There will be no more than 6,500 oil wells on Anticosti Island, Quebec Minister of Natural Resources Pierre Arcand said Thursday.
The island's roughly 300 residents were surveyed and preferred to have 6,500 wells on the 8,000 square kilometre island over the next 75 years rather a lesser total of 3,900 wells over 56 years.
The Couillard Liberals inherited a deal struck by the predecessor Marois PQ government, which Premier Couillard did not speak of in flattering terms Thursday. “We’re stuck with a contract. Am I happy with that deal? There are steps that must be taken,” he told reporters Thursday.
However CAQ leader Francois Legault urged the oil exploration to go ahead. “There are 240 people living on the island and they are all okay with it,” he said.
Parti Quebecois leader Pierre Karl Peladeau said that the PQ’s deal with Petrolia was reached in a proper fashion and that environmental BAPE meetings are slated to take place to evaluate the plan.
Petrolia CEO Alexandre Gagnon said in a televised media report that the 6,500 total is “very high but it’s the most optimistic scenario.”
-With a file from The Canadian Press
