Environmental Law Alert Blog

Through our Environmental Law Alert blog, West Coast keeps you up to date on the latest developments and issues in environmental law. This includes:

  • proposed changes to the law that will weaken, or strengthen, environmental protection;
  • stories and situations where existing environmental laws are failing to protect the environment; and
  • emerging legal strategies that could be used to protect our environment.

If you have an environmental story that we should hear about, please e-mail Andrew Gage. We welcome your comments on any of the posts to this blog – but please keep in mind our policies on comments.

2020 Canadian Law Blog Awards Winner

(Community Values Drive Responsible Waste and Resource Management)

Imagine criticizing a development or asking for changes to a law and getting sued by a large corporation with high priced lawyers and deep pockets.  Even if you did absolutely nothing wrong, fighting the lawsuit could bankrupt you.  Sound intimidating?  That’s the point of lawsuits intended to silence public debate – known by the acronym SLAPPs,

On Sunday (May 30th), I gave a workshop at the Your Water Your Future conference in Nanaimo, organized by the Vancouver Island Water Watch Coalition.

Turns out that good top-soil is important not just for gardeners, but for city planners as well.  Topsoil can provide valuable water conservation management services for cities.

On April 28th Blair Lekstrom, Minister of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources finally unveiled the BC government’s long promised Clean Energy Act (Bill 17).  The Act is intended to promote the development of renewable energy in BC. 

On May 18, the BC government announced that a mobile air quality monitoring station has arrived in Peace River Country.

Another lesson from the Gulf oil spill for Canada – think twice about subsidizing industries that deal in dangerous substances by limiting their liability for catastrophic accidents. Let me explain.

There was a fascinating article in the Vancouver Sun on May 19th: B.C. regulators give failing grade to proposed $2.9B Whistler-like resort.

As I posted previously, the biggest take-away message for Canada and BC from the BP oilspill in the Gulf of Mexico is that oil and gas development at sea is so inherently risky that even strong environmental laws regulating the activity cannot remove the

There is nothing but bleak news in the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico currently destroying livelihoods and the environment in Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and possibly beyond.  There are reports circulating that that spill could quic