Traditional territory of the Wabanaki Peoples/Fredericton — Yesterday, a solidarity statement was sent to every MLA in New Brunswick, calling for the government to immediately halt its drive to bring a shale gas industry to the province.
The statement, from the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, the Sierra Club Atlantic Region, and the New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance (NBASGA), was accompanied by the endorsements of 44 organizations from across the province, nation and world.
As Dr. Moe Qureshi, Manager of Climate Solutions at the Conservation Council, noted, “The World Meteorological Organization warned that climate change indicators are ‘off the charts,’ and furthermore the Secretary General of the United Nations stated governmental policies that refuse to halt fossil fuel expansion amount to a civilizational ‘death sentence.’ Cast in that light, even having a discussion about a new gas industry makes no sense.”
Dr. Louise Comeau, Co-Executive Director at the Conservation Council, added that, “the government’s recurring threat of shale gas distracts us from what the province can do, and needs to do, to actually meet our energy needs, while protecting us from the climate crisis. It’s time to face reality and get to work on a clean energy strategy that ensures New Brunswick has a reliable, sustainable and affordable electricity system with the right balance of in-province efficiency, wind, solar, hydro and storage, along with regional transmission interties like the Atlantic Loop.”
“The fact that it was easy to get so many provincial groups to endorse the statement, shows that there is little to no social acceptance of fracking,” said Jim Emberger, Spokesperson for NBASGA. “It is time for the government to admit that the health and environmental conditions for lifting the moratorium cannot be met, and these underpin the concept of social acceptance in both the Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities.”
Gretchen Fitzgerald, National Programs Director of Sierra Club Canada, emphasized that, “without discussions of those major concerns, trying to persuade First Nations to allow fracking by simply offering them highly speculative economic deals, while withholding other funds, appears to be more akin to bribery than to consultations that are mandated by law to be free, prior and informed.”
The groups all agree that the time has come to remove the issue permanently from the political discourse on energy and climate, and join many other jurisdictions around the world by permanently banning fracking and shale gas.
It is an industry that can have no long future, and needlessly pursuing it will keep us from competing in the clean energy economy that is already leaving us behind.
-30-
For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact:
Corey Robichaud, Communications Manager, Conservation Council of New Brunswick | corey.robichaud@conservationcouncil.ca | 506.458.8747
Jim Emberger, Spokesperson, New Brunswick Anti-Shale Gas Alliance | shaleinfo.nb@gmail.com | 506.367.2658
Grethen Fitzgerald, National Programs Director, Sierra Club Canada Foundation | gretchenf@sierraclub.ca | 902.444.7096