The Quebec government admits it made a mistake that led people to believe that Northvolt’s mega-factory project could endanger agricultural land in Montérégie. The Ministry of the Environment had included agricultural land in this project and Minister Pierre Fitzbiggon had mentioned a future rezoning.
We confirm that an error occurred when entering the batch numbers into our database due to the manual delineation of polygons, explains the Ministry of Environment, Fight against Climate Change, Wildlife and Parks (MELCCFP) via email.
In the days following the announcement of the Northvolt project, the ministry’s register of environmental permit applications showed 16 lots for the project. They comprised several agricultural properties with a total area of 70 hectares.
The entry in the register has since been changed and now shows only a project of nine properties, none of which are in an agricultural zone, neither in McMasterville nor in Saint-Basile-le-Grand.
According to our information, the Northvolt company insisted to the government that this error be corrected. “Our entire site is sufficient to accommodate our buildings,” said Swedish company spokesman Laurent Therrien.
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A map of the project boundaries presented by Northvolt during public information sessions.
Photo: Radio-Canada
Minister of Business, Innovation and Energy Pierre Fitzgibbon also sowed doubt, saying in an interview with Radio-Canada that there could be zoning issues in Phase 2 of the factory’s development. He also mentioned, during another interview (New window)the possibility of compensating for the loss of agricultural land.
When asked to clarify the origin of these comments, Minister Fitzgibbon’s office responded as follows: As the MELCCFP has written to you, an error has occurred [son] document.
We are pleased that no zoning changes are required for any of the phases.
The battery sector is threatening to gobble up agricultural land in Quebec as the number of projects in agricultural areas could increase in the coming years, Quebec’s Ministry of Agriculture indicated in a recent document.
Northvolt’s mega-factory project could harm wetlands considered of interest by the Montreal Metropolitan Community. There are protected bird species on the site.
Earlier this year, the Legault government amended an environmental regulation that could result in Northvolt avoiding a review by the Bureau d’audiences publique sur l’environnement (BAPE). There are currently no plans to conduct such a review, despite requests from several citizens and groups.