Canada’s indigenous tribes consider pipeline stake

Canada's native population, long marginalised from the oil and gas boom, is proposing to buy the Trans Mountain pipeline

It has been said that if you cannot beat them, then join them. Canada’s aboriginal communities, which have traditionally opposed oil and gas development on tribal lands, have made a major shift in strategy with a surprise proposal to buy the embattled Trans Mountain pipeline expansion (TMX) to the west coast of British Columbia.  After years of opposition, in January the Indian Resources Council (IRC)—a coalition of 134 Canadian First Nations—proposed to assume ownership of the controversial project from the federal government, which in turn purchased the line from US midstreamer Kinder Morgan’s Canadian subsidiary last summer.  The 1,150km (750-mile) TMX would twin the existing Trans Mounta