The Project: Environment

This document is an Environmental Assessment (EA) report, made pursuant to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. The review of the EA report will be coordinated by the federal Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency (CEAA).

Environmental Impacts are Limited and Mitigation Measures are Appropriate

AltaLink has completed a very thorough EA, utilizing an experienced environmental consulting firm. The EA complies with the CEAA Terms of Reference. The overall conclusions of the EA confirm that the majority of environmental effects both in the Application and Cumulative Cases are negligible to low in magnitude. All residual Project effects are rated as not significant.

A transmission line has substantially lowered environmental effects compared to other linear facilities such as pipelines or environmentally intensive projects such as mines or surface oil sand operations, which have intensive disturbance footprints. Key differences resulting in substantially lower environmental impacts include:

• terrain or soil disturbance includes a small tower footprint typically every 350 metres 
      versus a continuous pipeline trench along the right-of-way
• transmission tower locations can be adjusted at the detailed design stage generally within
      a +/- 20 metre range along the centreline in order to mitigate site specific
      environmental, heritage resource  or traditional land use issues
• right-of-way vegetation and groundcover primarily remains intact, only tall incompatible
      trees are removed
• transmission lines automatically turn off upon failure with no environmental implications
      such as plumes or product release into the air, on the land surface or into ground water
• transmission lines span water bodies with setbacks for tower locations, and selective
      removal of trees in riparian areas significantly reduces effects to riparian areas

In addition to the above basic environmental advantages of transmission lines, AltaLink is committed to the following key mitigation measures to further manage environmental effects of the Project:

• AltaLink has already incorporated the potential environmental effects identified through
      the EA development into the tower location process
• pre-disturbance assessments will be performed prior to construction at proposed tower
      locations in areas that could affect rare vegetation, protected wildlife, heritage resources
      or traditional land use sites to adjust tower locations to reduce or avoid effects, based on
      criteria set out in Volume II, Section 3.1.1: Pre-Disturbance Assessments
• a dedicated environmental/heritage resource/traditional land use monitor(s) during the
      construction phase to ensure AltaLink’s mitigation measures are effectively implemented
• annual structure payments will be increased substantially to compensate agricultural
      landowners fairly in the market for the effect to farming operations
• standard transmission line construction practices developed through years of experience
      focused on effective environmental and safety management