{"id":7392,"date":"2024-05-29T19:18:19","date_gmt":"2024-05-29T22:18:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=7392"},"modified":"2024-05-29T19:20:15","modified_gmt":"2024-05-29T22:20:15","slug":"masland-new-mill-a-great-opportunity-for-queens-but-environment-must-be-protected","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2024\/05\/29\/masland-new-mill-a-great-opportunity-for-queens-but-environment-must-be-protected\/","title":{"rendered":"Masland: New mill great opportunity for Queens, but environment must be protected"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Nova Scotia’s Public Works Minister and Queens MLA Kim Masland. (Rick Conrad photo)<\/p><\/div>\n

Like many longtime Queens County residents, MLA Kim Masland lived through the closure of the Bowater mill in Liverpool in 2012.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we lost Bowater, it was a huge blow, to not only Liverpool but to Queens County and to the western end of the province,\u201d Masland said Wednesday.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Nova Scotia government announced last Thursday that Paper Excellence Canada, the company that operated the former Northern Pulp mill in Pictou County, is looking at the possibility of opening a new mill in Queens County.<\/span><\/p>\n

The company plans to conduct a feasibility study that could take nine months. It\u2019s part of an agreement between the province and Paper Excellence to settle the company\u2019s $450-million lawsuit it filed after the mill shut down in 2020.<\/span><\/p>\n

Premier Tim Houston and Natural Resources and Renewables Minister Tory Rushton said last week that a new mill<\/a> would fulfill a need identified in a 2018 report on forestry practices by Prof. William Lahey. It found that demand for forestry products in the western end of the province was seriously affected by the closure of Bowater and Northern Pulp.<\/span><\/p>\n

Houston said that a new mill would represent a $1.4-billion investment.<\/span><\/p>\n

Masland, who is also Nova Scotia\u2019s public works minister, has heard from a lot of constituents about the possibility of Liverpool becoming a mill town once again.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we look at the reputation of Northern Pulp in Pictou, it wasn\u2019t great,” she says.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Environmental standards have certainly changed, environmental reporting has certainly changed. I am a rural country girl who grew up and was supported through our industries aof forestry, farming and fishing. I believe in all of them. I believe that in our province and in Queens County we can still continue that. But everything that we do does need to be done with the highest, and I mean the highest, of standards, environmentally. And that will be government\u2019s job to make sure that if this does go ahead that all of those standards are being met.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Masland told QCCR on Wednesday that opinions seem to be evenly split between concern about the environment and the potential for employment that a new kraft pulp mill would bring to Queens County.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI do believe that we as a forestry sector do have the ability to supply a mill. This is tremendous economic benefit to our community, but I also understand that economic benefit and the health of a community, one can\u2019t outweigh the other.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She said that while people are concerned about the smell and about Northern Pulp\u2019s environmental record, it\u2019s also clear that residents, woodlot owners and the forestry sector in general would benefit greatly from a mill.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cLet\u2019s think about this. In Liverpool right now, Queens County has one of the highest poverty levels in Nova Scotia. We have no industry. We have a small industry in a sawmill. We have no industry, we have tourism, fabulous, we have two wonderful resorts that offer great employment, but we really do not have any industry for people in our community. People are struggling and people deserve to have an opportunity that others have had.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Masland said that she won\u2019t commit to supporting a Northern Pulp mill in Queens County until she sees the results of the feasibility study.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI would want to see the feasibility study before I would support anything. I\u2019m not going to say I\u2019m going to support something unless I have all the information. I\u2019ve never done that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/maslandmillfolomay2924.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Like many longtime Queens County residents, MLA Kim Masland lived through the closure of the Bowater mill in Liverpool in 2012. \u201cWhen we lost Bowater, it was a huge blow, to not only Liverpool but to Queens County and to the western end of the province,\u201d Masland said Wednesday. The Nova Scotia government announced last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[745,729,31,2259,39,2225,2226,2258,2229,2227,49,98,719,2260],"class_list":["post-7392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-bowater","tag-forestry","tag-kim-masland","tag-kraft-pulp-mill","tag-liverpool","tag-northern-pulp","tag-paper-excellence","tag-paper-excellence-canada","tag-pulp-and-paper","tag-pulp-mill","tag-queens-county","tag-tim-houston","tag-tory-rushton","tag-william-lahey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7392"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7392\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7397,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7392\/revisions\/7397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}