Media Releases

BP Offshore Drill Project Approval Points to Need for Reform, According to Sierra Club Canada Foundation

Posted on February 3, 2018

OTTAWA - Sierra Club Canada Foundation is disappointed, but not surprised, that Federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna approved up to seven exploratory drill wells for BP off Nova Scotia yesterday. The leases where BP will be drilling are located 48 km from Sable Island National Park and 71 km from the Gully Marine Protected Area, home to the Northern bottlenose whale and deep-sea corals. 

Environmental groups in court to intervene in NAFTA tribunal overstep

Posted on January 29, 2018
-- NAFTA tribunal exceeded its jurisdiction when it made determination on what a Canadian environmental assessment panel can decide, groups say --

We are in federal court this week in Ottawa to ensure that original environmental assessments hold related to a US company wanting to set up quarry operations on the pristine shores of Digby Neck, Nova Scotia, in the the Bay of Fundy - home to critcally endangered right whales, important marine species, and upon which thousands of people make their lives and their livelihoods.

The Big Heist: Ottawa Hands Offshore Regulation to Oil Industry

Posted on January 24, 2018

For immediate release

K’JIPUKTUK (HALIFAX)  --  An alliance of twenty Atlantic Canadian and Quebec environmental, Indigenous, and fishery organizations gathered today to express alarm that offshore petroleum boards would be given more power over oceans off Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, and in the Gulf of St. Lawrence under the Liberal government’s plan to modify the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. 

Sierra Club Leader Charlie Richmond Honoured with Alberta Lieutenant Governor's Leadership for Active Communities Award

Posted on November 7, 2017
Ottawa: Sierra Club Canada Foundation would like to congratulate Charlie Richmond, leader of the Prairie Chapter, for being awarded the Alberta Lieutenant Governor's Leadership for Active Communities Award. The province-wide award is given to individuals who "demonstrate the very best of active community leadership, engages citizens in planning, use leadership to get people more active more often, and work to create places, spaces, and opportunities for people to be active and engage their communities, using recreation as a catalyst."

Sierra Club celebrates cancelled Energy East pipeline, Looking Ahead to New Energy Future

Posted on October 5, 2017
You did it! We WON! Energy East Pipeline cancelled.
Ottawa - Sierra Club Canada Foundation is celebrating the announcement today that the Energy East pipeline project is cancelled. The project, that would have sent 1.1 million barrels of oil per day from the tar sands 4,500 km across the country, traversing hundreds of waterways - including the mighty St. Lawrence - and the territories of indigenous people in its path.

Sierra Club statement regarding NAFTA

Posted on August 15, 2017
KEEP ENVIRONMENT FRONT AND CENTRE IN NAFTA RE-NEGOTIATIONS

Sierra Club Canada Foundation recognizes the positive steps Minister Freeland announced yesterday as part of the opening salvo in re-negotiating a North American free trade deal, including more transparency and consultation, her move to make NAFTA more progressive in general and in regard to the environment, indigenous, and gender rights, recognizing the importance of placing the environment within the core text, and that that new trade agreement will be for all Canadians.

SIERRA CLUB QUEBEC REQUESTS PROTECTION OF CRITICAL HABITAT TECHNOPARC WETLANDS

Posted on July 27, 2017

As a signatory of the United Nations Convention on the Conservation of Biological Diversity and the Convention for the Protection of Migratory Birds, Sierra Club Canada Foundation – Quebec Chapter is calling on the Government of Canada to honour its obligations and prevent irreversible damage to wetlands due to the expansion of the Technoparc, Montreal's industrial park.

Oil exploration licence at Old Harry - Enviro groups sue over drilling in Gulf of St. Lawrence

Posted on May 16, 2017
Fishermen loading lobster trap
The Gulf of St. Lawrence, home to thousands of species, with robust fishing and tourism industries as well as Indigenous harvest must be protected from risky oil exploration, groups say.

TORONTO – Environmental groups took legal action today against the renewal of an exploration licence at Old Harry to protect the Gulf of St Lawrence — home to more than 4,000 species including blue whale, salmon and cod — from unlawful oil exploration.  

Federal, Provincial Governments Have 30 Days to Protect the Gulf

Posted on December 16, 2016
Blue Whale tail flukes

Sierra Club Canada Foundation has learned that the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board will take the unprecedented step of issuing a new license for oil and gas exploration in the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Corridor Resources. In the last nine years, Corridor has been granted three free extensions on its license in the Gulf, and has reached the maximum term set out in the Accords Act for holding an offshore exploration license.