Northvolt temporarily stopped work on Thursday for its battery factory in Montérégie, while the Superior Court rules on a request for an injunction.
Emmanuelle Rouillard-Moreau, spokesperson for the Swedish multinational, confirmed in an email that the work had been suspended Thursday afternoon “out of respect for the ongoing legal process.”
The case will be heard before the Montreal courthouse on Friday morning, and Mme Rouillard-Moreau indicated that representatives from Northvolt would be on hand to present their position on the subject.
The Quebec Environmental Law Center (CQDE) and three citizens filed a request for an injunction in the Superior Court on Thursday to require the immediate suspension of work on the battery factory project.
Tree felling work began at the beginning of the week on the site of the future factory in McMasterville and Saint-Basile-le-Grand, after the Ministry of the Environment authorized last week the start of factory construction work.
In a press release released Thursday, the CQDE requested “the suspension of this worrying work” for biodiversity.
The CQDE lawyers argue that a few months ago, “the destruction of wetlands in the same place had been refused” as part of another project and that “the ministry’s experts” mentioned at the time “the importance of these environments for the region and for biodiversity”.