Watch Live: CityNews at Six Vancouver

Vancouver highlights spill response issues three years after Marathassa leak

By

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Days before Kinder Morgan is set to reveal the fate of its Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson is taking aim at Ottawa’s spill response.

The MV Marathassa leaked 2,700 litres of bunker fuel in the waters of English Bay back in April 2015. Three years later, Robertson says taypayers are still on the hook for clean up and response costs.

“While we’re repeatedly told that there is a world-class spill response system for oil tankers in Canada, our experience shows otherwise,” Robertson says. “Instead, we have to continue to put legal resources into fighting our case and chasing repayments.”

Joined by the heads of the Vancouver Park Board and the Georgia Strait Alliance for the announcement, Robertson says the city is still fighting to recover more than $500,000 in costs spent on staff salaries, equipment costs and third-party groups to help in the cleanup.

He says the Ship Source Oil Pollution Fund, a federal body that’s supposed to help compensate businesses and governments, will only cover 27 per cent of the cost. Though the fund was set up to help is such situations, Robertson says it doesn’t deliver results, and speaks to the greater concern he has with potential spills.

This prompted the city’s claim last month against the MV Marathassa’s owner for compensation.

“This really identifies the problem here with oil spills around the world, typically the ship owners are difficult to go after when there’s a spill. And the costs are never quite recovered by taxpayers, but governments, by citizens.”

He wonders if the city can’t recoup money for a small spill, how will it recover money for a large spill, which he believes will happen if the pipeline expansion moves forward.

“This is yet another reason why the City has taken a definitive stand against the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion,” he adds.

The spill and the ensuing miscommunications among Canadian authorities as well as delays in clean-up raised questions about Canada’s preparedness for oil spills.

“That oil spill and those oil tankers are not addressed meaningfully in the review that happened by the National Energy Board.”

The Vancouver Aquarium says it’s still owed $180,000 that was spent on environmental testing to figure out what the fuel was and the risks it posed to the facility. However, the ship’s owner has offered to cover less than a quarter of the cost.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today