislative Jurisdiction Support a Broad, Sustainability-Based Impact Assessment?

Report Commented On: Expert Panel on the Review of Federal Environmental Assessment Processes, Building Common Ground: A New Vision for Impact Assessment in Canada

This is the fourth in a series of ABlawg posts to consider the report of the Expert Panel on the Review of Federal Environmental Assessment Processes. Professor Arlene Kwasniak wrote the first post, wherein she summarized the main contours of the Expert Panel’s recommendations; Professor Shaun Fluker and Drew Yewchuk (JD 2017) tackled the ever-present challenges of discretion, transparency and accountability; and Professor Sharon Mascher recently discussed the Expert Panel’s recommendations with respect to triggering. In this post, I tackle an area of lingering doubt in the Panel’s report, namely the federal government’s jurisdiction to make project-related decisions following a broad, sustainability-based impact assessment. In my view and as further set out below, this doubt is misplaced. My analysis is admittedly somewhat novel but doesn’t break entirely new ground – a similar analysis was put forward in the commentary following the Supreme Court of Canada’s landmark decision in Friends of the Oldman River Society v. Canada (Minister of Transport) 1992 CanLII 110 (SCC). Fundamental to my approach is the distinction between legislating with respect to a subject on the one hand, and subsequent decision-making pursuant to such legislation on the other.