Wilber cut from forestry transition team

Robin Wilber, the president of Elmsdale Lumber, has been cut from the province’s forest transition team just days after he was appointed.

Speaking on the Rick Howe Show on Jan. 7, Wilber said he was fired for wanting to talk about the possibility of a hot idle for Northern Pulp.

“Last night I got a call and they fired me,” Wilber told Howe. “They don’t want to have any discussions about Northern Pulp.”

On Friday, Jan. 3, Wilber had told SaltWire Network that he believed the province should work with Northern Pulp to allow them to hot idle the plant. This would require running water through the plant’s boilers to keep the facility in working order.

The province confirmed Wilber’s removal with an announcement in the early afternoon of Jan. 7.

“The forestry transition team was formed to collaborate on ways to support the forestry sector and the workers and businesses connected to the industry. This is not a table to discuss the future of Northern Pulp. That is the company’s issue,” stated Kelliann Dean, deputy minister of Intergovernmental Affairs and Trade, and forestry transition team lead in a release.

“Robin Wilber is focused on options for Northern Pulp,” she wrote. “That is not part of the transition team’s mandate therefore he is no longer part of the transition team.”

Dean said Wilber is still welcome to share ideas with transition team members on support for businesses and workers, and moving the industry forward.

Prior to his dismissal Wilber had said that Paper Excellence is considering the option of keeping Northern Pulp in a hot idle but that the company will need some co-operation to make it happen. Northern Pulp did not return requests for verification.

Wilber said he was talking with someone from the company as recently as Jan. 2 and believes it is one of the best hopes of mitigating damage that a long-term closure of the mill would have on Nova Scotia’s economy.

“There’s of course thousands of jobs in the province at stake, and I know jobs are important, but the bigger story that hasn’t come out, and it will over the next while, is that the 30,000plus woodlot owners in the province have just lost 30-50 per cent of the value of their land and their timber resources,” Wilber said.

Long term, the consequences of that would be huge.

“It is bigger than anybody realizes,” he said. “It’s going to be a slow, painful demise.”

But to keep the mill in hot idle would require taking water from the Middle River and running it through the boilers to keep them going. This water (which would not contain chemicals) would then be released into Boat Harbour the same way treated effluent currently is before it flows through the Boat Harbour basin and out to the Northumberland Strait.

He said this wouldn’t contravene the Boat Harbour Act because it wouldn’t be effluent, but it would require approval from Pictou Landing First Nation.

Pictou Landing First Nation Chief Andrea Paul issued a statement in regards to reports that Northern Pulp might consider a hot idle, saying that Pictou Landing has not been made aware of that.

“As far as I am aware no notice to consult has been issued in respect of a request by Northern Pulp to the province to allow it to discharge any amount of wastewater into Boat Harbour from the mill, even if it is wastewater used only in the power boiler or other non-pulping parts of the mill,” stated Paul.

She also said Wilber’s comments that the project would require Pictou Landing First Nation’s approval are inaccurate.

“Pictou Landing First Nation is not in a situation to approve or not approve anything,” stated Paul.

The statement said PLFN considers any water discharged by the pulp mill, even it is only from its power boiler, is effluent under the federal Pulp and Paper Effluent Regulations and the Boat Harbour Act, and any discharge of wastewater, even from an idling pulp mill, into Boat Harbour after Jan. 31, 2020, would violate the Act.

“If and when a consultation is initiated by NS Environment, PLFN would have to participate,” Paul said.

Consultations involve the exchange of technical information, and in the past PLFN has hired independent consultants as advisors in order to fully understand the potential risks involved.

“One of the risks is the delay of the remediation of Boat Harbour,” she said.

The statement says relevant technical information would include the volume of water that Northern Pulp proposes to discharge from the idling mill, the concentration of contaminants in the water, the temperature of the wastewater and whether other means of disposing of the wastewater have been considered, such as holding the water in the mill’s current spill basins and removing it by truck.

“Unfortunately, Northern

Pulp does not appear to have planned in advance for idling the mill,” Paul stated.