The very foundations of the Environmental Quality Act are based on the principle of preventing damage to ecosystems, society and the economy through assessment and authorization of projects before they see the light of day. day. This is why large projects, with potentially heavier impacts or which raise concerns in their environment, are subject by regulation to the environmental assessment process, based on the development of an impact study based on of a ministerial directive and the examination of a commission of inquiry created by the Bureau d’audiences publique sur l’environnement (BAPE).
In this context, it appears all the more inconsistent to exclude from this evaluation process the Northvolt company’s battery factory project which, by Prime Minister François Legault’s own admission, would be the “most important industrial project of the history of Quebec.
Battery factory projects are still subject to the regulatory provisions that apply to major projects. But the government conveniently raised the standard for subjecting the Northvolt project to the environmental assessment process just high enough that the project wouldn’t bump its head against it.
The government’s haste to throw this economic player on the ice as quickly as possible by removing it from public and independent review discredits the BAPE and the legal environmental assessment process, by presenting it as an obstacle to development. However, the examination required for this type of project, before Quebec removed it with a simple tailor-made regulatory modification, is precisely aimed at improving it through a debate with the public covering all its aspects and not only on those that its private and government promoters are willing to examine.
To date, nearly 400 major projects have been improved in Quebec thanks to this process. And this government would avoid subjecting the most important of them to it?
The excuse put forward by the government, which maintains that “all environmental standards will be respected”, cuts a little short. In fact, the regulations that formally apply to such a project only cover a very limited number of its impacts, mainly aquatic and atmospheric discharges as well as the management and elimination of hazardous materials.
And the information that the private developer makes available to citizens in the public sessions that it sponsors has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with the much more exhaustive nature of a written impact study, on which groups and individuals can reflect, verify and counter-verify assertions and document themselves with a view to further public questioning.
This step is all the more crucial as it allows us to address everything that is not regulated, but which is still part of the necessary insertion of a major project in a given environment, such as questions of environmental policies. land use planning, public safety, protection of biodiversity and agricultural land, but also risks to the health of local residents and the long-term quality of neighboring ecosystems.
This also raises questions about the future of local public services, which are often poorly suited to large-scale projects, water and energy supply, the impacts on the local economy and the social fabric as well as tax increases. caused by rising land values due to predictable growth in demand.
And we cannot ignore the possible intensity of heavy transport and its effects on the quality of life of citizens nor the risks linked to the supply, transport and use of raw materials, including lithium, which is an element toxic and highly flammable. And important questions will also arise, which no regulations govern, such as the choice of the site for the factory – three sites would be examined, according to the promoter – and its second phase. The scenarios for establishing such an important factory cannot be left to the sole consideration of a promoter based on his private interests. The population must have a voice.
All these unregulated aspects of the Northvolt megaproject must be transparently clarified with the rigor required by a public impact study, just as the population has the right to debate all issues before an independent body such as a commission of BAPE investigation.
The hearings of such a commission also allow the public to question the various ministries, public bodies and invited experts to complete or counter-examine the assertions of the impact study with a view to providing the government and the population with a improved portrait of this project before its regulatory authorization.
This critical and independent vision is all the more necessary and of public interest since the government is judge and party here since it is itself a shareholder in the project… Removing this project from a rigorous environmental assessment and the BAPE would constitute a social regression and environmental unworthy of a project which aims to be at the forefront of the ecological transition.