The Alberta government has relaxed its environmental oversight rules for industry, saying that forcing companies to fully comply during the COVID-19 pandemic would cause "hardship."

The March 31 order allows companies that are normally required to update the government about the condition of the environment they work in ⁠— including air emissions, or water diverted from rivers ⁠— to temporarily suspend that reporting. Critics say the move, signed off by Alberta Environment and Parks Minister Jason Nixon, looks like an overreach that hasn’t been properly justified by the government.

“When I see orders like this I do scratch my head a little bit,” said Shaun Fluker, an associate professor at the University of Calgary who studies environmental law.

“We’re removing transparency when we remove reporting obligations … I think we make matters worse if governments are seen to be exercising powers that they don’t necessarily need.”

Jess Sinclair, a press secretary for Nixon, said in an email that the order is intended to allow companies to focus on their employees’ health and safety.

“This is about deadlines for filing paper work — not about standards,” she said.

“Monitoring activities continue. Environmental data is still being collected and any results found out of the ordinary still need to be reported to us.”

South of the border, similar moves have been made by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on orders from the Trump administration.

With numbers of COVID-19 cases rising rapidly in Alberta, the province declared a state of emergency on March 17. Nixon’s order was done through that emergency declaration, using a mechanism that doesn’t require cabinet approval.

"I think we make matters worse if governments are seen to be exercising powers that they don’t necessarily need," said Shaun Fluker, an associate professor at the University of Calgary who studies environmental law.

The order itself doesn’t directly explain how the ongoing pandemic relates to companies’ ability to fulfill their environmental obligations. Instead, it states that “there is hardship in having to comply with routine reporting requirements ... during this public health emergency.”

The order also doesn’t say whether companies will eventually be required to report the environmental data to the government, saying only that they must collect the data and give it to provincial officials upon request.

The pause in environmental reporting doesn't apply to drinking water or wastewater facilities.

It’s odd that the province would give companies a blanket exception without asking them to prove that they need it, Fluker said. The federal COVID-19 financial assistance packages, for example, require applicants to show why funding would be necessary. And many companies would likely still be able to keep up with the reporting during the pandemic, Fluker added.

“We’re really impairing the ability of the regulatory system to do its job,” he said. “We require this for a reason.”

Dale Marshall of Environmental Defence said he doesn’t believe even the extreme circumstances of the pandemic would merit the move from the Alberta government. Environmental laws are crucial to maintaining public health, he said.

“Saying that it is not in the public interest to enforce environmental laws is really scary,” Marshall said. “It clearly shows that in moments like this, where there are a lot of distractions and a lot of people thinking about a lot of things other than corporate responsibility, governments like that in Alberta are willing to roll back laws that essentially protect people.”

The relaxed rules would end either on Aug. 14, or 60 days after Alberta ends its current state of emergency, whichever comes first. Nixon could also choose to end it sooner at his discretion.

‘It’s really hard to discern what some of the risks are’

Though the environmental reporting covered by Nixon’s order is routine, it’s still important, Fluker said. Oftentimes, they’re meant to give the government more information when they’re not sure what the potential impacts of industrial activity could be.

“Without getting those reports, there are risks of not knowing what you don’t know.”

Jason Unger, the executive director of the non-profit Alberta Environmental Law Centre, said it’s not clear that reporting environmental data to the government would have been particularly difficult for many companies. It’s understandable that the government wants to reduce the costs imposed on Albertans right now, he added, but depending on the type of monitoring required ⁠— air emissions are more complex than water level monitoring, for example ⁠— it may not take much more effort to report that information.

While these measures are in place, he added, it’s crucial that officials maintain environmental monitoring and keep consequences in place for companies that disobey the rules.

“It’s really hard to discern what some of the risks are,” he said.

“We want transparency in how our environment is being impacted. There’s the need for public assurance that things won’t be missed.”

