Government Pay-the-Rich Schemes Harm Mother Earth
Legault Government's Environmental
Double Standards
In March 2023, the Ministry of Environment, the Fight Against Climate Change, Wildlife and Parks (MELCCFP) refused permission to MC2, the former owner of the land on which the Northvolt battery plant is being built, to build a 4,000-unit housing project because wetlands would be destroyed. The MELCCFP stated in its decision that the diversity of ponds and marshes "provides a variety of habitats for living species, which, within a context where natural environments are rare and agricultural practices and urban development are homogenizing the landscape, helps maintain biodiversity."
According to documents submitted by Northvolt to the MELCCFP, a copy of which was obtained by Le Devoir, the site contains no fewer than 74 wetlands, including eight ponds, 19 marshes, 28 mature deciduous forest swamps and 19 shrub swamps. One of these documents, a report entitled Floristic Inventory and Characterization of Wetlands and Water Environments, is the result of work carried out by the private firm CIMA, hired by Northvolt. The 523-page report states that 62 of the 74 wetlands are of "medium" or "high" importance for the "conservation of biodiversity," and that 55 of the 74 documented wetlands have a medium or high "carbon sequestration" capacity. The majority of these 55 wetlands will be destroyed in the plant's construction.
Carbon sequestration in natural environments is considered an important tool in the fight against climate change caused by the increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the atmosphere. Whether they are marshes, swamps, ponds or peat bogs, wetlands act as kidneys for nature. They filter and buffer water to prevent both floods and droughts, and regulate water flows.
The Montérégie region, where the Northvolt plant is to be built, is in the southwest part of Quebec. MELCCFP Minister Benoit Charette stated in December 2022 at the COP15 biodiversity conference in Montreal that François Legault's government had ruled out the idea of committing to conserving more natural environments in southern Quebec. At present, the Quebec government boasts that it has managed to protect 17 per cent of its land and freshwater, a goal that has been achieved largely thanks to the protection of vast, sparsely populated areas of northern Quebec. However, for years now, experts and environmentalists have been stressing the importance of protecting southern Quebec as well, where the majority of human activity is concentrated. Only five per cent of the land in the Montérégie region is wetlands or forests.
The Legault government amended the regulation in 2023 requiring that any project involving industrial chemical production in excess of 50,000 tonnes per year be subject to an environmental assessment in the form of environmental public hearing consultations, known as the Environmental Public Hearings Bureau (BAPE). The effect of its raising the threshold to 60,000 tonnes is that the MELCCFP has expedited the issuing of permits so that the cutting down of 8,730 trees and backfilling of 138,162 square metres of wetlands, that will be "permanently affected," could begin.
As Radio-Canada reported last November, it generally takes much longer for the MELCCFP to issue authorizations for the elimination of wetlands. "We analyzed the timelines for 116 authorizations granted by the Montérégie regional branch of the Ministry of the Environment since 2018. On average, developers wait 15 months before being authorized to damage a wetland. For example, the Alta industrial park in Coteau-du-Lac took 22 months and the expansion of a logistics centre in Varennes took 13 months. Even the construction of schools took between three and seven months for the go-ahead from the ministry. And it took eight months to destroy wetlands for the Carignan seniors' centre project."
MELCCFP officials have also been instructed to speed up environmental authorizations so that construction can begin on similar projects for the GM and Ford battery component plants in the Bécancour industrial park.
This article was published in
Volume 54
Number 27 - April 20 2024
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/Tmlm2024/Articles/MS54274.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca