Even if the issue of the third link will be at the heart of the next provincial election campaign, it is quite possible that the impact study of the road megaproject will not be available before the elections in October 2022, according to information obtained by The duty. Environment Minister Benoit Charette said anyway on Wednesday that the $ 10 billion tunnel will be built, regardless of the opposition of “some people”.
Transport Minister François Bonnardel announced on September 28 the launch of the environmental impact study for the road link project between Quebec and Lévis. A “mandate” of $ 2 million was also granted to the SNCL-Englobe consortium to carry out this impact study.
However, the environmental procedure has still not started, according to information obtained by The duty. Under Quebec legislation, the project proponent, the Ministère des Transports du Québec (MTQ), must first file a “project notice” with the Ministry of the Environment and the Fight against Climate Change (MELCC ).
When the ministry has received this opinion, it issues a “directive” which specifies the elements that must be analyzed as part of the impact study. In the case of a project like the third link, these should probably include the impacts on the host environments, on the climate and on the St. Lawrence River, but also the psychosocial effects associated with the project.
Once the study is submitted to the MELCC, several ministries will be called upon to give their opinion on its “admissibility”. These opinions, as well as those of the MELCC, should lead to several exchanges between the promoter and the ministry. It is only at the end of this entire process that the study can be deemed admissible, which will trigger the evaluation procedure of the Bureau d’Audiences Publiques sur l’Environnement (BAPE).
Project submitted in 2022
For the moment, the project notice has still not been submitted to the MELCC. This will be filed “during 2022”, indicates the MTQ in a written response. Despite requests for clarification, it was not possible to obtain more details on the planned timetable. How long will it take to complete the study? “The information concerning the impact study will be available following the filing of the project notice,” replied the MTQ only.
The ministry was also not able to say if this study will be available for the next electoral campaign, in view of the poll scheduled for October 3, 2022. “The details of the impact study will be available following the filing of the project notice expected in 2022. It is not possible at this stage to confirm, or not, September 2022 as a schedule, ”repeated the ministry, during a second request for details.
It is therefore possible that the environmental impacts of this road project, which would be carried out at a cost of $ 10 billion in public funds, will not be known before the next elections.
Project “necessary”
In any case, the environmental assessment will not change the Legault government’s plans, Environment Minister Benoit Charette reaffirmed on Wednesday. “It’s an infrastructure that will be built, no offense to some people. Our role is that this be done in compliance with the Environmental Quality Act and with the least possible impact on the environment, ”he argued in a press scrum. in the National Assembly. This project is “useful and necessary”, he added.
According to Mr. Charette, the BAPE is “one step among others” in the environmental assessment of the project, designed to facilitate travel by car between the shores of the St. Lawrence River. The commissioners will however have “all the latitude” necessary to evaluate the project, he assured.
“We opted for the most direct option between the two city centers, to limit urban sprawl and limit environmental impacts,” Mr. Charette also argued. The Minister of Transport, François Bonnardel, for his part said that it is “false” to say that the third link will promote urban sprawl. According to him, there will be no “gargantuan development” in the Lévis sector. “No one has ever spoken of development on the south shore,” he insisted on Wednesday.
Reviews
The Legault government’s decision to go ahead with the third link has already made the opposition parties react on Wednesday. “No matter what is said, no matter if it costs 10 billion dollars, no matter if it is a project that is not positive for the environment, no matter if it promotes urban sprawl, no matter if science says the opposite, no matter if it turns its own experts on its own, no matter if it forces him to say silliness over silliness, the government has made its face, it has chosen, it is moving forward », Supported the parliamentary leader of the Liberal Party, André Fortin.
The co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, for his part affirmed that the ministers of the Legault government “are increasing the number of anti-scientific statements”, even though the international community is gathered at the 26e United Nations climate conference. “I find it embarrassing that we are represented by people who say: we, science, we wash our hands of it,” he added.
On the part of the Parti Québécois, it is estimated that the Legault government is showing “pure dogmatism” in the issue of the third link, by promising to build it even before having an analysis of the environmental impacts in hand. “We obviously choose political interests over the general interests of the population,” said MP Joël Arseneau on Wednesday.
Minister Benoit Charette, however, refrained from promoting the electoral interests of the Coalition Avenir Québec with this road tunnel project. We are not in an electoral dynamic. The subject has been in the air for decades, ”he said.
With Alexandre Robillard