Alberta's political and business leaders are voicing strong reaction to Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre's opposition of the Energy East pipeline project.
Coderre said in announcement made Thursday that potential environmental risks outweigh possible economic benefits for the Montreal area.
Wildrose Party Leader Brian Jean took a jab at Montreal on Twitter, slamming the St. Lawrence sewage dump.
You can’t dump raw sewage, accept foreign tankers, benefit from equalization and then reject our pipelines https://t.co/J94PksWtJt #ableg
— @BrianJeanWRP
"While Mr. Coderre dumps a billion litres of raw sewage directly into his waterways and benefits from billions in equalization payments, his opposition to the Energy East pipeline is nothing short of hypocritical," said Jean in a media release.
"Montreal buys millions of barrels of foreign oil from dictatorships, but it is rejecting oil from their friends in confederation — it's disgraceful! This is a project that will benefit all of Canada, and will improve our GDP by $55 billion."
The City of Montreal's official opposition is the latest challenge to TransCanada's proposed pipeline project, which would carry 1.1 million barrels a day of oilsands crude through Quebec to an export terminal in Saint John, N.B.
The project would include the existing TransCanada pipeline as far east as Montreal plus a new pipeline through Quebec.
Deron Bilous, Alberta's minister of Economic Development and Trade, is calling Corderre's statement "both ungenerous and short-sighted."
"The people of Alberta are now doing our share to combat climate change. We are also facing a very serious challenge today due to the collapse in commodity prices — and so do all Canadians, since we all look to the same resource revenues to create jobs and fund the social programs we all depend on.... Everyone loses if we destroy our resource economy."
Greenpeace is responding to the announcement by calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to reject the pipeline project.
"Trudeau already said that pipelines projects must be accepted by the local communities before they get approved. [Montreal's] decision is a clear no to TransCanada's project, which means that it cannot go forward," said Patrick Bonin, a Greenpeace climate and energy campaigner.
TransCanada Corp.'s proposed pipeline project, which would carry 1.1 million barrels a day from Alberta through Quebec to an export terminal in Saint John, N.B. (Canadian Press)
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