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Disaster capitalism at its finest.
As COVID-19 dominates the headlines, and millions of citizens cower before an invisible enemy, billions of dollars are transferred from public coffers to fossil fuel corporations. Environmental regulations and health protections are rolled back.

I predicted Kenney would follow Trump's example last week (March 27):
"'To help businesses deal with the outbreak, the Trump administration has decided it will be easing back on environmental enforcement and compliance requirements, according to an Environmental Protection Agency memo. The decision follows requests by the energy industry and other sectors.' (CBC)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/us-coronavirus-thursday-1.5510581
"Expect the same demands here."

Where is Alberta's Loyal Opposition?
"The pre-2015 AB NDP was a force for good in opposition. The only voice of sanity on climate and energy. Notley has eliminated that option.
"Now we have zero oil industry critics in the AB Legislature. Banished to opposition benches, the shrivelled NDP caucus can say nothing about oilsands expansion, oil & gas pollution, and climate inaction — because they shilled for Big Oil in office. Notley threw billions of dollars at the oil industry, beat the drum for new pipelines, failed to increase royalties, failed to investigate health concerns in the oilsands, and failed to fix Alberta's Energy Regulator. Whose CEO 'grossly mismanaged public funds'.
"Once Notley endorsed Vivian Krause wacky theories, it was no longer right-wing and no longer conspiracy theory. Notley took it mainstream.
"We no longer have a mainstream party that champions science."

Notley's multiple failures enabled Kenney's successes.
"Notley's denialism and pipeline push, supported by a wide swath of progressives, created the political space for Kenney to move AB further and faster towards climate disaster.
"A pox on both their houses."

Former AB Liberal leader Kevin Taft can now write a sequel to his book: "Oil's Deep State: How the petroleum industry undermines democracy and stops action on global warming - in Alberta, and in Ottawa".
The triumph of neoliberalism. Global disaster.

https://quillandquire.com/review/oils-deep-state-how-the-petroleum-indus...
https://www.parklandinstitute.ca/oils_deep_state_edmonton
https://thenarwhal.ca/how-oil-hijacked-alberta-s-politics-behind-curtain...

Indeed. It has been said that the most beneficial investment the industry ever made in Alberta and all of North America was not in exploiting the actual resource, but in investing in politicians.

Polluting corporations given a break in accountability? - truly a neoliberal theft of the common good. This is a naked failure to demand accountability for corporate malfeasance during a national crisis. Even in ordinary times, "energy" corporations get free passes. Consider the awful "orphan wells" syndrome: "Not my poison wells! Somebody else (the public purse) has to pay for them. "
It seems that so far as the UPC's indifference to polluting corporations goes, All Is For The Corporate Best In This Best Of All Possible Pandemics.

Jason Kenney needs Trudeau badly. First, as the focus of blame when teaching his patented course, Politics of Division 101. Second, to urge the feds to direct the firehose of largesse to flood a gigantic bottomless hole in the ground. The evidence suggests that the success of this act to prime the pump is nothing more than wishful thinking.

The challenge is, of course, that both Kenney and Trudeau are economically illiterate by design. The Canadian model running today’s fossil fuel industry is based on the original export structure for beaver pelts. After 300 years, you’d think is was about time for a reset.

Alberta and the entire eight per cent of the Canadian economy dependent on fossil fuels gives control over its destiny to Vladimir Putin, Mohammad bin Salman and the US shale oil industry. A big chunk of that control will be wrestled away then killed off by the CEOs of Daimler, Volkswagen, Toyota, GM, Volvo and many other big carmakers as they ship tens of millions of electric vehicles to world markets this decade.

Jason Kenney may well preside over the collapse of Alberta oil sometime during his second term. If he was smart he’d get out before the rush to greener pastures takes hold, though not without an impossibly steep bill to pay for the environmental and economic liabilities.

Maybe they're not economically illiterate as much as that they are economically beholden.
Either way, same result.
And it bears asking whether the loyalty is only to the corporations themselves, or to the burgeoning "investor class," which in re gas/oil includes all our chartered banks and most pension funds.