Something’s got to give on Northern Pulp deadline

Two trains, on a collision course, running out of track.

That’s as apt a metaphor as any for the rising tension over the future of Northern Pulp and looming closure date for the plant’s Boat Harbour effluent treatment site.

The company says it cannot possibly meet the Jan. 31, 2020 deadline for ending treatment in the heavily polluted lagoon. The paper mill submitted environmental assessment regulation documents last week that laid out details of its planned — and controversial — new effluent treatment facility, including piping treated waste into the Northumberland Strait.

But under even the most optimistic circumstances, that new treatment facility wouldn’t be operational until nearly a year after the legislated closure date for Boat Harbour.

So Northern Pulp, let’s call the company Train A, is banking on getting that extension. Without it, company officials have suggested, the mill may have to shut down for good. Cold idling — closing temporarily — isn’t a realistic option, they’ve said.

Meanwhile, the Nova Scotia government, which we’ll call Train B, is vowing the deadline for Boat Harbour’s closure remains immovable — unless the community agrees.

That seems highly unlikely. Pictou Landing First Nation, which recently celebrated beginning to count down the final year before closure of the treatment facility on their doorstep, has made it clear they have no intention of agreeing to any extension.

Collision course.

Proponents on both sides argue the stakes are enormous. Unifor, which represents more than 200 workers at the mill, has called on Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil to protect forestry jobs. The forestry industry had warned that sawmills across that province rely on Northern Pulp as a buyer.

Meanwhile, beyond Pictou Landing’s clear rejection of any Boat Harbour extension, the fishing industry, in Nova Scotia and here in Prince Edward Island, and community group Friends of the Northumberland Strait remain strongly opposed to plans to pipe effluent into the strait separating the two provinces.

Where is this headed?

The crucial question is whether Northern Pulp’s plan for a new effluent treatment plan will pass environmental muster.

Despite understandably hightened emotions on both sides, the science must prevail.

If the mill’s plan is rejected, Northern Pulp’s future will be in grave doubt. The Nova Scotia government is now bracing itself for that eventuality.

But if the new effluent treatment facility wins approval — whether through the shorter provincial path or, which could still happen, a much longer federal review — then the pressing question becomes what to do about the seemingly unavoidable need to temporarily shut down the mill. Given the enormous costs the permanent loss of Northern Pulp would have on the province’s economy, in that latter scenario McNeil’s government may have to swallow hard and find a way to keep Northern Pulp — and others affected in the foresty industry — on life support until the new treatment plant is up and running.