As B.C. spends hundreds of millions fighting one of the province’s worst wildfire seasons, critics are questioning the relatively small amount earmarked for wildfire prevention and whether those funds are being used efficiently. Following devastating wildfires in 2003, the province provided nearly $68 million over 10 years for wildfire prevention for communities that have…
Rain may have cooled off Saskatchewan’s wildfire situation, but the province is not out of the woods yet, environment officials say. Hundreds of Canadian Forces members were leaving the fire zone in the province’s north Monday and there are fewer active fires than last week. But with 98 fires still burning, the battle to protect northern…
With summer on us, things are heating up and it’s not only the weather. One thing that would be nice to keep from becoming overheated is the rhetoric around the Trans Pacific Partnership, a trade deal comprised of 12 Asia-Pacific nations, including Canada, the U.S. and Japan. The TPP has been in the news recently,…
Domtar Corporation (NYSE: UFS) (TSX: UFS) today announced the partial redemption of certain notes and a new debt financing. Domtar Corporation has elected to redeem on August 20, 2015, the redemption date, $55 million in aggregate principal amount of its 9.5% Notes due 2016, representing 59.16% of the outstanding notes, and $215 million in aggregate principal amount of its 10.75%…
Not so long ago, Chad Wasilenkoff was a darling of the stock market, having found a way to transform money-losing old paper mills into low-cost producers of rayon that sent shares of his Fortress Paper Ltd. soaring on the TSX. But Fortress fell out of favour, done in by steep import duties in key markets,…
The Grand Chief of the Cree Nation is in Waswanipi, Que., trying to calm concerns over a forestry agreement signed last week between the Cree Nation and the province of Quebec. The deal was signed last Monday in Quebec City to resolve a long-standing dispute over how forestry industry was clear cutting on a large swath of land…
Two new evacuation orders have been issued in British Columbia because of wildfires. The latest was issued early Tuesday in West Kelowna for residents in about 70 properties on the west side of Okanagan Lake. The residents (on Westside Rd.) were asked to report to a community centre in West Kelowna. Other residents in the…
Saying this year’s wildfires may be the new normal, the premiers of British Columbia and Saskatchewan are calling for a national approach to fighting forest fires. Saskatchewan’s Brad Wall is calling for a partnership between the provinces and the federal government to ensure firefighting equipment is available where it is needed. Wall — who says…
A Spruce budworm infestation is on its way and it appears to be entering a new outbreak phase in northeastern Ontario, according to CBC Sudbury’s backroads adventurer Bill Steer. The Spruce budworm is the most destructive pest of spruce and fir forests in North America, notes Steer. The larvae are wasteful feeders as they only…
Even though the smell and smog spewing out of Northern Pulp has faded this summer, a Pictou activist group remains skeptical the pulp mill’s emissions will stay out of their lungs for long. “It’s not a big issue in the town of Pictou any more, except for the people who comment, ‘Oh isn’t this nice…