Solidarity Halifax: Stop the Alton Gas Project – Halifax Media Co-op

K’jipuktuk (Halifax)—Eight years ago, Alton Gas—a subsidiary company of Alberta-based AltaGas ltd.—applied to the Nova Scotia government with a proposed project that would allow natural gas to be stored in underground salt caverns near the Shubenacadie River, in Alton, N.S. Since then, the project has received opposition from community members, activist groups and resistance from local Mi’kmaq Bands, Sipekne’katik First Nation and Millbrook First Nation. In the fall of 2014, development of a brine discharge pipeline started next to the Shubenacadie River, but local resistance and claims to First Nation title managed to halt the project for about a year. However, in January 2016, Alton Gas was given government permits for the project to continue. Now, in March 2016, the Alton Gas project faces more opposition than ever.

Who is Alton Gas? What is the Approved Project?

Alton Gas is a subsidiary company, as is Halifax-familiar Heritage Gas, of AltaGas Ltd., an energy giant based out of Calgary, Alb. Thanks to its many subsidiaries, AltaGas has become a behemoth in the Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) industry with projects ranging from fracking to cross-Canada pipelines to processing and home delivery. The company is now expanding its diversity further, as it seeks to melt and hollow up to 20 salt caverns, anywhere from 800-1,000 metres deep, out of naturally occurring salt formations beneath Brentwood, N.S. Here it will store anywhere between four to six billion cubic feet of LNG, a project which has a 65% failure rate in the United States and a 40% failure rate globally. These failures have lead to massive explosions that can kill or injure workers and locals, as well as to the uncontrollable release of extremely toxic chemicals into the air, soils and waters of local environments and communities, forcing locals out of their homes while threatening their health.

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