The Twilight Zone…What it’s like to be an intervenor in the Kinder Morgan application

When I became an intervenor in mid-April, realizing that the first deadline to submit questions was early May — and that preparing questions required getting through the 15,000 page submission in two weeks, it was hard to know where to start.

Fortunately, I have been in dozens of environmental assessments and NEB hearings. If the predictable scams were used, I reckoned that 15,000 pages might contain a thousand pages of critical information; so I decided to perform triage on the patient.

I began the evaluation by printing out the on-line NEB report —all 15,000 pages (doublesided and onto recycled paper!). That made getting a handle on the document possible.

As I suspected, the submission, as is the custom in such processes, was deliberately redundant and impenetrable. Some pages are repeated dozens of time, ditto maps and charts. Every presentation by Powerpoint shown at any community hall is reproduced (even though the presentations were virtually identical).

Another few volumes are descriptions of the current state of our rich coastal environment and those areas along the pipeline route. Also included are descriptions of the wide range of successful economic operations threatened by any mishap with toxic dilbit.

Fifteen thousand pages sounds impressive. And in that much paper, it is possible to bury the inadequacy of the research. The goal is to overwhelm the intervenor and bedazzle and bamboozle the media through simple repetition of the phrase ‘a 15,000 page report’.

Once I had reduced the pile, by eliminating the least useful and redundant material, it was possible to start finding useful information. The project will cross 1,000 water courses (streams and rivers), with directional drilling under 15 rivers. The volume of dilbit will increase from one tanker a week to approximately one a day.

Still, a great deal just came down to being the stuff of comedy routines. There is attention devoted to the risk of Avian flu being spread in construction, with promises that construction workers will not enter poultry barns. The threat of spreading diseases such as clubroot will be fought with footbaths at every site. The threat of infectious workers will be addressed with hand-washing.

There are pages on the construction impact on livestock and poultry. We are informed ‘Milk cows are very curious…’ Apparently, they will lose interest in construction in a few days and milk production will return to normal. The following excerpt, from the socioeconomic section on the impacts of pipeline spills, has made ripples in the media, coming in for a direct attack by Rachel Maddow on MSNBC.

‘Pipeline spills can have both positive and negative effects on local and regional economies, both in the short and long term. Spill response and clean-up creates business and employment opportunities for affected communities, regions, and clean-up service providers. This demand for services and personnel can also directly or indirectly affect businesses and livelihoods. The net overall effect depends on the size and extent of a spill, the associated demand for cleanup services and personnel, the capacity of local businesses to meet this demand, the willingness of local businesses and response opportunities, the extent of business and livelihoods adversely indirectly) [sic] by the spill, and the duration and extent of spill response and clean-up activities.’

As bad as that is, the shockers for me are the details of the testing conducted for Kinder Morgan. (For which the key questions should be the impact of dilbit spilling along the pipeline route or in the marine environment.)

Dilbit On The Comedy Channel

The report asserts repeatedly that dilbit behaves much like conventional crude (not that crude’s good for the environment), that it can be cleaned up using the same methods used for crude, and, that dilbit is not more dangerous, and so on.

Kinder Morgan says that it commissioned research to find how dilbit behaves. In an appendix, I finally found the technical report setting out how this was done.

Evidence for behaviour of dilbit in the marine environment was conducted in Alberta over a thirteen-day period. Correct: 13 days of tests in Alberta.

Researchers put salt water in tanks and then dumped in dilbit. Then they stirred and took other action they claimed approximated wind and wave action. The tanks held 26.5 m3 (7,000) gallons. Additional tests were done in a 1m x 1m x 1m fish tank and in plastic five gallon pails. I kid you not.

The 7,000 gallon tanks in Gainford, Alberta were supposed to mimic the natural conditions found in Burrard Inlet, with temperatures of 10ºC and at 7 pH. As if the notion of a tank in Alberta representing the Salish Sea is not sufficiently absurd, the testing failed to meet the parameters the researchers had established. It got quite hot in Alberta during the 13 days of the testing, so the water in the tanks heated up to 19.5ºC. The study reports that that temperature is okay as it would be like Burrard Inlet in the summer. (Have any of the Kinder Morgan brain trust ever been to Burrard Inlet in the summer?)

The pH went to alkaline as high as 8 pH. In the real world, the oceans are getting more acidic, not more alkaline.

The five gallon pail and fish tank research also went awry, even according to the researchers:

‘Errors occurred in the fish tank, because the spill was installed in a manner that resulted in a large amount of dispersion at the outset, due to air ingestion, and the resulting slick was larger than the ruler and developed an asymmetric form.’

They conclude: ‘A better-equipped test is certainly recommended for future consideration.’ Ya think?

In other news, Clayton Ruby has agreed to represent me to challenge the refusal to allow oral cross-examination. If I am not allowed to cross-examine Kinder Morgan’s evidence in oral hearing, I will go to court.

FARLEY MOWAT 1921- 2014

When someone you love dies, it is not possible to begin to express the love and loss. Farley Mowat was one of my dearest friends. His 93rd birthday would have been Monday, May 12 and—as always—I was looking forward to talking with him.

Farley Mowat was a champion for the wild things. He spoke with unflinching courage against humanity’s destruction of each other and of the other species with whom we share this planet.

He raised public consciousness of the famine that laid siege to the Inuit.

Farley spoke for whales and seabirds, for tadpoles and mosses. He was possessed of a ferocious talent, able to write stories that provoked laughter, tears and action.

We owe him more than I can say.