British Columbia's attorneygeneral said on Tuesday that the West Coast province is notdelaying Kinder Morgan Canada's Trans Mountain pipelineexpansion, despite the company's saying that B.C.'s oppositionwas making the build "untenable."
The attorney general, David Eby, told reporters that BritishColumbia is approving Trans Mountain permits on the sametimeline as other major projects, and that its new environmentalrules and a jurisdictional challenge simply come down to theprovince protecting its interests.
"It is not to stop the pipeline, it is not to prevent it -it's to ensure that we have the protections in place for whenthe pipeline is built and turned on," Eby said.
His comments run up against assertions from Kinder Morgan,which stopped all non-essential work on the C$7.4 billion ($5.8billion) project last month, citing permitting delays andpolitical opposition in British Columbia, and set a May 31deadline to decide if the build would go ahead or not.
Alberta's premier, Rachel Notley, said separately that herprovince was "getting closer" in its talks with Kinder Morgan toensure the expansion gets built, but she declined to providedetails.
Notley backed out of a meeting with other Western Canadianprovincial leaders this week, including B.C. Premier JohnHorgan, saying she would instead focus on Trans Mountain as theMay 31 deadline looms.
Canadian oil trades at a steep discount to the NorthAmerican benchmark, with the gap widening in recent months dueto tight capacity on rail and pipelines.
That has Alberta desperate to get new pipelines built,particularly a line to the coast to access overseas markets. TheTrans Mountain expansion would nearly triple capacity on anexisting line from Alberta to a Metro Vancouver port.
The project is fiercely opposed by environmental groups,some aboriginal groups and the B.C. government.
B.C. said on Tuesday that it had filed a challenge to a newAlberta law that would allow the oil-rich province to cut fuelshipments west.
(Reporting by Julie Gordon in VancouverEditing by Leslie Adler)