Paul Strome: The “Goldboro” Boondoggle | Unpublished
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Unpublished Opinions

Paul Strome's picture
Cheticamp, Nova Scotia
About the author

Paul Strome’s Bio 

Paul has two adult daughters and he has lived with First Nations, Inuit and Metis for a significant part of his life. After graduation from the University of Waterloo in Anthropology, he worked in the Northwest Territories/Nunavut as an educator, so he experienced the culture, language, and geographic parameters with indigenous people for 12 years. He has seen first hand how indigenous people of Canada are treated. This impassioned him to petition the government at every opportunity to bring about the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People.

After he moved to southern Ontario as an educator, he ran the extra-curricular Outdoor Education Club in addition to his classes, in one of the largest high schools in Canada training and taking students on canoeing, hiking, climbing, snow-shoeing and dog-sledding expeditions.  He has canoed/kayaked many of Canada’s Heritage Rivers and has lived in or travelled to every province and territory in Canada which has broadened his concerns about environment and social concerns. These experiences have intensified his deep-seated love and admiration for Canada.

As an elder and David Suzuki Ambassador he has championed the Blue Dot Movement in Unama’ki and in recent years was the Atlantic Regional Representative for the Council of Canadians. He collaborates and networks for the common good with other like-minded organizations.  He is well-known as an environmentalist/social activist throughout Unama’ki (Cape Breton Island) and beyond. He has met personally with many municipal, provincial and federal politicians to encourage them to adopt sustainable environmental and social changes to address climate change. He has also done the same at schools, community colleges, libraries, community halls and Cape Breton University.

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Paul Strome: The “Goldboro” Boondoggle

May 23, 2021

Canada is the only G7 country that is still emitting GHG emissions way above 1990 levels at 21% more. Compare that to the US which is on par with its 1990 levels, the 27 EU countries that are 25% below 1990 levels or the UK which is at 42% below 1990 levels and it s evident that Canada’s climate policy isn’t working and we have been moving in a contradictory direction.

Nova Scotia is a huge part of Canada’s climate change response. We have eight fossil fuel driven generating stations (four coal, four fuel oil and two biomass) that need to be transitioned off sooner rather than later but this won’t happen until we can get more solar and wind generators on line. What would be even more sensible would be to have the Atlantic Loop in place so that all the Atlantic provinces would be electrified by green energy.

There are fossil fuel corporations that want to get the Canadian taxpayer to fund their projects while we are all trying to get off of fossil fuels. Pieridae, a majority Canadian owned corporation based in Calgary is one of those companies. Pieridae’s stated plan is to use mainly fracked gas from Alberta and Pennsylvania and send it through a pipeline to Goldboro, Nova Scotia where it will be liquified and then transported to Europe for sale there. Besides the absolutely enormous negative environmental consequences for this project, Peridae has no confirmed end price deal at the other end which is one more flaw in this bizarre scheme. CEO Alfred Sorensen has been trying to obtain financing for this $10

billion idea from almost anywhere he can including the Canadian federal government of which he is asking almost $1 Billion.

The Nova Scotia Fracking Resource and Action Coalition said "If this project were to go ahead, Nova Scotia's greenhouse gas emission targets would be gone out the window". In order for the “Goldboro” project to move ahead Pieridae petitioned the Province of Nova Scotia to re-route Hwy 316 around the proposed project site mainly for “safety” reasons.

Minister Keith Irving recently agreed to this. Environment Minister Gordon Wilson said making room for a large emitter such as a Liquid Natural Gas plant would make meeting emission reduction targets "challenging" but “overall, greenhouse gas emissions are coming down in Nova Scotia”. Yes, those emissions are coming down extremely slowly thanks only to wind and solar installations that have been built in the last decade but it is definitely NOT because of the decommissioning of fossil fuel fired and biomass generating stations.

We will not be able to reach our national climate change goals if projects like Pieridae’s “Goldboro” project are even considered. This makes NO sense to me whatsoever, especially when very knowledgeable people within the energy and financial industry are viewing this idea as a ‘boondoggle’.

The public needs to research the issue and understand the future consequences of this decision and make their views well known to every politician in sight.