---
title: "Carney Announces $1.2 Billion for Ocean Protections as Major Projects Loom"
description: "The funding comes as Ottawa faces a Thursday deadline on designating an Alberta-to-B.C. pipeline a project of national interest"
author: "rews desk"
published: 2026-09-30T01:19:51.708Z
modified: 2026-10-01T02:53:41Z
url: https://rews.cc/a/carney-announces-1-2-billion-for-ocean-protections-as-major--7420b3
language: en
tags: ["ocean", "pipeline", "environment", "coast-guard", "whales", "us"]
publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)"
---

# Carney Announces $1.2 Billion for Ocean Protections as Major Projects Loom

*The funding comes as Ottawa faces a Thursday deadline on designating an Alberta-to-B.C. pipeline a project of national interest*

By rews desk · September 30, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/carney-announces-1-2-billion-for-ocean-protections-as-major--7420b3

## In brief

- Canada announced 1.2 billion Canadian dollars in ocean protection funding on Tuesday as major project decisions near
- Measures include Coast Guard monitoring, an oil spill plan, $100 million for underwater noise and $90 million for fisheries enforcement
- Ottawa faces a Thursday deadline on designating an Alberta-to-B.C. pipeline a project of national interest
- LNG Canada confirmed a Phase 2 expansion at Kitimat, B.C., that would double the facility’s capacity
- Coastal First Nations welcomed the money; the Wilderness Committee called it “pennies” next to a $10 billion port plan

Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada announced 1.2 billion Canadian dollars in federal funding for ocean protections on Tuesday, as his government moves toward decisions on a new pipeline to the West Coast and an expansion of the Port of Vancouver’s Roberts Bank terminal.

The projects would put “more ships on the water and more pressure on the habitats that we are all working to protect,” Mr. Carney said at the announcement in North Vancouver. “We must scale up our systems to protect marine life in the event that something goes wrong.” The money will expand the Canadian Coast Guard’s capacity to monitor marine traffic, create a national near-shore weather forecasting system and finance a marine mammal oil spill response plan, along with upgraded search-and-rescue stations, better seabed mapping and fisheries conservation.

The announcement came two days before a Thursday deadline for Ottawa to decide whether to designate a proposed pipeline from Alberta to British Columbia’s south coast a project of national interest. “This project would diversify our economy, create almost 150,000 new jobs right across Canada, and make us much less dependent on the United States,” Mr. Carney said, describing what he called a “protect-while-we-build approach.” He said the pipeline would avoid “highly sensitive areas,” follow a route similar to the existing Trans Mountain line and leave the oil tanker ban along British Columbia’s north coast in effect.

Hours earlier, LNG Canada had confirmed it will proceed with a Phase 2 expansion of its facility in Kitimat, British Columbia, doubling its capacity. The push on major projects comes as Albertans prepare to vote, in a matter of weeks, in a referendum on separating from Canada.

Mr. Carney has also backed the Roberts Bank expansion, in Delta, near the mouth of the Fraser River, telling reporters during a July visit that his government was looking to provide about $10 billion for the project, part of an effort to grow exports beyond the United States. The port is “already at such tight capacity,” he said Tuesday, and the expansion would help Canada “trade more with different partners, to diversify, to reinforce our sovereignty.”

Much of Tuesday’s money is aimed at the waters those ships would ply. Ottawa is providing $100 million to monitor, assess and reduce underwater noise that affects whales along the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic coasts, with a goal of holding noise in waters off Vancouver to 2023 levels even as vessel traffic grows. Endangered southern resident killer whales depend on those waters. “To put it simply, if a killer whale gets too close to the site, work must stop,” Mr. Carney said of the port project, promising “rigorous conditions” on construction, plus funding for Indigenous-led stewardship and restoration in the Lower Fraser River Estuary.

Another $90 million will go to front-line fisheries enforcement and equip fisheries officers with modern tools, including drones, and $186 million to the Northern Shelf Bioregion Reconciliation Framework Agreement, which Mr. Carney’s office said would support shared governance, conservation, waterway management and emergency preparedness across the Great Bear Sea region.

Coastal First Nations welcomed the funding. “This brings increased risks of accidents as well as impacts on sensitive coastal ecosystems,” the group’s president, Samuel Schooner, said in a statement of the expected surge in vessel traffic. “Our communities have consistently advocated for investments in safe and responsible shipping to keep pace with increased economic development.”

The Wilderness Committee, an advocacy group, called $1.2 billion for ocean protection “pennies” compared with Ottawa’s $10 billion contribution to the Roberts Bank expansion, and said the government’s proposed Bill C-39, aimed at strengthening the economy, undermines protections for species at risk. The decision on the pipeline designation is due Thursday.