Work will continue on downtown Burnaby Tank Farm tank, considered most likely to collapse due to extreme conditions, company says
The Trans Mountain pipeline will be restarted on Monday after being shut down by heavy flooding in the outskirts of Vancouver last week, in what has been seen as a symbolic move designed to show that the project is still on track.
The federal government approved the $7.4bn project last November despite opposition from environmentalists and First Nations groups.
Trans Mountain pipeline on track to avoid day of reckoning, but may run too close to cliff notes Read more
However, opponents have vowed to step up pressure to stop it from being built, with the deadline for legal challenges to be filed in October. The company has also promised to seek federal approval for the project in July 2021.
The pipeline expansion project between Alberta and a marine terminal in Burnaby, British Columbia, was halted by Trans Mountain on Wednesday due to flooding in the neighbourhood near the tank farm.
Chris Johns, a manager at Trans Mountain, said the company’s “ultimate goal” is for the pipeline to restart Monday, and the process of restarting the system was being slowed down.
Trans Mountain had been pumping oil at above capacity for about two weeks before the flood shut it down. The company had the option of allowing leaks along the route to occur before shutting down, Johns said.
“We didn’t want to do that because it was more detrimental to move oil or would not have gone very far at all,” he said. “We really don’t have any other choice other than the temporary closure we’ve taken.”
Rich Coleman, the minister responsible for Trans Mountain, told reporters last week the company is aware of the fears of flooding around the tank farm and will “put as much effort into ensuring that this shouldn’t happen again”.
Johns said it was not yet clear when the Tank Farm would be operating again, nor how much oil was still in storage. He said Trans Mountain does not have the capacity to move the amount of oil it needs if the Tank Farm were to be shut for any extended period of time.
During the closure, Trans Mountain said it was securing emergency sandbags and added it has a “swift” response team on standby.
“By taking this proactive step we can keep our oil flowing and keep communities safe,” the company said in a statement.