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Baffinland Mary River Project

Baffinland Mary River Project. Environmental Assessment Methods Marine Environment VECs Workshop Session 02 November 2011. Contents. EA Methods Marine Environment VEC Selection KIs Measurable Parameters. Environmental Assessment Methods. General Principles

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Baffinland Mary River Project

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  1. Baffinland Mary River Project Environmental Assessment Methods Marine Environment VECs Workshop Session 02 November 2011

  2. Contents • EA Methods • Marine Environment • VEC Selection • KIs • Measurable Parameters

  3. Environmental Assessment Methods • General Principles • Prediction Methods – “Significance” • Tools used in Effects Prediction • Mary River EIS Issues • Adequacy of Baseline • Adequacy of Project Description • Thresholds and Magnitude • Significance Determination

  4. Guidelines • “ Deficiencies in baseline data increase uncertainties in the prediction of potential impacts, and consequently require an intensification of corresponding monitoring and mitigation programs…..” • VECs • Marine and Coastal Habitats including sea ice and seabed sediments • Marine fish and invertebrates • Marine mammals including such representative species as polar bears, seals, bowhead whales, walrus, beluga whales, narwhals. • Baseline Data • “Descriptions of marine wildlife populations”

  5. Ringed seal “ at least a few million” Walrus “population numbers or trends are not well known” Beluga Eastern High Arctic Baffin Bay(21,213) Western Hudson Bay (57, 300); Eastern Hudson Bay (2,453); Ungava (endangered) Narwhal > 63, 000 Bowhead (Eastern Canada- West Greenland population) – 6,344 Polar BearFoxe Basin (2,119); Baffin Bay (2,074); Davis Strait ( 2,100)

  6. General Principles • What is an environmental assessment? • a planning process • a tool to communicate a project’s environmental impacts and mitigation measures. • an approval process • high level decisions on • overall acceptability of major undertakings.

  7. Timing of Environmental Assessment • normally carried out “as early as possible” in the Proponent’s Project definition process. • affects detailed design; however • less than perfect or highly detailed plans are available for the EIS.

  8. Significance “significant adverse effects” • Direction + • Frequency, Duration + • Extent + • Reversibility + • Magnitude • Measurable Parameter • = Significance of Effect

  9. Dealing with Uncertainty • Probability + Level of Confidence • = Certainty

  10. Direction Nature Geographic Extent Magnitude Complexity Significance of Impact Frequency Duration Reversibility Level of Confidence Probability Certainty

  11. Significance Certainty IMPACT PREDICTION

  12. Baseline Environment Description • Misconceptions • “complete” body of knowledge required for effects prediction • Rare to have “perfect” level of information for decision-makers • Implies that detailed and final Project description is available

  13. Baffinland Iron MinesMary River ProjectMARINE ENVIRONMENT October 18, 2011 Technical Meetings

  14. Marine VECs & Key Indicators Sea Ice • Landfast ice in Steensby Inlet • Pack ice along southern shipping route * • * Added based on an Information Request. Water & Sediment Quality • water quality parameters: TSS, nutrients, metals, salinity, & hydrocarbons • sediments: focus on metals & PAHs • Reliance on • CCME – PMAL thresholds Marine Habitat & Biota • Marine fish habitat: HADD approach • Arctic char Marine Mammals • Ringed Seal • Bearded Seal * • Walrus • Beluga Whale • Narwhal • Bowhead Whale • Polar Bear *Added based on an Information Request.

  15. Basis of Effects Predictions

  16. Basis of Effects Predictions (cont’d)

  17. Interactions Assessed

  18. Summary of Effects Predictions • No Significant Negative Residual Effects PLUS • Mitigation • Monitoring • Adaptive Management

  19. Threshold Values and Population Estimates • “….. if there is a public benefit to frontier resource development, then there is a public obligation to ensure that research required to ensure environmental sustainability is done in an orderly fashion. It is neither reasonable nor productive to put this burden on the first proponent in an area.”

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