Grassy Mountain, peak to left, and the Grassy Mountain Coal Project are seen north of Blairmore, Alta., on June 6. On Nov. 25, Crowsnest Pass will hold a referendum to ask whether its residents support the coal project.Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press
A coal mining proposal has divided two neighbouring municipalities in Southern Alberta – and one of them recently received a blow from the Alberta Energy Regulator, which denied its application for an adjournment of licence hearings for a new coal development.
To the north is Ranchland, a municipality of rolling terrain in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains with around 100 residents. To the south is Crowsnest Pass, a municipality of about 5,700 people.
Both picturesque, the two municipalities could not be more different when it comes to their positions on coal mining.
The issue centres around an Australian coal company, Northback Holdings Corp., which has three applications in front of the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) for coal exploration, drilling and water diversion on an old mine called Grassy Mountain.
Grassy Mountain is in Ranchland, Alta., but the site – which for decades was dug out and tunnelled to get to steel-making coal – is accessed via Highway 3 in Crowsnest Pass.
On Nov. 25, Crowsnest Pass will hold a referendum to ask whether its residents support the coal project, and the councillor behind the vote says he’ll be very surprised if the answer is “no.”
Ranchland, on the other hand, has taken the AER to court, challenging the fact the regulator is considering Northback’s applications at all. On Friday, an AER panel denied Ranchland’s request for an adjournment of the hearings pending the conclusion of that court appeal.
A mine plan for Grassy Mountain under Northback’s predecessor was already rejected by a joint federal-provincial review. That was in 2021. A year later, Alberta banned new coal exploration. But advanced projects are exempt from the ban, and Northback insists it’s on that short list. The AER – after receiving guidance from Alberta Energy Minister Brian Jean – agreed to send the applications to a public hearing.
The court action is a top priority in Ranchland, Reeve Ron Davis said in an interview, because of the impact a coal mine could have on the quantity and quality of water in the region.
Grassy Mountain is in the Oldman River basin, which supplies water to much of Southern Alberta, including a huge slice of the province’s agriculture sector. The basin is already under enormous stress, and Mr. Davis worries an open pit coal mine – thirsty by its very nature – will only make that worse.
“Southern Alberta is the breadbasket of Alberta ... and it needs to be looked after well in order for that to continue,” he said.
Dean Ward is the Crowsnest Pass councillor who proposed the coal referendum. His father came to the region to work in the mines and Mr. Ward followed in his footsteps, spending 15 years in the sector.
Mr. Ward acknowledges that Grassy Mountain is a “very contentious issue” between Crowsnest Pass and its neighbours, and within his municipality.
“There’s a lot of people that feel bullied and intimidated to express their opinion on both sides,” he said.
But why hold a vote at all when it has no legal power? To give council the social licence to lobby federal and provincial governments, he says.
“We feel that it’s time to send a message to not just the levels of government, but the various NGOs, the environmental groups and citizens outside of our community. Everybody’s talking for the Crowsnest Pass except the Crowsnest Pass.”
Mr. Ward is convinced of strong local support for Grassy Mountain, given around 600 people who live in Crowsnest Pass work in the coal mines further west, earning a combined $60- to $70-million a year in wages.
He says a new mine would bring much-needed jobs and more spending to the region, but Mr. Davis, from Ranchland, argues there will be little benefit to Albertans. Instead, profits will head offshore to Australia’s Hancock Prospecting Ltd. – Northback’s parent company – which is run by Australian billionaire Gina Rinehart, the country’s richest person.
“We’re really going to see very little return from that type of an operation, and we’re going to pay the price with the damage to the environment,” Mr. Davis said.
Alberta collects royalties from coal mined in the province – much like it does for oil and gas, but it’s a fraction of the amount. In the 2023-24 fiscal year, bitumen royalties dumped $14.5-billion into Alberta’s coffers. Coal royalties, on the other hand, brought in $92-million.
Ms. Rinehart has been a vocal critical of the federal and various state governments in Australia, accusing them of introducing policies and red tape that obstruct mining development and move investment offshore.
Her company, via Northback, has hired two firms to lobby the Alberta government on its behalf – Enterprise Canada and Crestview Strategy – to organize meetings, phone calls and informal communications with the government on Alberta’s coal policy, and the Grassy Mountain project specifically, according to the province’s lobbyist registry.
Enterprise, for example, lists activities such as “securing meetings to educate elected and department officials about information on all relevant aspects of the proposed project, including expected economic and environmental impacts, support from Indigenous communities and local stakeholders.”
Its lobbying targets include the office of Premier Danielle Smith, government ministries such as Indigenous Relations, Energy and Minerals, Environment and Protected Areas, and the Alberta Energy Regulator.
Crestview, too, has targeted the Premier’s Office and various government departments to “ensure elected and department officials understand all relevant aspects of the proposed Grassy Mountain steelmaking coal mining project and how it fits within the government’s broader coal and economic development policies.”