West Coast Environmental Law is an environmental law and public advocacy organization based in

Vancouver, British Columbia Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

, Canada that works to shape environmental policies in British Columbia and in Canada. It is known for its involvement in green communities,

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

energy In physics, energy (from Ancient Greek: ἐνέργεια, ''enérgeia'', “activity”) is the quantitative property that is transferred to a body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of work and in the form of heat a ...

forest A forest is an area of land dominated by trees. Hundreds of definitions of forest are used throughout the world, incorporating factors such as tree density, tree height, land use, legal standing, and ecological function. The United Nations' ...

s and land use, aboriginal law, and environmental assessment. The organization also provides free legal advice regarding environmental issues, and it provides grants through its

Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund The Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund (EDRF) is a legal aid program based in British Columbia, Canada, which provides grants to individuals, community groups and environmental organizations who need to hire legal representation to assist them i ...

to individuals or groups seeking legal representation to resolve an

environmental conflict Environmental conflicts or ecological distribution conflicts (EDCs) are social conflicts caused by environmental degradation or by unequal distribution of environmental resources.Libiszewski, Stephan.What is an Environmental Conflict." ''Journal ...

. West Coast Environmental Law also monitors developments in British Columbian and Canadian environmental policy, and distributes this information to the public through various online channels.

History

West Coast Environmental Law was founded in 1974 and is the oldest environmental law organization in British Columbia, Canada. It was established to promote the cause of environmental law reform and to empower citizens so that they could work together to bring about progressive change. For much of its history, it has been engaged directly in law reform, legal education and test case litigation. In the late 1980s, it was determined that a stand-alone environmental law organization, which would devote itself primarily to test case litigation, was required. As a result, West Coast Environmental Law played an active role in the establishment of Sierra Legal Defence Fund, now known as

Ecojustice Canada Ecojustice Canada (formerly Sierra Legal Defence Fund prior to September 2007), is a Canadian non-profit environmental law organization that provides funding to lawyers to use litigation to defend and protect the environment. Ecojustice is Canad ...

, to take the lead in using test litigation to defend and protect the environment. West Coast Environmental Law, in turn, narrowed its focus to drafting and advancing legislative reform initiatives and providing public legal education. From 1990 to present, West Coast Environmental Law and Ecojustice Canada have avoided duplication by cooperating and coordinating on areas of potential overlap and having distinct market niches.

Notable achievements

West Coast Environmental Law has played a role in several environmental legislative initiatives in Candada. * Played a role in the developing the ''

Canadian Environmental Assessment Act The ''Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012'' (CEAA 2012) (the ''Act'') and its regulations established the legislative basis for the federal practice of environmental assessment in most regions of Canada from 2012 to 2019. It was repealed w ...

'' and the ''

Canadian Environmental Protection Act The ''Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999'' (''CEPA, 1999''; french: Loi canadienne sur la protection de l'environnement (1999)) is an act of the 36th Parliament of Canada, whose goal is to contribute to sustainable development through p ...

''. * Represented the Peace Valley Environmental Association at hearings on the controversial

Site C dam The Site C Dam is an under construction hydroelectric dam on the Peace River, 14 kilometres southwest of Fort St. John in northeastern British Columbia, Canada. It is located approximately 80 kilometres downstream from the W. A. C. Bennett Dam. ...

. * Worked as part of a delegation to help negotiate the

Kyoto Protocol The Kyoto Protocol was an international treaty which extended the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that commits state parties to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, based on the scientific consensus that (part ...

. * Negotiated the amendments that resulted in the protection of the

Great Bear Rainforest The Great Bear Rainforest is a temperate rain forest on the Pacific coast of British Columbia, Canada comprising 6.4 million hectares. It is part of the larger Pacific temperate rainforest ecoregion, which is the largest coastal temperate rainfo ...

. * Helped to draft the "good wood" certification standard for British Columbia, which independently verifies that wood products come from forests that are managed in an ecologically and socially responsible way.

Areas of work

West Coast Environmental Law specializes in areas dealing with green communities, climate change, energy, forests and land use, aboriginal law, and environmental assessment. ;Green communities: Work in this area is focused on reducing urban impacts, strengthening local government environmental by-laws, policies and practices, and advancing community livability and sustainability through strategic use of the law and law reform. ;Climate change: Work in this area is focused on creating a legislative framework that will allow British Columbia and Canada to do its part to protect and sustain the Earth's atmosphere. ;Energy: Work in this area is focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions by working on projects that shift away from the reliance on

fossil fuels A fossil fuel is a hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the remains of dead plants and animals that is extracted and burned as a fuel. The main fossil fuels are coal, oil, and natural gas. Fossil fuels ...

and towards sustainable renewable energy sources. ;Forests and

land use Land use involves the management and modification of natural environment or wilderness into built environment such as settlements and semi-natural habitats such as arable fields, pastures, and managed woods. Land use by humans has a long h ...

: Work in this area is focused on transforming the way rights and responsibilities about land use are understood in British Columbia – creating new legal mechanisms for resource tenures (licenses) and land use decision-making that are more democratic, sustainable and just. ;Aboriginal law: Work in this area is focused on providing legal and strategic advice to

First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...

and First Nations political organizations, including crafting law reform solutions that address

Aboriginal Title Aboriginal title is a common law doctrine that the land rights of indigenous peoples to customary tenure persist after the assumption of sovereignty under settler colonialism. The requirements of proof for the recognition of aboriginal title, ...

and Rights and foster ecological and cultural

sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livi ...

.: ;Environmental assessment: Work in this area focuses on law and policy reform discussions at both the federal and provincial levels, and works on a number of fronts to advance its law reform objectives.

Environmental Legal Aid

West Coast Environmental Law provides legal information and advice to members of the public who are facing an environmental problem. In some cases, it will provide brief legal opinions or letters where doing so has the potential to achieve an important environmental result.

Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund

West Coast Environmental Law provides grants through its

to individuals or groups who need to hire legal representation to resolve an environmental problem. The Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund is the only source of environmental legal aid in British Columbia and is used to hire lawyers at a

legal aid Legal aid is the provision of assistance to people who are unable to afford legal representation and access to the court system. Legal aid is regarded as central in providing access to justice by ensuring equality before the law, the right to co ...

rate. Since 1989, when the Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund was established, it has provided over $4 million in grants, which have aided in more than 500 legal cases in British Columbia. Marine biologist and fish farm activist Alexandra Morton used funding from West Coast Environmental Law to challenge the constitutionality of allowing fish farms in British Columbia. In another such case, a group of citizens known as Coal Watch used funding from West Coast Environmental Law to oppose a proposed coal mine located in Baynes Sound in Vancouver Island.

Public information

West Coast Environmental Law tracks and analyzes developments in British Columbian and Canadian environmental policy and distributes this information to the public through its Environmental Law Alert Blog, monthly Legal E-Brief newsletter, and Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube pages.

References

External links

* {{Authority control Environmental organizations based in British Columbia Legal organizations based in British Columbia Legal advocacy organizations based in Canada Environmental law in Canada