By Chad Klassen

SSN wants Trans Mountain pipeline expansion to run along Coquihalla Highway

May 3, 2018 | 5:53 PM

KAMLOOPS — The Secwepemc Nation had its chance to argue an alternate route for the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion on Thursday in front of the National Energy Board, pushing for the extension to be built along the Coquihalla Highway to Merritt. 

The Stk’emlupsemc te Secwepemc (SSN) wants the pipeline to be located outside it’s territory and away from Jacko Lake, or Pipsell as it’s refererence in their culture. 

“Pipsell is a cultural keystone area which must be presented in a state consistent with the traditional importance of the site to the Secwepemc people,” says Sunny LeBourdais, one of three members speaking for the SSN along with Skeetchestn Indian Band chief Ron Ignace and fellow SSN member Travis Marr.

In its arguments to the National Energy Board, the SSN referenced the cultural heritage study done by the Shuswap Nation that led to its official opposition to the Ajax Mine project last year.

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LeBourdais, who was the project coordinator for the SSN review of Ajax, says the study gave the Secwepemc people solid ground to defend their land against further projects like the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. 

“I can only hope that what we did for the Ajax project becomes the normal moving forward when it comes to the assessment of the impacts on Stk’emlupsemc te Secwepemc Nation regarding major projects,” notes LeBourdais. “I’ve seen the impacts of this project tear my nation apart.”

SSN’s hearing on Thursday, the final day of sessions in Kamloops, was not intended to convince the National Energy Board not to proceed with the project, which was approved in 2016 by the federal government contingent on 157 conditions.

The hearing for SSN was to argue that Kinder Morgan’s proposal to route the expansion just west of Jacko Lake is simply not far enough away. The Secwepemc Nation would like the pipeline to run along the Coquihalla Highway to Merritt.  

“In consulting and engaging with internal knowledge-keepers and members, that route was chosen,” says Marr. “It was also to avoid significant grassland impacts, upstream and downstream impacts, and to avoid some old-growth.”

Kinder morgan argued again on thursday that its proposal is more safe than going underneath Jacko Lake, but SSN wants it completely off that area of land. 

The National Energy Board will render a decision of where the pipeline will be built in this stretch of territory in the next couple months.