Indigenous Group Wants 100 Percent of TM Pipeline

(Bloomberg) -- Project Reconciliation, a Canadian indigenous group seeking a stake in the Trans Mountain oil pipeline, is now aiming for a path to full ownership, the group’s new chairman said.
“We are hopeful that we can get our position across,” Robert Morin, the group’s new chairman, said in a phone interview. The group has said it has funding lined up for the purchase, without revealing any lender.
Canada’s federal government bought Trans Mountain from Kinder Morgan Inc. for C$4.5 billion ($3.7 billion) in 2018 after the company threatened to scrap the line’s expansion amid fierce environmental opposition. Alberta’s oil sands industry badly needs more conduits to export its crude, and many hope that indigenous participation would help quell objections to the project.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government has said it will sell its ownership once the expansion is completed and de-risked, and is open to indigenous participation. The government is currently engaged in consultations with First Nation communities.
Project Reconciliation is among several indigenous groups that formed more than two years ago to seek a stake in Canada’s only oil pipeline system that delivers crude oil from Alberta to the Pacific Coast.
Until now, Project Reconciliation had sought no more than a 51% stake. Now it’s seeking 75% with the option to eventually own 100% of the pipeline, Morin said.
The group wants to use pipeline revenue to start a sovereign wealth fund to support indigenous communities, which often suffer from higher levels of poverty.
Morin, a member of the Enoch Cree First Nation west of Edmonton, Alberta, assumed his position last month, replacing Delbert Wapass, the former chief of the Thuderchild First Nation in Saskatchewan. Project Reconciliation had been criticized for being led by an indigenous leader from a province far removed from the communities in British Columbia and Alberta that would be most affected by the line.
Another group seeking ownership is the Western Indigenous Pipeline Group from British Columbia.
Other indigenous groups, including some in British Columbia, see the project as a threat to the environment and have sought to block it.
© 2021 Bloomberg L.P.
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Generated by readers, the comments included herein do not reflect the views and opinions of Rigzone. All comments are subject to editorial review. Off-topic, inappropriate or insulting comments will be removed.
- Oil Prices Buck Recession Trend
- Sonatrach Makes Massive Gas Find In Sahara Desert
- Exxon, Shell, CNOOC To Develop CCS Project In China
- More Oil Workers Being Trained to Operate in Permian
- Shelf Drilling Buying Five Noble Rigs For $375 Million
- Europe Needs to Make Every Gas Molecule Count
- G7 to Allow Fossil Fuel Financing If Climate Pledges Kept
- Esoteric Oil Gauge Spikes to Unprecedented Level
- QatarEnergy Joins Initiative To Eliminate Methane Emissions By 2030
- RWE, Bourbon Team Up For Mediterranean Offshore Wind Auction
- Top Headlines: USA Navy and Iran Corps Clash in Strait of Hormuz and More
- USA Energy Sec Leads Meeting with 7 Major Oil Companies
- Oil and Gas Lease Sales in Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico Pushed Back
- G7 Weighs Russia Oil Price Cap
- Germany Fears Russia Could Permanently Close Main Gas Pipeline
- New Mexico Oil Refinery Cost Doubles
- $150 Oil Could Still Happen. Here's How.
- Russian Oil Isn't Dead Yet
- Oil Prices Buck Recession Trend
- Sonatrach Makes Massive Gas Find In Sahara Desert
- USA Navy and Iran Corps Clash in Strait of Hormuz
- Oil Industry Responds to Biden Letter
- Rapidly Decaying Supertanker Could Explode at Any Time
- Oil Nosedives on Fed Inflation Actions
- Top Headlines: USA Navy and Iran Corps Clash in Strait of Hormuz and More
- Top Headlines: Oil Industry Responds to Biden Letter and More
- Too Early To Speculate on ExxonMobil Refinery Fire Cause
- Fitch Solutions Reveals Latest Oil Price Forecast
- ExxonMobil Made More Money Than God This Year
- Russian Oil Disappears as Tankers Go Dark