The Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project will bring jobs and more tax revenue to Burnaby, according to Kinder Morgan, the pipeline's operator.
"Our current taxes, we pay $6.5 million, so there will be an incremental $5.4 million of municipal tax, so that will take our total annual tax contribution to the municipality to $12 million," said Greg Toth, project director for the Trans Mountain expansion project. "On the construction side, the project will create a lot of opportunities, those opportunities will be in the form of direct employment opportunities."
Kinder Morgan would like to twin the Trans Mountain pipeline, the only line that currently runs Alberta crude to the West Coast. The $4.1 billion-project would increase the line's capacity from 300,000 barrels of oil per day to 750,000 by 2017. The company also wants to double capacity on the Burnaby Mountain tank farm and expand the Westridge Marine Terminal so more tankers can fill up with oil in the Burrard Inlet.
Kinder Morgan estimates the expansion project will mean 300 to 850 construction jobs (either with the company or hired through contractors) related to the terminal and the pipeline. That's not including jobs involving traffic management, trucking, first aid and supplying sand and gravel. According to Kinder Morgan, there are also indirect economic benefits linked to support services, such as the food and hospitality industries and commercial businesses that support construction.
Toth pointed to an eight-month Kinder Morgan pipeline project in 2007, based in Jasper, which infused an estimated $40 million into the local economy.
Toth was responding to Mayor Derek Corrigan's comments that Burnaby would face the biggest risks with very little to gain, while Alberta would reap most of the benefits.
