by Graham Brazier
Some Notes on Coal Mining on the T’sable River (contd)
An era ended on Vancouver Island in 1966 when the T’sable River mine closed. For the first time in more than one hundred years there wasn’t a single active coal mine on the Island. Coal was the fuel of the past. Oil was modern and clean. And, at least until October 17, 1973, it was cheap. However, on that date the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) declared an embargo on oil exports from member countries in the Middle East and oil prices in North America and Europe soared – effectively tarnishing some of modernity’s luster.
Though the embargo only lasted a year, the ‘energy crisis’ it created seemed to deepen as time went on and had many profound consequences well into the 1980s. One of those consequences was that T’sable River coal got a second look. In 1975, geologist Michele Curcio, under contract to Weldwood of Canada Ltd., which was primarily a forestry and lumber manufacturing company, returned to the Cowie Creek/Cougar-Smith Creek area where ten test holes were drilled. Analysis of the results led Weldwood to a decision to retain their mineral interests in the T’sable River property but to shift their exploration activities to their holdings on the Quinsam River in the Campbell River area.
Fifteen years were to go by before the company returned to the T’sable River. In the meantime, however, Weldwood, working with a variety of partners (including Luscar Ltd of Edmonton, Consolidated Brinco Ltd., and Hillsborough Resources Ltd.) went through a prolonged and highly contentious public process in Campbell River before the Quinsam Coal Mine opened in 1987. At the beginning of the application process in 1978, ‘environmental impact’ was a relatively new phrase in the lexicon of both the mining industry and the provincial government and, for those who were opposed to the opening of an open-pit coal mine on the tributary of a river which was at the heart of the community’s view of itself as ‘the salmon capital of the world’, it offered considerable hope that the required permits would not be granted. The process was both formal and fractious. It involved twenty days of public hearings before three appointed commissioners who considered submissions from the company, the government and numerous interveners. It involved expert witnesses and cross examination by lawyers. It involved geological reports, water and fish reports. It involved the spontaneous creation of numerous organizations opposed to the opening of a coal mine. It involved proclamations of opposition from unions, sports fishing groups and environmentalists as well as from the local MLA, Colin Gableman. It involved a 4,600 name petition and a protest at the legislature. In the end, the Commission, in its 290 page report, concluded that the mine could function safely if it were ‘subject to adequate controls, supervision and surveillance.’ It then recommended the creation of an environmental technical review committee to monitor the construction and operation of the mine ‘so as to protect the use of water for the fishery, recreation, aesthetics and domestic purposes.’ ‘The end result,’ wrote S. L. Gardner, a geologist and industry supporter, ‘was the granting of mining permits to Brinco Mining Ltd. [Weldwood’s operating partner in the Quinsam Joint Venture] for the development of the Quinsam Coal Mine. This lengthy and costly process was significant in that it convinced other companies that coal mining on Vancouver Island could be resumed, despite the poor environmental and social history associated with the business in its somewhat chequered history.’ The provincial government granted the permits in 1984, the open-pit mine began excavation of thermal coal in 1987, and after a twenty-one year hiatus, coal mining returned to Vancouver Island somewhat triumphantly.
With the Quinsam Mine fully operational, Weldwood was, once again, able to turn its attention to the area south of the T’sable River and in 1990 and 1991 an extensive program of exploratory drilling was undertaken on its behalf. Apparently results were sufficiently encouraging to warrant the expense of a more extensive program in 1996-97 when Hillsborough Resources acted for Weldwood’s mining interests. Following the geologist’s report on this program, Hillsborough concluded that, before it could proceed confidently with a proposal for a full underground coal mine, it would apply for a permit to conduct a test mine in the Cowie Creek area. In 1998 a permit to remove 90,000 tonnes of coal was prepared by the Ministry of Mines and Petroleum Resources subject to the placement of a $125,000 reclamation bond. Citing the financial demands of the Quinsam Mine in an era of falling coal prices, Hillsborough chose not to act on the permit and, in stead, suspended all activity on the Cowie Creek/T’sable River site.
Three years later they were back seeking to ‘reactivate’ their permit for a test mine. This time there was considerable pressure form the community of Fanny Bay for the province to undertake an environmental assessment of the potential impact such a test mine may have on local water supplies. Stan Hagen, MLA for the area, however, was convinced that sufficient safe-guards were built-in to the permit and said that there was ‘no way’ the government would allow anything to degrade the water supply and the request for an environmental assessment was denied. Rather than act on the permit, however, Hillsborough, somewhat mysteriously, allowed their option on the property to expire and, once again, shifted their activities back to the Campbell River area where they entered into a joint venture with a company from Texas to investigate the coal bed methane possibilities on their lands.
For a brief time between 2001 and 2004, the search for marketable coal bed methane gained considerable public attention in the Comox Valley but ended abruptly when the major player ran afoul of the B.C. Securities Act. During this interlude exploration in the Cowie Creek area languished while the public debated the pros and cons of coal bed methane. Then in 2005/2006 Compliance Energy Corporation (CEC) acquired the rights to the vast Weldwood lands on Vancouver Island [which had been acquired in 2004 by West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd.] and commissioned a new drilling program and the first of what would become four technical studies on the viability of an underground coal mine at the site. A small bulk sample was taken from the property for analysis in 2006 and 12 more test holes were drilled, bringing the number of holes drilled adjacent to the site to 140. Two technical reports, one of 53 pages and the other of 82 pages, summarized the data in 2007 and both agreed that CEC ‘should carry on with exploration …to confirm the mineabilty of the coal’. CEC apparently took the advice and commissioned two more evaluations of the data. Both, one of 93 pages and the other of 269 pages, reported in 2010. The most recent report suggested the CEC undertake further investigation and a drilling program at a cost of $1,391,000. It seems that CEC is yet to get the answer it wants, but whether it is willing to spend more on another drilling program and technical report it is perhaps too soon to know.
In any case, as much of CEC’s promotional material emphasizes its commitment to developing an underground coal mining ‘project that leaves a positive…environmental legacy’ by way of monitoring and mitigating any negative environmental impacts its activities may trigger, readers may find the following quotation from a report titled ‘A Review of the Quinsam Coal Monitoring Process’ written in 2006 of interest: “The Campbell River Environmental Committee (CREC) is requesting intervention by the B C provincial ombudsman into the monitoring process of the Quinsam Coal Project which is presently being supervised by the Ministry of Environment. Our primary interest is protecting the fisheries resource that exists within the Campbell/Quinsam River System. … Central to the difficulty is the lack of enforcement of the company’s mining permits. The City of Campbell River, the Comox-Strathcona Regional District and Claire Trevena MLA North Island have all written to the provincial government requesting that permits be enforced yet violations are still taking place. The latest water quality monitoring report of August 2006 lists 131 effluent violations. The only attempt that we have seen by the government to bring the company into compliance with their permits is to revise the permits upward so that the company does not exceed them.”
And so it goes.
/ends
Denman Opposes Coal 