Ellen Page is taking the protests against Alton Gas into her own hands.
The Halifax-born actress was at the Alton Gas site over the weekend to speak out against a controversial plan that would use water from one of Nova Scotia’s major rivers to create huge underground caverns to store natural gas.
“Humbled and honoured to have spent time with the extraordinary Dorene Bernard and other grassroots grandmothers and water protectors to learn more about how they are protecting the water and land from Alton Gas and the Nova Scotia Government and the best ways to support,” Page wrote in an Instagram post to her two million followers Monday.
READ MORE: Ellen Page throws her support behind Indigenous land protectors protesting Alton Gas
Page also recently shared a link to a Change.org petition, encouraging her followers sign the petition and “support our environment and indigenous rights.” She shared the link again on Monday.
For the past 12 years Alton Gas has been planning to pump water from the Sipekne’katik (Shubenacadie) River to an underground site 12 kilometres away, where it will be used to flush out salt deposits, creating up to 15 caverns.
WATCH: Alton Gas fortifies fences after removal of Mi’kmaw grandmothers
The leftover brine solution would then be pumped back into the river over a two- to three-year period.
Three grassroots grandmothers were arrested last week after the RCMP enforced a court injunction, removing protesters from a blockade at the Alton Gas site near Fort Ellis, N.S.
The three women, however, weren’t charged and were released from the RCMP detachment in Enfield the same day.
READ MORE: Mi’kmaw matriarchs serve eviction notice to Alton Gas
Page, an Oscar-nominated actress, has been a vocal critic of the plan and has previously spoken about her responsibility to put a spotlight on the efforts of marginalized communities that are disproportionately impacted by environmental disasters and environmental racism.
Page has also spoken out publicly about a plan by Northern Pulp to close its mill’s effluent treatment plant in Boat Harbour, N.S., a heavily-polluted lagoon on the edge of the Pictou Landing First Nation.
— With files from Alexander Quon, Elizabeth McSheffrey and The Canadian Press.
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