One hundred years on from when the Engineering Profession Act was first passed into BC law, our duty as professional engineers remains the same: to protect the public.

We must continuously remind ourselves that, as professional engineers, our “exclusive right to practice” our profession is afforded to us solely if we “uphold and protect the public interest and exercise the duty of professional care.”[1]

Indeed, as the APEGBC Code of Ethics states, we shall “hold paramount the safety, health and welfare of the public, the protection of the environment, and promote health and safety within the workplace[2].”

It is from this acknowledgment of professional duty that we, the Concerned Professional Engineers Society (CPE), seek to inform the public about the high risk decisions that were made by the federal government in approving the Trans Mountain Expansion — a project that will now cost Canadians more than $12 billion.

An oil tanker colliding with the Second Narrows bridges is a scary possibility and a proper risk assessment of this scenario has not yet been completed. Watch our video to learn more.

This project will increase the tanker traffic in Burrard Inlet from 5 to 34 vessels per month. This increase has not had a proper risk assessment on two counts:

A risk analysis on collisions with the existing bridges has not been done.

The 10% risk of a major spill of 8.25 million liters in 50 years has not been properly analyzed

The government has given no explanation as to why they’ve accepted this risk, nor is there any evidence that this assessment has been peer-reviewed and compared with other acceptable risks.

The key is to reduce risk to acceptable levels. The basis on which the federal government approved the expansion is 5 times the risk we accept for earthquakes and 20 times riskier than what we accept for new bridge construction.