NEB | Raincoast Conservation Foundation

We are headed to the Supreme Court for Southern Resident killer whales

Published on 2019 11 05 | by Misty MacDuffee, Wild Salmon Program Director & Paul Paquet, Senior Scientist | in For the coast

Southern Resident killer whales on the surface of the blue Salish Sea.

Today, Raincoast takes our work to protect Southern Resident killer whales from the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. Working with Living Oceans Society and our legal team at Ecojustice, we have filed an application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court. We are arguing that the […]

NEB recommends Trans Mountain proceed despite “significant adverse effects” to Southern Residents

Published on 2019 03 20 | by Chris Genovali, Misty MacDuffee & Paul Paquet | in For the coast

The National Energy Board (NEB) has recommended that the Trans Mountain expansion project should proceed despite the “significant adverse effects” of oil tankers on the critically endangered population of Southern Resident killer whales. Although we disagree with the NEB’s conclusion, their review of the project effects on killer whales is forthright and portrays the severity of the current situation…

The National Energy Board and killer whales, on As It Happens

Published on 2019 03 11 | by Raincoast | in Interviews

Killer whales spyhop with a tanker in the background and population viability maps in the foreground.

In this interview, Misty outlines that while oil spills remain a clear risk, the effects of increased vessel traffic, i.e. noise and disturbance, are a certainty.

No mitigation measures can protect Southern Resident killer whales from the noise of Trans Mountain’s tanker traffic

Published on 2019 02 22 | by Misty MacDuffee, Wild Salmon Program Director | in Conservation update

J16 spy hops: Southern Resident killer whale.

While we disagree with the NEB’s conclusion, we acknowledge that their review of the effects on killer whales accurately portrays the complexity and severity of the situation.

Raincoast’s new evidence on Southern Resident killer whales for the National Energy Board’s reconsideration of the Trans Mountain Expansion

Published on 2019 02 20 | by Raincoast | in Backgrounders

Beam Reach Haro Strait Salish Sea, with a map of the Southern Resident killer whale critical habitat and the tanker route tot he Trans Mountain Expansion Burnaby terminal.

The National Energy Board is now preparing its recommendations to cabinet on the Trans Mountain Expansion. When we won our legal case in the federal court of appeal in August 2018, the courts quashed the Trans Mountain permits and required the National Energy Board to reconsider their recommendations…

Meet the team of applied conservation scientists at the University of Victoria

Published on 2019 01 23 | by Chris Darimont, Raincoast Director of Science | in Raincoast updates

Chris Darimont looking off into the distance on the river with the sun coming through trees in the background.

Last year the Raincoast lab at UVic marked an important new milestone with the creation of the Raincoast Chair in Applied Conservation Science at the University of Victoria. This five year Chaired Professorship allows us to expand our research, teaching and outreach programs in community-driven applied conservation science. Our long-term vision is to train next […]

Still no adequate threat reduction measures for endangered killer whales

Published on 2018 09 22 | by Misty MacDuffee, Wild Salmon Program Director & Paul Paquet, Senior Scientist | in Conservation update

Southern Resident killer whales spy hop with oil tankers in the background.

The federal government is instructing the National Energy Board to conduct a review of marine shipping associated with the proposed sevenfold increase in tanker traffic from the Trans Mountain expansion…

Backgrounder: Emergency order under the Species at Risk Act

Published on 2018 08 16 | by Raincoast | in Backgrounders

J16 and J26 on a smokey day in the Salish Sea.

Research by an international team of scientists, including Raincoast staff, showed that a modelled 30 per cent increase in the coast-wide Chinook abundance above the 1979-2008 average could increase southern resident growth rate by as much as 1.9 per cent…

Trans Mountain is now Taxpayer Mountain

Published on 2018 06 12 | by Chris Genovali, Executive Director | in For the coast

The Canadian federal government’s purchase of the Trans Mountain project from Kinder Morgan is financially and environmentally dubious. With this decision, Trans Mountain should now be renamed Taxpayer Mountain…