Kebaowek Chief Lance Haymond said Friday’s court decision is 'precedent setting' and would also have implications for 'brother and sister' First Nations battling development of their traditional lands. Chief Haymond speaks at a news conference on Parliament Hill on Sept. 9, 2024.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
A small Quebec First Nation has won a second court victory over plans to build a nuclear-waste storage site near the Ottawa River, this time over a failure to take proper steps to reduce risks to rare turtles and long-eared bats.
The Federal Court ruled in favour of Kebaowek First Nation on Friday in a challenge to steps taken to protect wildlife that may stall plans to build the nuclear waste mound at the Chalk River Laboratories site northwest of Ottawa.
Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL) last year received a permit from the federal environment minister to build a low level nuclear-waste storage facility just over a kilometre from the Ottawa River. The planned containment mound, to be built at ground surface level, is designed to hold up to one million cubic metres of radioactive low-level nuclear waste.
But First Nations from Ontario and Quebec have argued that the forested site, in Ontario’s Renfrew County, which is home to bears, bats, turtles and other wildlife, is too close to the river and that the waste storage mound should be located elsewhere.
Friday’s ruling by Justice Russel Zinn will force the environment minister to go back and reconsider the government’s issuing of a species-at-risk permit, and whether there could have been other viable locations for the site with fewer impacts on wildlife. CNL, which plans to build and operate the proposed waste dump, looked at other locations owned by the Crown corporation Atomic Energy of Canada but chose Chalk River.
Kebaowek First Nation’s victory is its second in less than a month. Last month, the federal court partially granted its application for judicial review on the grounds that it was not properly consulted over the plans for the nuclear storage site.
Kebaowek Chief Lance Haymond said Friday’s court decision is “precedent setting” and would also have implications for “brother and sister” First Nations battling development of their traditional lands.
“This is a victory for our people and future generations,” he added.
He said as stewards of the land, the Kebaowek “have a responsibility to speak up for those who cannot be heard” including wildlife, and he is “deeply encouraged by Justice Zinn’s decision which recognizes the critical importance of protecting species at risk in our territories.”
In his ruling granting a judicial review, Justice Zinn said the environment minister’s issuing of the species-at-risk permit was “unreasonable due to fatal flaws” in interpreting and applying the federal Species at Risk Act, adding that the issuing of the permit must be reconsidered. The judge awarded legal costs to the Kebaowek First Nation.
The Justice said former environment minister Steven Guilbeault, who in Friday’s cabinet shuffle was made Canadian Culture and Identity Minister, had not adhered to his department’s prior practice of ensuring that alternative sites, where there could be less harm to threatened species, are fully considered as options in issuing a species at risk permit.
The permit the minister issued authorizes incidental harm, harassment or killing of the threatened Blanding’s Turtle, the endangered little brown bat and endangered Northern long-eared bat.
The construction of the Chalk River site could lead to Blanding’s turtles being killed on the roads, while the habitat where the bats roost and raise their young could also be threatened, the court heard.
The Blanding’s turtle, which can live for up to 80 years in the wild, has a distinctive bright yellow chin, and its upturned mouth gives the impression it is smiling. Its population has been hit by habitat loss and the illegal pet trade.
CNL has devised a number of ways to reduce the effect on the species including reducing traffic speeds to prevent turtles being hit and the installation of bat boxes in alternative forested areas, as well as wildlife corridors to allow safe passage for the protected turtles under roads.
But Chief Haymond said he thought the measures were not adequate and that advice from Indigenous people on how to protect wildlife had not been properly considered. He wants CNL to end preparations to clear the site, including blocking access to bear dens, following the decision.
The Kebaowek are one of 10 First Nations in Quebec and Ontario against the proposed Chalk River Near Surface Disposal Facility. It is also opposed by conservationists, the Bloc Québécois and the Green Party.
Ole Hendrickson, a researcher with the Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County and Area, and chair of the Sierra Club Canada Foundation’s national conservation committee – both of which mounted the court challenge with Kebaowek First Nation – said the decision is “huge.”
“The government should have listened to First Nations and citizens who said this was the wrong plan at the wrong location,” he said.
CNL and the federal government did not respond to requests for comment on Friday.