Canadians will have to wait until after the 2015 federal election for data on deforestation by the country’s oil and gas industry, The Hill Times reported this week.
And when it’s finally released in 2016, the federal tracking data will only cover activity and impacts for 2011 and 2012.
Oil and gas activity destroyed 11,100 hectares (about 27,450 acres) of boreal forest in 2010, compared to 400 hectares in 1990, according to the latest State of Canada’s Forests report. While fire and pests have a far more serious impact, Naumetz writes, oil and gas deforestation “is a sensitive issue for the Harper government as it battles environmentally-based opposition to rapid expansion of oil sands mining and extracting.”
