Over 50 community groups from around BC - organizations focused on health, faith, human rights and environment - have asked BC's local governments to take action to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable for its role in the climate costs being caused by fossil fuel pollution.
In January 2016, West Coast Environmental Law Association released Keeping Our Coast Clean: Frequently Asked Questions About an Oil Tanker Ban on BC’s Pacific North Coast, in response to the Prime Minister’s direction to formalize an oil tanker ban on the north coast of British Columbia.
The Green Waterfront Design Charrette brought together design experts and staff from five British Columbia municipalities, including planners, engineers, sustainability specialists, emergency managers and biologists. Working collaboratively, they explored how shifts in land use and building design could support community resilience to sea level rise, focusing on responses that developed green infrastructure and provided opportunities to protect and restore coastal ecosystems, and maintain valuable natural shoreline amenities.
Our climate is changing, and we need to plan for a “new normal”. Just a few examples include rising sea levels in coastal areas, more extreme weather events, increased risk of flooding and forest fires, and the possibility of seasonal water shortages.
The federal approval of Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipelines and tankers proposal is on track to expire at the end of 2016. To keep its project alive, Northern Gateway has requested a 3-year extension.
This report, co-released by West Coast Environmental Law and the Vanuatu Environmental Law Association, explains how well-established principles of private international law allows the courts and governments of individual countries to take action against fossil fuel polluters. The report also includes the first public proposal for the text of a Climate Compensation Act that clarifies the principles of liability for large-scale greenhouse gas emitters, and which could be enacted by countries around the world.
This open letter, endorsed by over 40 Canadian organizations representing hundreds of thousands of people, calls on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Cabinet Ministers to reject the pressure to champion tar sands pipelines.
The open letter challenges key myths being used to support the false argument that more pipelines will fix Alberta's economic woes, and emphasizes the very serious risks presented by the projects and the viable alternatives we have.
West Coast Environmental Law's submissions to the BC Ministry of Environment in response to the province's Climate Leadership Team report and the Ministry's public consultation.
A new report – A Carbon Budget for Canada: A collaborative framework for federal and provincial climate leadership – explains how budgets and other best financial management practices provide a model for national leadership on climate change. The report also calls for a national scientific committee to advise both levels of government on what needs to be done to fight climate change in Canada.
An open letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Catherine McKenna, Minister of Environment and Climate Change regarding the NEB process.