Olivier Primeau has owned 36% of Quebec’s permitted water volume for less than a year and is urging the Legault government to wake up. “Everyone would sleep better if we all owned the water,” he says.
The entrepreneur publishes this unusual message since March 22, International Water Day, has passed without Quebec moving. He also did it Wednesday on QUB radio.
However, last December François Legault promised a bill “to protect water” for the first six months of 2023.
Since then nothing. radio silence.
“It’s unacceptable,” the then-prime minister said of the 811 billion liters of water abstracted in Quebec in 2021 for royalties of less than $3 million.
Olivier Primeau has noticed investor interest in blue gold since his purchase of Dominion Water Reserves in September 2022. The company has since changed its name to Prime, the entrepreneur’s childhood nickname.
“We’ve grown from 200 to 2,000 shareholders, and even if we’re a penny stock with no income, there are a lot of people who are betting on the water,” he says in a phone interview.
Still no law
The public company has six groundwater catchment permits issued by the Quebec Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Mitigation (MELCC) covering a total of 36% of Quebec’s water volume.
The market cap is $20 million. As of now, Prime isn’t absorbing water and has no plans to do so any time soon.
Still, its owner says it’s “unrealistic” to be able to buy a natural resource “that has never been protected.”
“Private companies have the permits. Could Investissement Québec or the Caisse de depot at least invest in the resource for Quebecers to control and benefit from? ” he asks.
Olivier Primeau therefore invites the government to sit down with him to discuss it.
Rébecca Pétrin, executive director of the organization Eau Secours, tends to agree.
“We cannot leave our water to those who have the financial means,” she exclaims.
Fishing permits should come with strict rules, she said, which is not the case at the moment.
Eau Secours also takes a firm stand on Quebec law.
“It is imperative that we have control over who takes water and for what purpose,” stresses Ms. Pétrin.
At the Center Québécois du droit de l’environnement (CQDE), we also note that “water is clearly seen as an economic resource by many actors”.
“There is a worrying privatization,” said Marc Bishai, a lawyer at CQDE. Hence the importance of the new law, which he awaits “with great impatience and growing concern.”
In the office of Environment Minister Benoit Charette, we reply that it will be tabled “in the coming weeks” without giving any further details.
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