LNG pipeline project through 'pristine wilderness' faces B.C. court challenges

Protesters opposed to fracking and liquefied natural gas march to the LNG conference in Vancouver, on Friday May 23, 2014. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck

A Gitxsan Nation hereditary chief is challenging the B.C. government’s decision to allow a pipeline to go through what he calls “pristine wilderness,” on the strength of a 12-year-old environmental review, while disregarding traditional Gitxsan governance by declining to attend feast hall meetings.

The B.C. Supreme Court is set to weigh in on two petitions filed over the provincial government’s decision last year to deem the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline “substantially started,” meaning it wouldn’t need a new environmental assessment.

The liquefied natural gas pipeline’s construction, which was authorized in 2014, and a deadline to start it was extended to 2024, spurring the court challenges from Gitxsan Hereditary Chief Charlie Wright and environmentalist groups opposed to the project.

The 900-kilometre pipeline, which was given the green-light by the B.C. Environment Ministry last June, will feed the Ksi Lisims liquefied natural gas facility off the northwest coast, which the Carney government has deemed a nation-building project that “will transform Canada’s energy future.”

The Gitxsan are made up of four clans, divided further into different houses known as wilps, which are the “central social unit in Gitxsan society,” each with their own territories.

Wright, on behalf of his wilp, says in legal submissions that the challenge isn’t about opposing the pipeline itself, but rather the route it’s expected to take through “one of the last remaining untouched areas” of their territory, without proper consultation.

The project route is set to directly cross his house’s territory, “including pristine wilderness and areas that wilp members rely on to sustain their culture and identity as Gitxsan people.”

The Gitxsan petitioners allege consultation “regarding the substantial-start determination was hollow because the outcome of that determination was a foregone conclusion.”

The province, they allege, repeatedly declined invitations to attend meetings at their feast hall where decisions are made in accordance with Gitxsan law.

“The province’s consistent refusal to meet with the petitioners and witness the wilp’s decision-making process in the feast hall is dishonourable and disregards the importance of Gitxsan law and governance,” court submissions filed in March say.

“The effect of the province’s conduct in the course of the substantial-start determination has been to sideline and silence the legitimate concerns of the rights-holding collective.”

The co-owner of the project, the Nisga’a Nation, lauded the province’s decision as an important step for its “vision of self-determination and long-term prosperity.”

Eva Clayton, president of Nisga’a Lisims Government, said at the time of the approval that the pipeline and the liquefied natural gas facility it will supply are a “turning point” for Indigenous-owned resource projects.

“For too long, Indigenous Nations have watched resource development happen around us, instead of with us,” Clayton said.

But Wright’s court submissions say that “reconciliation with one Indigenous group cannot take place at the expense of another.”

“The petitioners recognize and respect that the project as a whole, together with the Ksi Lisims LNG facility, is of economic importance to the Nisga’a Nation,” court documents say. “However, the petitioners also have rights and responsibilities in respect of their own territories.”

Environmental opponents to the pipeline, the Kispiox Valley Community Centre Association, the Skeena Watershed Conservation Coalition and a local resident claim the project has not been substantially started.

Shannon Lea McPhail with the Skeena coalition said in a statement that the project stalled for a decade and the work to satisfy the substantial start condition was “last minute,” alleging the province appeared willing to “bend over backwards … to keep this zombie project alive.”

Matt Hulse, a lawyer with environmental law group Ecojustice, is representing the group of petitioners opposed to the project.

He said in a statement released last week that there was a “clear deadline” to meet in order for the project to be truly substantially started.

“The law imposes this deadline for a reason: to give proponents sufficient time to start construction while also protecting the public from long-delayed projects being built based on outdated information and conditions,” he said.

“Proponents shouldn’t be allowed to preserve their certificate indefinitely by only doing a trivial amount of work, then returning to the project whenever it suits them. This defeats the very purpose of the substantial-start deadline.”

B.C.’s Environment Assessment Office said in its reasons for decision in June that the company behind the project, Prince Rupert Gas Transmission Ltd., had spent $584 million between 2013 and 2024 to advance the project.

The cases are scheduled to be heard together for six days in B.C. Supreme Court in Vancouver.

This report by Darryl Greer, The Canadian Press, was first published April 27, 2026.