It’s true unnecessary delays are hampering the building of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain Expansion Project, but federal and provincial politicians backing the project might want to look to the company itself to understand why.

Detailed route hearings, such as those in Burnaby, B.C., are a standard part of the National Energy Board (NEB) process. The company serves and publishes notices along the proposed route, which are followed by a 30-day period where affected residents can file statements of opposition. Statements meeting NEB Act requirements result in hearings to deal with the issues raised.

With Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain project, the period for statements of opposition was drawn out after the company failed to publish notices on schedule — a schedule the company had set — and when it failed to file copies of project documents. Subsequently Kinder Morgan chose to republish notices along the entire route and 30-day periods for statements of opposition grew to as many as 109 days.

Kinder Morgan subsequently filed for seven route changes to its pipeline project. One of those changes is a sub-segment of the pipeline in Chilliwack. Technical issues prevent Kinder Morgan from laying the pipeline where they’d first planned to, however the proposed change is widely opposed in Chilliwack because it would put the new pipeline across an elementary school, between homes in residential neighbourhoods, and closer to city drinking water wells. Furthermore, Kinder Morgan’s reroute application indicated another option was available that would be safer for the city.

When the NEB chairperson adjourned the Chilliwack reroute hearing in mid-January, one NEB information request remained. Kinder Morgan said it would respond within two weeks. In early February the company filed a draft report arguing that the only possible reroute was the option Kinder Morgan wanted.

Interestingly, Kinder Morgan wrote previously that it had worked with BC Hydro for over two years looking at possible route alternatives for this part of the pipeline. Added to those two years were another 312 days, from the original reroute application date of March 27, 2017, to Kinder Morgan’s filing of its draft report Feb. 2, 2018. This means it took the company three years to review a pipeline segment of less than two kilometres.

If the NEB accept the report’s conclusions, it also means the realignment hearing — notices, comments, public consultations, information requests and responses, motions, written evidence, technical studies, oral hearings, staff and legal costs — was largely a waste of everyone’s time and money.

It is also another unnecessary delay of the detailed route hearings for the project more broadly across Chilliwack and the rest of project segment 6 — the only remaining major segment of the project for which detailed route hearings have yet to be announced.

The original Trans Mountain project application indicated the pipeline would be operating by the end of 2017. The company has said it now expects to be operating by the end of 2020.

Prime Minister Trudeau, Natural Resources Minister Carr, and Alberta Premier Notley may wring their hands over delays to the project, but instead of taking shots at British Columbia for proposing to do science, maybe they should be asking Kinder Morgan why it is taking the company so long to determine the viability of two kilometres of pipeline.

Ian Stephen is an 11-year resident of Chilliwack and program director of The WaterWealth Project.