The sale of oil and gas tenures in northeast British Columbia by the provincial government for $260-million is being challenged in court by a native band.
The oil and gas industry does not expect the legal development to slow work in the region, but is watching the case with interest.
Roseanne Kyle, legal counsel for the band, said it is the first case dealing with government consultation concerning the shale-gas industry, and it may be the first time any band in Canada has launched a challenge regarding shale-gas extraction, which uses an increasingly controversial process known as “fracking.”
She said the Dene Tha are “not seeking an injunction at this time” to stop the oil and gas industry from working on the tenures. But she added the industry “would be well advised” to pay attention to the case, which she thinks could be in court by late fall, or early next year.
Ms. Kyle said before the sales went ahead, the Dene Tha advised the government it was concerned about a lack of land-use planning, about the potential impacts on caribou, which are threatened with extinction, and about the extensive use of water in the fracking process.
The industry extracts gas from shale by injecting huge volumes of water, sand and chemicals into wells, causing shale to fracture.
“For the Dene Tha, water is life,” Ms. Kyle said. “The whole area is a linkage of many, many waterways. Of course they are concerned.”
The petition states the band raised concerns with government about “draw-downs on surface water, impacts to groundwater, contamination of water through the fracturing process, toxic chemicals in drilling fluids and disposal of contaminated water.”
But it says the government officials responded to those concerns by referring Dene Tha representatives to a web site that had a two-page fact sheet on the fracturing process.
The petition states that the Dene Tha have historically hunted, fished and trapped throughout the area and its rights to continue doing so are “being eroded from the ever-increasing level of development in its traditional territory.”
The petition claims the government “failed to properly identify, assess or consider potential impacts to the Dene Tha’s treaty and aboriginal rights … [and] failed to obtain all relevant information necessary to assess or consider potential impacts … despite repeated requests, prior to selling the parcels.”
Travis Davies, a spokesman for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said the impact of the case isn’t clear yet, but he didn’t think it would cause any work disruption in northeastern B.C.
“I don’t anticipate that kind of problem,” he said. “We can’t speculate on what’s going on with the court process, but pre-tenure consultation is not new and our expectation is that the Crown did its due process … of course that will be sorted out between the government and this first nation.”
Mr. Davies said the individual companies affected aren’t known because gas tenures are sold through land agents for competitive reasons.
He said as companies move ahead with development of the tenures, they will have to go back to government “and provide environmental impact statements and address any concerns the community or the government might have.”
The Ministry of Energy and Mines declined comment because the matter is before the court.
