by Deborah Carr
President, New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance
There are few people in public service who hold my respect as much as Dr. Eilish Cleary, our former Chief Medical Health Officer. To say I’m shocked and saddened at her death is an understatement. We had some wonderful conversations. She was one of my heroes.
Environmental organizations representing millions of Canadians call on the federal government to reject new East Coast LNG export facilities due to climate-wrecking emissions and risks of stranded assets
Halifax, NS – Ahead of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s visit to Canada to discuss a potential LNG deal, environmental organizations representing millions of Canadians are launching an initiative called StoptheGas to call on the federal government to reject proposals for new East Coast gas export facilities due to climate impacts and economic risks.
“On the world stage, Canadian politicians deliver passionate speeches about climate action, but their words will be revealed as empty promises if the federal government approves new fossil gas infrastructure on the East Coast that will facilitate climate-damaging emissions. As UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, ‘investing in new fossil fuel infrastructure is moral and economic madness,” says Kelsey Lane, Climate Policy Coordinator, Ecology Action Centre.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 11, 2022
Traditional Land of Wabanaki People/Fredericton – The Conservation Council of New Brunswick and the New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance issued the following joint statement in response to Premier Blaine Higgs’ speculation that shale gas and liquified natural gas are solutions to war-induced threats to European gas supply:
Premier Higgs’ talk of ripping up the moratorium on hydraulic fracturing and building an LNG export terminal in Saint John to “save our neighbours internationally” is shortsighted, unrealistic and fails to protect New Brunswickers’ health and safety from the increasing threats of climate change.
In a landmark 2021 report, the International Energy Agency (IEA) concluded that to reach net zero emissions by 2050 no new oil, gas or coal development is possible if the world is to avoid a global temperature increase of 1.5°C.
In early July, NBASGA, along with member groups, Kent County Council of Canadians and Notre Environnement, Notre Choix, and our friends and allies from Kobit Lodge (representing Elsipogtog First Nation), sent letters to federal Minister of Justice Lametti concerning the final report of the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission (CRCC), which was investigating RCMP actions during a 2013 raid in Rexton, NB.
ADAM HURAS, Telegraph Journal, 7 February 2019
The Trudeau government’s carbon tax “overreaches and invades” provincial jurisdiction, according to New Brunswick’s legal argument filed in a Saskatchewan court that aims to challenge Ottawa’s looming price on carbon. The province’s attorney general’s office has filed a factum ahead of the prairie province’s carbon tax court challenge set to be heard next week.
New Brunswick sought to intervene in the case as the Higgs government attempts to fight the carbon tax slated to be handed down by Ottawa beginning in April.
For immediate release: February 6, 2019
FREDERICTON — Today, the New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance (NBASGA) announced it has been accepted as an intervener in the Saskatchewan Court of Appeals reference case against the federal carbon tax. NBASGA will intervene in support of the federal government and against New Brunswick.
“Climate change is happening here and now, and it needs a fair, effective and immediate response,” says NBASGA’s Jim Emberger. Winter and summer flooding, storm surges from intense storms and sea level-rise, droughts, heat waves and other climate change effects are already disrupting the lives, livelihoods, and well being of New Brunswickers, and are predicted to get worse.
by Jim Emberger, Telegraph Journal Sept. 21,2018 Featured Letter
The recent Atlantica Centre for Energy commentary about making N.B. a “have” province, by comparing it to Saskatchewan, uses only one financial figure. It predicts that shale gas could provide $900 million annually to our economy.
This is a hopeful speculation.
Perhaps examining some actual figures would be more instructive.
For Immediate Release
Sept. 13, 2018
[Le français suit]
(Fredericton) With less than two weeks left until the election, the Progressive Conservatives’ finally released their party platform. It contains a single sentence supporting ‘regional resource development.’ The words ‘shale’, ‘fracking’ and ‘moratorium’ do not appear in the document.
It is clearly designed to mask the PC’s plan to lift the moratorium on fracking without arousing citizens who fought a bitter battle to stop fracking during the last election.
Jim Emberger, Spokesperson for the New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance (NBASGA), warns that, “The platform statement is a catch phrase without benefit of details, designed to mute discussion of a contentious and deadly serious issue during the election,” adding that, “the language is so vague because the PC’s are aware of the continued widespread opposition to shale gas development. They don’t want the issue examined too closely.”
The New Brunswick Election is September 24 (Early polls September 15, 17) and hydraulic fracturing is once more an issue of interest to New Brunswickers.
Before you vote, consider this: There are many issues to be considered when choosing how to vote. Sometimes we have to choose between two parties, each of which has some positions you support, and some you don’t.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Fredericton, NB (April 26, 2018) – It was with great surprise and disappointment that the New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance learned that the Progressive Conservative Party has decided to make shale gas an issue in the 2018 election.
“There is absolutely no basis on which to reconsider the current moratorium,” says spokesman Jim Emberger. “There is not a single one of the five conditions for lifting the moratorium that can be met.” He also noted that a partial lifting is illogical saying, ”the problems associated with shale gas do not stay local. The air and water pollution, health problems, earthquakes and climate change effects of shale gas travel far from the well, and further than originally thought.”