How does environmental racism manifest in Nova Scotia? How do you establish a direct link between health issues in a community and the landfill down the road? We speak with Dr. Ingrid Waldron of the ENRICH project. and meet with two scientists who looked at water quality issues in Lincolnville, an African Nova Scotian community situated near a large landfill.
Ken Summers reports on the abandoned oil well in Cogmagun, Hants County. It is still not cleaned up 14 years later. Triangle Petroleum is on the hook for cleanup costs, but it’s facing bankruptcy in the US and it got a pretty sweet deal from the province. It will pay nothing.
Residents of the South End, a black community within the Town of Shelburne, fear for their health because a nearby landfill has been allowed to operate without many constraints for most of its 75-year existence. The Town isn’t really listening to their concerns, they say.
Volunteers associated with the Ecology Action Centre and various naturalist groups conducted a “Bio Blitz” on the proposed route for the gas pipeline slated to supply the Alton Gas Storage project in Brentwood and crossing a wilderness area. It appears Alton Gas missed at least one wetland area.
Ten years after Nova Scotia enticed Triangle Petroleum to experiment with hydraulic fracturing for shale gas in Kennetcook, Hants County, the company walked away and it’s the province that is cleaning up the mess left behind. The province is unwilling to explain what deal it made.
The idea that the Energy East pipe line continue on to Strait of Canso rather then stop at St John today received an endorsement from a Senate Committee. Nova Scotia politicians also support the idea, and a powerful Texas company wants to make it so.
This weekend’s featured video is In Whose Backyard?, a documentary about people dealing with environmental racism all over Nova Scotia. The documentary came out of Ingrid Waldron’s ENRICH project. It premiered in 2014, and that’s also when I wrote this article. Check it out.
Looks like there will be quite a bit of gold mining activity on the Eastern Shore in the years to come. They will bring jobs, but risks as well. Let’s do this right, says the Easter Shore Forest Watch Association, because if we don’t we may have to live with the consequences for a very long time.
A quick read on how all that focus on “conquered people”, shameful as it is, ignores a larger question. How come government lawyer Alex Cameron was allowed to make a very similar argument in June?
Land protectors in Labrador continue their resistance against Muskrat Falls. Just because the national and Nova Scotia press stopped reporting doesn’t mean all is quiet. We talk with Ossie Michelin about the Nova Scotia connection. Ossie’s 96-year old aunt was just served with a court order for visiting a protest site.