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Remarks prepared for

The Honourable Laurel Broten
Minister of the Environment

Media Studio Announcement
Improvements to Environmental Assessments

June 6, 2006

(Check against delivery)

Good afternoon.

I’m here today to announce that our government is taking action to improve Ontario’s environmental assessment (EA) process.

That’s good news for Ontarians. It means that as we move ahead on the most urgent projects for our communities and our cities — particularly for the transit, energy and waste sectors — we’ll continue to keep strong environmental protections in place.

That’s also good news for proponents proposing new projects such as dedicated busways, and renewable energy initiatives. It’s going to save them time and it’s going to save them money.

These improvements will address some longstanding concerns. Everyone involved knows the current EA process can be slow, often confusing and costly.

We need to be able to say “Yes” more quickly to green-light projects that are environmentally protective, necessary and constructive — and “No” to projects that are neither environmentally responsible nor viable.

This is doing just that.

More must — and can — be done to make the EA process work better and faster.

I’d like to recognize the important contributions of the EA Advisory Panel. We couldn’t have made it this far without their hard work and commitment to making this important process even better. What they told us has helped us craft a new process — one that fits the needs of Ontario in the 21st century.

We know that the fundamental principles of EA are sound. The process is designed to look at potential environmental impacts, identify issues and protect the environment before projects are built. That will not change.

Nous devons être en mesure de donner plus vite le feu vert aux projets qui sont nécessaires et constructifs – et de refuser les projets qui ne sont pas responsables du point de vue environnemental ou qui ne sont pas faisables.

Nous savons que les principes fondamentaux de l’évaluation environnementale sont excellents. Le processus vise à examiner les effets possibles sur l’environnement, à cerner les questions centrales et à protéger l’environnement au moment de l’élaboration des projets. Cela ne changera pas.

What we need though is a better-designed process, one that uses the best available science and that saves time and money for Ontario taxpayers and for proponents of well-planned projects.

We want to help towns and cities to move forward faster on new, well-designed and environmentally sound projects that will make a difference to people in their communities.

Over the next several months we’ll be implementing our proposed plan. We’ll be consulting with EA practitioners, environmental and community groups, and of course, Ontarians from across the province.

While the EA process is effective and protective in many ways, we’ve identified some key regulatory and administrative improvements. I’d like to outline what these are and the results we expect to achieve.

The first of these is developing codes of practice to help participants better understand the EA process and what’s required from them.

The codes of practice will lay out the ministry’s expectations for the main elements of the EA process, including the content of documents.

This will reduce uncertainty and duplication. It will produce higher quality EAs and faster approvals or faster rejections. It also clarifies the role of stakeholders and the public in EA planning and decision-making.

We’re also introducing a facilitator role to assist and advise stakeholders on EA matters. That will add transparency and help projects move through the EA process.

We also heard loud and clear from all our stakeholders, proponents, communities and environmentalists that the time it takes to reach a conclusion is costing valuable time and money.

We’ve listened and we’re taking action.

We will shorten government decision-making timelines and provide direction to project proponents on their own timelines to get the process moving faster and so that concerned citizens have a better understanding of where projects are at, how long they will take and how they can get involved.

Certainly, deadlines and duplication are a key area of the EA process that need improvement.

We will work with ministries such as Municipal Affairs, Public Infrastructure Renewal, Transportation, Energy and Natural Resources to make the process more integrated and efficient. We’ll also be working with our counterparts at the federal level to cut out duplication.

That will help reduce costs and delays for project proponents, for our government and most importantly, for Ontarians.

These changes will benefit every application under the EA process, but we’re also taking action in a few key sectors — energy, transit and waste.

We will help municipalities proceed with much-needed transit and energy projects by integrating the EA process with other planning processes under other provincial legislation, to reduce duplication.

We will streamline the approvals process for transit projects to help more people get out of their cars and onto public transit. Good news for our environment and the health of Ontarians.

We are going to look closely at Regulation 116, which sets out rules for the electricity sector, to ensure we have an efficient process, one that allows Ontario to generate cleaner, greener energy into the future.

We also need to help municipalities and industry find better solutions to increase waste diversion and deal with the wastes they produce here at home in Ontario.

We will develop a new waste regulation that standardizes the EA process based on type, size and impact of the project so everyone knows what’s involved.

For projects with a greater environmental footprint, the process will be more rigorous — those with less impact will move ahead more expeditiously.

We are also committed to reviewing the existing Class EAs that are used in the province to ensure the level of review matches the potential for environmental impacts.

The proposed changes to Ontario’s Environmental Assessment Act are going to help us achieve positive results for Ontarians as they will put in place a clearer and more comprehensive framework. Time and cost savings for project proponents will result in important infrastructure projects being built faster while reducing costs and protecting the environment.

What does this mean in concrete terms of time?

As an example for transit projects — the proposed amendments would move full-scale independent environmental assessment to a streamlined process that would result in a time savings of one and a half to two years.

Depending on the size of any given transit project, time savings will be between six months and two years.

How much money can be saved?

For a large project it could be as much as several hundred thousand dollars in savings.

Better guidelines, clear rules and a faster process means money will be tied up for less time and money won’t be wasted on things that aren’t required.

We know that EA helps protect the environment like no other tool that government applies. So let me be absolutely clear. These time and costs savings will not come at the expense of the sound environmental protection that the EA Act affords.

On the contrary, we know that updating our approach to encourage development of modern, efficient projects is good news for the environment.

A more efficient process gives us better focus.

It means we can put the time, resources and energy towards the projects that do have environmental implications and require more careful consideration.

Improving EA is clearly a win-win situation — for proponents, for municipalities and for the people of Ontario as we work together to build a strong sustainable future.

Thank you.

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