Provincial climate update shows no room for fossil fuel expansion

Today’s release of B.C.’s Climate Change Accountability Report, on the first day of the COP28 UN climate conference, shows the province is not on track to meet its targets and it cannot accommodate liquefied natural gas (LNG) proposals and the fracking required to fill them.

Provincial government modelling released in the Climate Change Accountability Report today suggests B.C. will fail to deliver its climate commitments for both 2025 and 2030, and its sectoral target for the oil and gas industry, despite the fact that it only includes emissions from the first phase of LNG Canada. Phase two of that project, along with Woodfibre LNG and Cedar LNG, already have permits and two more facilities, Ksi Lisims LNG and Tilbury LNG are under provincial review. Any of these projects would put the province even further off track.

“There’s nothing in the CleanBC climate plan that prevents these LNG terminals and the massive expansion of fracking required to fill them from derailing the provincial government’s climate commitments entirely,” said Wilderness Committee Climate Campaigner Peter McCartney. “It is deeply troubling that the province is reviewing and approving more fossil fuel expansion when they clearly have no plans to account for it.”

While Minister of Environment and Climate Change George Heyman points to a proposed emissions cap on the oil and gas sector, that policy does not prevent more LNG facilities from creating millions of tonnes of new climate pollution. It merely applies a carbon price to emissions above a certain benchmark.

“Clearly additional measures are necessary to meet our targets, and halt runaway climate change,” said Stand.Earth Oil and Gas Program Director Sven Biggs. “That is why we are calling on Premier Eby and the B.C. government to stop issuing new permits for fracking wells and other new fossil fuel expansion projects, as recommended by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.”

Frack Free BC is calling on the provincial government to do what’s needed to address B.C.’s biggest climate problem: reject new LNG plants, stop issuing new permits for gas wells, phase out fracking in the province and support the workers and communities that are left in its wake.

“Climate disasters are already costing British Columbians their homes, their livelihoods and even their lives,” said Dogwood Director of Organizing Alexandra Woodsworth. “B.C. needs to fix the LNG-sized hole in its climate plan. Today’s report shows there’s no room for more fossil fuel expansion here in B.C. or around the world.”

About Frack Free BC

Frack Free BC is a broad-based alliance of organizations and individuals working to end fracking in B.C. It is made up of allied organizations including NGOs, Indigenous partners, grassroots organizations, community groups, and individuals who are organizing their communities to end fracking in BC.

Media contacts:

Peter McCartney, Climate Campaigner, Wilderness Committee

778-239-1935, peter@wildernesscommittee.org

Sven Biggs, Oil and Gas Program Director, Stand.Earth

778-882-8354, sven@stand.earth

Alexandra Woodsworth, Director of Organizing, Dogwood

778-316-5558, alexandra@dogwoodbc.ca