politics | Here we go again

ENERGY: Pipeline Sabotage Blows Image of Stable Canada

POUCE COUPE, British Columbia, Aug 27 (IPS) - North America's largest natural gas corporation hopes a one-million-dollar bounty will take down the saboteur who is blowing up their pipelines in northern Canada.

Since October 2008, six controlled explosions have rocked sour gas pipelines operated by EnCana energy around the Tomslake area in the province of British Columbia. EnCana's reward is thought to be the largest in Canadian history.

While Calgary-based EnCana is the largest player in the area, a boom in unconventional gas extraction has transformed the rolling hills and sleepy farmland in this sparely populated region to a bustling hub of activity.

"We really ramped things up in 2003," Encana spokesperson Brian Liverse told IPS during an interview at the company's field office.

The corporation has several hundred wells in British Columbia, and between 150 and 200 in the area facing sabotage, says Liverse.

Much of the region's gas is sour, or contaminated with hydrogen sulfide, a "highly toxic gas" which can cause death within a few breaths, according to the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.

...

In 2008, the province reaped a record 2.7 billion dollars from selling natural gas drilling rights. But as sour gas lines cut into fields of canola, companies flare toxic chemicals lighting up the night sky with an eerie glow, and trucks kick up dust on previously tranquil dirt roads, some local residents say increased production is coming at their expense.

"Billions of dollars leave our community every year, yet our elders have to travel to Vancouver when they get sick," said Cliff Calliou, Chief of the Kelly Lake First Nation, an indigenous community of some 500 residents 30 minutes from the bombed sites.

Industry's incursions are "changing the way of life in the community, our hunting, trapping, berry picking - even just going camping," Calliou told IPS during an interview at Kelly Lake's community centre, where several dozen residents attended a conference on strategies for dealing with the petroleum industry.

Despite the region's oil wealth, many houses in Kelly Lake are ramshackle trailers.

Unlike other native groups, there is no official treaty between Kelly Lake and the Canadian government. Natives say the gas is being stolen from unceded land and have launched a 5.2-billion-dollar claim for recompense.MORE