Is someone proposing an industrial or other significant project in your community? How are environmental impact assessments conducted in Alberta? How can you get involved in the environmental impact assessment process?

The short answer is that Alberta Environment regulates environmental aspects of many activities under the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act. Some of these are subject to mandatory environmental impact assessments and there are a variety of ways for the public to participate.

The Regional Director of Alberta Environment has authorized an activity to take place in your area. You disagree with the approach taken by the Director. What recourse do you have?

Join Jason Unger, Staff Counsel with the Environmental Law Centre, to discuss appeals of the Director’s decision to the Alberta Environmental Appeals Board.

The Environmental Law Centre’s Consistency and Accountability in Implementing Watershed Plans in Alberta: A jurisdictional review and recommendations for reform is a jurisdictional review focused on comparing law and policy approaches to implementation of collaboratively produced and approved watershed management plans. The review identifies central issues that must be dealt with in a policy framework for implementation of plans.

This publication can be downloaded for free from the Materials Available to Download section of the ELC website.

A new issue of News Brief - Vol. 24 No. 4 - is now available on the Environmental Law Centre website.

If you’re like many Albertans, you’re probably asking yourself some pretty important questions about greenhouse gas and climate change.

• What will Copenhagen mean?
• Why is cap and trade controversial?
• What are other places doing to address climate change through law and policy?

Or, maybe you’re not even sure which questions to ask. Whatever the case, let the Environmental Law Centre (ELC) get you started.

How are decisions made to authorize industrial operations in Alberta? Who gets to use water and how? How can you get involved in those types of decisions?

The short answer is that Alberta Environment regulates environmental aspects of many industrial activities under the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, and water use and activities affecting water under the Water Act.

Get the straight facts on Bill 50 and how it changes the role of public participation and environmental factors in transmission approvals in Alberta.

On January 7^th 2010, Laura Bowman of the Environmental Law Centre presented a lunch seminar on Bill 50, the Electric Statutes Amendment Act, 2009. This controversial bill was tabled in the summer and has been part of a storm of publicity and often confusing and contradictory information ever since.

The handouts from this presentation are now available for download from the Environmental Law Centre website.

The Alberta Government is considering amendments to water allocation and water licence transfer systems in the province. This review is being driven by issues of overallocation of water in some areas of the province and the economic and environmental issues that overallocation has caused.

This controversial bill was tabled in the summer and has been part of a storm of publicity and often confusing and contradictory information ever since.

Location

Alberta’s lands have been subject to ever-increasing pressures by population growth, industrial expansion and competition for multiple uses on the same pieces of land.

In its Land Use Framework, the province stated:"What worked for us when our population was only one or two million will not get the job done with four, and soon five million. We have reached a tipping point, where sticking with the old rules will not produce the quality of life we have come to expect. If we want our children to enjoy the same quality of life that current generations have, we need a new land-use system."