Grandfather climbs tree to protest pipeline
Country singer was arrested for similar treetop action in Burnaby last year
A 71-year-old man who was arrested last year for camping in a tree at Burnaby’s Westridge Marine Terminal to protest the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion has again climbed a tree at the site.
Terry Christenson, an Ontario grandfather of two, scaled the tree inside the terminal Monday morning and erected a mid-air camp to protest the proposed twinning of the Trans Mountain Pipeline.
“I’m doing this for all of the grandchildren of the world. Climate change is an issue that will impact my grandchildren much more than it will impact me,” Christenson said in a news release. “Canada is already on the path to clean energy and we must continue to diversify our economy — not build more dirty pipelines. I’m here today to ensure Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hears this message loud and clear.”
Christenson, a country singer who has twice been nominated for a Juno Award, was arrested after a similar protest in March 2018.
His first protest lasted 16 hours before he was removed, but Stand Earth spokesman Sven Biggs says the professional mountain climber has enough supplies to remain in his new perch for a week.
Stand Earth says about 230 people were arrested last year for violating an injunction against protests at the marine terminal and other nearby infrastructure linked to the Trans Mountain Pipeline.
In February, the National Energy Board recommended that the federal government approve the $9.3-billion pipeline expansion that would twin the existing 1,150-kilometre pipeline from Edmonton to Burnaby, built in 1953, and nearly triple capacity. Tanker traffic on the Burrard Inlet is estimated to increase from 60 tankers a year to more than 400.
The Alberta government says it needs the extra pipeline capacity so it can export more crude oil to Asia and beyond. The B.C. government and the cities of Vancouver and Burnaby are opposed, due mostly to the risk of an environmental disaster and the effect on marine life and some First Nations bands, but also because of the economics of the project. Bitumen is expensive to extract from the oilsands and demand from Asia has so far been sporadic.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is expected to green light the project soon.
“(The protest) is a message to Justin Trudeau and his cabinet who are right now considering whether or not to re-approve the pipeline. If they do that, I think they are going to see a lot more actions like this mornings,” Biggs said.