Northern Gateway pipeline ‘too dangerous’ for the environment: Mulcair

OTTAWA – NDP Leader Tom Mulcair says approving the Northern Gateway pipeline, and the subsequent shipment of oil from British Columbia’s northern coast, would be “madness.”

A federal review panel will issue a report Thursday, spelling out whether it supports the proposed pipeline.

But Mulcair says the project is too dangerous for the environment.

READ MORE: Critics to Northern Gateway react to recent tentative pipeline deal

And he says the New Democrats support a better option, which is a west-to-east pipeline from Alberta through to New Brunswick.

The panel is expected to release its report in Calgary on the nearly 1,200 kilometre pipeline that would link the Alberta oil sands with a tanker port in B.C.

READ MORE: British Columbians warming up to Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline

The federal government will then have 90 days to make a final decision.

The pipeline has become a lightning rod in the debate over global climate change and has raised concerns about the possibility of an oil spill on land or off the coast of British Columbia.

Northern Gateway spokesman Ivan Giesbrecht says he’s confident the decision will be based on solid science.

The pipeline would deliver 525-thousand barrels of petroleum a day from Edmonton to a tanker terminal in Kitimat to help oil producers reach emerging markets in Asia.

The report follows more than a year of hearings across B.C. and Alberta.