To frack, or not to frack Nova Scotia? That seems to be the question. Again. There’s been a de facto moratorium on fracking — more specifically on “high-volume hydraulic fracturing in shale” — in the province since 2014, and oil and gas companies haven’t exactly been beating down our doors to get it lifted, demanding...
PCs put fracking back on the agenda
Five years since Stephen McNeil’s Liberal government placed a moratorium on fracking in Nova Scotia, the Progressive Conservative party seems intent on putting it back on the agenda. In February this year, the two PC members of the Standing Committee on Natural Resources and Economic Development — MLAs Pat Dunn and Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin — proposed...
“Pig in a poke”: die-hard proponents want to open Nova Scotia to fracking
About 200 people gathered last evening in Pugwash, filling the Northumberland Community Curling Club for a debate framed around the resolution “fracking will be beneficial to Cumberland County.” The audience was, not surprisingly, clearly divided between those in favour and those against. For many, including several members of the Nova Scotia Fracking Resource and Action […]
The corporate kleptocracy takes aim at Nova Scotia
Morning File, Friday, August 31, 2018
Hi, I’m Joan Baxter, a Nova Scotian journalist and author. Some of my books are actually quite upbeat, proving that I’m not always a bearer of bad news. News 1. Abandoned tidal turbine Jennifer Henderson updates the situation of the abandoned tidal turbine in the Minas Basin in this article for the Examiner. After a […]
We’re Cooked: The Case for Ignoring Nova Scotia’s Fracking Potential
On the same day that Nova Scotia’s governing Liberals introduced legislation to ban high volume hydraulic fracturing in the province, I happened to be on a “fracking tour” in the U.S. with a bus load of other environmental journalists in a place that had instead embraced it. We were headed from New Orleans to the […]
Fracking ain’t what it’s cracked up to be: Morning File, Monday, January 15, 2018
News 1. Immigration Writes Stephen Kimber: Reading news accounts of last week’s meeting of the legislature’s committee on economic development, you could be forgiven for assuming the much fooforahed Ivany Report’s call to action on immigration had already become a neatly gift-wrapped fait accompli, topped with a pretty government-tied bow. Not so fast… Click here […]
New map reopens the fracking debate: Morning File, Wednesday, January 10, 2018
News 1. Trudeau and Abdi “A 23-year-old former refugee from Somalia waited in a segregated cell in New Brunswick Tuesday night as about two dozen of his supporters called attention to his case at the prime minister’s town hall in Lower Sackville, N.S,” reports Emma Smith for the CBC. I detailed Abdi’s plight in yesterday’s Morning File. I don’t see any news […]
Squirrel In The Transformer Media Inc.: Examineradio, episode #107
This week we speak with David Wheeler, the former president of Cape Breton University and current NDP candidate in Halifax-Armdale for the upcoming provincial election. In a wide-ranging conversation, he talks about his tenure at CBU, his frustration with the Liberal government’s lack of commitment for education funding, and his stance on fracking and the […]
What the frack? Hydraulic fracking may be allowed in Nova Scotian waters
Canada’s push to protect 10 per cent of its marine areas by 2020 won’t face opposition from Nova Scotia’s offshore petroleum regulator. But the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board won’t stand in the way of offshore fracking. Carl Makrides, the board’s resources director, faced questions recently about whether the organization will need to push back on some...
Where are the provincial fracking regulations?
Environmentalists fear the Nova Scotia government is looking to pursue an "outdated model of prosperity."
Catherine Abreu’s optimism is turning to concern. More than a year ago, Abreu, the energy coordinator at the Ecology Action Centre, and other environmentalists heralded the decision by the provincial government to place a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing as it attempted to draft regulations to go along with new legislation for the practice. The decision...