John Godbold, project director of Bear Head LNG, speaks about his company’s liquified natural gas project near Port Hawkesbury at the Cape Breton Partnership’s Investor Summit in 2014. (ERIN POTTIE / Cape Breton Bureau).
After an environmental assessment, the provincial environment minister has granted Australian firm Bear Head LNG Ltd. approval to build an eight-million-tonne-per-year liquefied natural gas plant in Richmond County.
The approval comes with 32 caveats that the company must agree to before commencing development. This is in addition to following all provincial and federal environmental regulations.
The conditions, released Tuesday afternoon, require Bear Head to produce several management, monitoring and contingency plans for air emissions, greenhouse gases, noise, birds, wildlife (especially species at risk), traffic and water sources.
The developers must also agree to cease work upon discovery of an archeological site or artifact.
Moreover, Bear Head will have to operate and consult with a community liaison committee that must include municipal, Mi’kmaq and citizen representatives. It must also submit a decommissioning and reclamation plan one year before the shutdown of the site.
All costs associated with the development of these plans will be the responsibility of Bear Head and must be approved by the Environment Department.
John Godbold, project director of Bear Head LNG, was unavailable for comment Tuesday. But the companysaid in a short statement that it was “happy” with the environment assessment approval and satisfied with its contents.
“Nothing in it was a surprise and we’ll be able to meet all these terms and conditions,” the statement read.
The Bear Head project is scheduled for front-end engineering and design this year, engineering, procurement and construction between 2016 and 2019, and operation beginning in 2019.
With the proposed timeline, Bear Head could become the first exporter of liquefied natural gas in Canada.
