Alberta regulator approves Northback coal exploration project in Rockies

The Canadian Press

· Posted: May 15, 2025 7:17 PM EDT | Last Updated: 2 minutes ago

The Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) says it has approved Northback Holdings Corporation's ember exploration task astatine the Grassy Mountain tract connected the eastbound slopes of the Rocky Mountains.

The Grassy Mountain task was rejected successful 2021, erstwhile a sheet ruled the mine's apt biology effects connected the food and h2o prime outweighed imaginable economical benefits.

The task was revived 2 years aboriginal and past twelvemonth it was exempted from Alberta's determination to prohibition open-pit ember mines due to the fact that it was considered an precocious proposal.

The latest ruling gives Northback a licence to divert h2o to the excavation site, which was among the concerns raised by farmers successful drought-ridden parts of confederate Alberta.

The regulator says the institution volition lone beryllium capable to gully h2o from a adjacent extremity pit water owned by Northback that's not straight connected to different h2o bodies oregon rivers. An extremity pit water is simply a h2o assemblage that forms successful the excavated pit of an open-pit mine.

The AER says the task won't person immoderate impact connected h2o prime oregon quantity downstream.