"B.C.’s energy regulator has the power to grant exemptions — without notifying the public. Experts are raising the alarm about the process, saying the regulator is playing soft with fossil fuel companies that break rules"
"The British Columbia government quietly granted one of Canada’s biggest oil and gas companies an exemption for thousands of pipelines that should have been deactivated before a legal deadline, according to documents obtained under freedom of information legislation.
In 2020, the BC Energy Regulator — then called the BC Oil and Gas Commission — exempted more than 4,300 of those pipelines operated by Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. (commonly known as CNRL) from the 18-month decommissioning requirements, according to documents unearthed by The Narwhal and the Investigative Journalism Foundation.
Major gas producers often operate hundreds or thousands of short pipelines that connect wells — including fracking wells — to larger pipeline networks that transport natural gas to buyers. When the wells dry up, those pipelines are no longer needed. B.C. law requires inactive pipelines to be fully decommissioned 18 months after they become inactive — a measure to prevent environmental damage and leaks as pipelines gradually decay."
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