The Dogwood West Shore team was joined by the Canadian Orca Rescue Society at a protest at Esquimalt Lagoon last weekend.
Dogwood is a non-profit organization within B.C. that advocates for environmental well-being.
There was a crew of roughly 20 people by the Lagoon on Saturday with inflatable orcas, orca signs and petition forms for supporters to sign.
There were ‘We vote no Kinder Morgan’ signs that lined the Lagoon side of the road to outline the perimeter of an Aframax tanker.
An Aframax tanker is longer than Vancouver’s tallest building at 245 metres long and 43 metres wide, and can carry 120 million litres, or 750,000 barrels of oil.
Dogwood member Doug Davies became involved with the group two years ago after happening upon them at a National Energy Board hearing.
Davies said he and Kathryn Cass, Dogwood team leader, brainstormed this idea a few weeks ago to come to the Lagoon and try to garner more signatures and support for the cause.
“Dogwood wanted to do this to draw attention to the impact the tankers will have as they move past this very shore on a daily basis,” Davies said.
“We also wanted to draw attention to the Orca Rescue society too, we speak for those who can’t speak for themselves.”
The oil would be transported from the port in Burnaby through the Haro Strait and Strait of Juan de Fuca right out to the Pacific Ocean.
Davies said there really is no safe way to clean up bitumen and that the federal government doesn’t really have a grasp of how they would go about cleaning an oil spill.
He said the ocean protection program of $1.5 billion isn’t enough to clean the water if anything happens. For roughly 200,000 kilometres of ocean, it works out to $7,500 per kilometre for water treatment.
“What these oil companies won’t tell you is a successful clean-up is 10 to 20 per cent, they can’t clean it up,” he said.
“Eighty per cent of it will remain in the water, and bitumen will sink, they don’t know what it does or how it reacts with the salt water, but they know it’s extremely toxic.”
Davies pointed to the Exxon Valdez oil spill nearly 30 years ago in Prince William Sound, Alaska, where there oil can still be found by sticking a hand in the sand, he said.
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lindsey.horsting@goldstream