Nisga’a Nation can help convince other nations for LNG export site off coast: Eby

By Canadian Press on September 16, 2025.

VICTORIA — British Columbia Premier David Eby says his government is “counting” on the Nisga’a First Nation to help “increase the level of support” among other nations that opposed a massive liquefied natural gas export facility soon to float off the northwestern coast.

Eby says his government will support the Nisga’a, while acknowledging “there is still work ahead” to get other area First Nations on board that opposed the Ksi Lisims LNG project, which has a limited window to get off the ground.

Both the provincial and federal government have signed off on the facility that is an agreement with the Nisga’a, Rockies LNG Limited Partnership and Western LNG, but four of six other First Nations asked to provide consent did not grant it, and numerous environmental groups are also opposed.

Eby says he has “great faith” in the Nisga’a and its president Eva Clayton to deliver that support through an “open spirit of engagement” with the other First Nations, adding that the project was designed to minimize environmental impacts.

Federal Energy Minister Tim Hodgson said from Ottawa that the streamlined approval of the project represents one of the largest private sector investments in Canadian history.

Hodgson says the project is an example of the “one project, one review” system in which the Canadian government has relied on the province for an assessment.

He says the project represents the “culmination of years of advocacy” by the Nisga’a as led by Clayton.

Eby, who was speaking in Vancouver Tuesday, says his government needs to work in partnership with those nations that are opposed however possible to accommodate their concerns about the LNG project, said to be valued at around $17 billion.

But Eby also says that his government is going to “stand” with the Nisga’a because, their decision to identify this project as a priority makes it “meaningful” for the government.

The project to build two floating facilities off Pearse Island in northwest B.C. is huge, designed to process two-billion cubic feet of gas per day and export 12-million tonnes of LNG per year.

Hodgson says the world “is relying on Canada for clean energy,” and he looks forward to the project being built.

A group of environmental organizations said in a news release that the plan is a “failure of environmental leadership and a direct contradiction” of provincial and federal commitments to climate action.

Lawyer Imalka Nilmalgoda from the group Ecojustice said it “is fundamentally at odds with B.C.’s claims to be a climate leader,” while Isabel Siu-Zmuidzinas of the Wilderness Committee said the province was “green-lighting LNG projects that trample over communities and torch our climate goals.”

However, Eby says the project will help drive down carbon pollution by producing some of the “cleanest, low-carbon LNG anywhere” in the world, which is in high demand from major trading partners like Japan and South Korea.

While the facility is being developed by the Nisga’a, Rockies LNG and Western LNG, documents show the project’s assets will be constructed, owned and operated by wholly owned subsidiaries of Western LNG, based in Houston, Texas.

It will be supplied by the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline that is being built in northern B.C.