NEB Seeks Comments on Jurisdictional Question

Canada’s National Energy Board (NEB) has asked Coastal GasLink – the TransCanada-developed pipeline that will feed the Shell-led LNG Canada project in BC – for its comments on an attempt to have the pipeline regulated as a federal undertaking.

In late July, BC environmentalist Michael Sawyer filed an application with the NEB asking the regulator to determine whether the pipeline, already approved and permitted under BC regulations, falls more properly within federal jurisdiction.

As a first step, Sawyer asked the NEB to establish a full jurisdictional process, a request the board is now asking Coastal GasLink to comment on.

“The board requests comments from Coastal GasLink Pipeline Ltd. (Coastal GasLink) as to whether a process should be established to examine the jurisdictional question raised in the application,” the NEB says in its letter to Joel Forrest, Coastal GasLink’s director, regulatory law & services, and William Andrews, counsel for Sawyer.

Comments from Coastal GasLink must be filed with the board and served on Sawyer by noon on August 24, while Sawyer has until noon on September 7 to file his reply comments.