Nova Scotia Key Environmental Conflicts
Moratorium oil and gas development on Georges Bank – NoRigs 3, a coalition of the fishing industry, NGOs, and coastal communities, has achieved an extension on a moratorium of oil and gas exploration on Georges Bank, NS until 2022. Georges Bank is a critical site for fishing communities in Canada and the U.S. as well as important marine habitat for a variety of non-harvested species. Offshore Energy Research has a report of their assessment of the effects of oil and gas activities on fishing.
Environmental Effects Monitoring – Curran et al. argue that Environment Canada should be the lead for overseeing offshore oil and gas environmental effects monitoring – programs which provide verification and compliance data for environmental assessments – instead of offshore petroleum boards such as the CNSOPB.
Seismic testing and Species at Risk in the Gulf of St. Lawrence – The Gulf of St. Lawrence is visited by endangered blue whales every summer. The Gulf is also subject to offshore oil and gas exploratory activities. Seismic testing, sending sound waves into the ocean to describe the seafloor, is identified by researchers as noise pollution and having potentially long-term, sub-lethal effects on blue whales. There is an excellent summary on the topic of noise pollution and its impact on whales by Dr. Weilgart of Dalhousie University. In 2010, the Ecology Action Centre in Nova Scotia criticized the CNLOPB for permitting seismic testing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
Fishing, whales and oil and gas activities in the Gulley, NS – The Gulley is 65 km long and 15 km wide, 200 km off the coast of Nova Scotia. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans describes it as “one of the most prominent undersea features on the east coast of Canada.” It is a designated Marine Protected Area and whale sanctuary, where over 15 species of cetaceans have been observed in the area and includes a resident population of bottlenose whales. The highly productive area is an important fishing grounds (for both people and whales). Offshore gas activities along the continental shelf, most notably noise pollution from seismic testing, threaten cetaceans because of the distances that noise can travel.
Gulf of St Lawrence, fishing communities and offshore oil and gas exploration – The Gulf of St Lawrence is a body of water shared by five different provinces and four different oil and gas regulators oversee activities (C-NLOPB, C-NSOPB, the Quebec board, Régie de l’énergie, and the National Energy Board). The Quebec government recently approved a permanent moratorium ban all oil and gas activities in the Saint Lawrence river and estuary between the Ontario border and the western point of Anticosti Island; the St. Lawrence Coalition is calling for a moratorium to oil and gas exploration and production for the entire in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
Disclosure and the Atlantic Accord Act – Section 122-2 of the Canada-Nova Scotia Accord Act gives oil and gas operators the choice of public disclosure, even for pollutants discharged into public waters. Fraser and Ellis provide a summary of this issue.
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The content for this province was not peer-reviewed.
