Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I did think the instructions of the Chair were for the Minister to take a break to prepare an answer. Just kidding, Mr. Chairman.
I think the Minister, first of all, didn’t respond to my colleague Ms. Bisaro accurately when she asked about the glacier ice on the road, and I think he now understands that, in fact, there is remnant Wisconsin Glacier ice in the northerly parts of the route proposed for this highway. Obviously, we know from our experience with highways throughout the Northwest Territories that this translates to dollars, especially when we’re talking maintenance of highways.
Of the many high-risk factors that have been identified – and I think I’ve heard of about 18 or something like that – climate change has been identified as one of them, which makes sense because this highway goes through the zone of the biggest climate impact and the impact is warming, which, when warming interacts with those large parts of remnant glacier ice, we’re talking about very, very serious costs.
I know the Minister is familiar with the situation with climate change. In fact, it’s getting considerably worse and more dire as the months now go by. The literature is clear. In fact, we’re now learning that the polar ice cap is starting to break up right here during the month of March, months before normal. This year, for the first time ever. Very scary business for scientists that know about these things; apparently not to the public or this government.
My question was, given these juxtaposition of serious factors here with great amounts of glacier ice, a great degree of climate warming predicted, what are the consequences and how can we address this risk without affecting the cost of the highway?