Prime Minister Mark Carney makes $1.2-billion announcement Tuesday to protect West Coast oceans ahead of the anticipated decision on proposed oil pipeline from Alberta to B.C.

Prime Minister Mark Carney made a $1.2 billion announcement on Tuesday to protect West Coast oceans, ahead of an expected decision to fast-track a proposed oil pipeline from Alberta to B.C. that could begin construction as early as the fall of 2027.

In the announcement, the federal government said it would expand the Canadian Coast Guard’s ability to monitor marine traffic, limit ocean noise, and create a national marine-mammal oil spill response plan, all efforts to support expansion of major projects on B.C.’s coast.

The announcement in Vancouver comes just before a Thursday deadline set by the federal government to make a decision on whether to designate the $44 billion oil pipeline and marine export tanker terminal at Roberts Bank in Delta as a project of national interest, which would expedite its environmental assessment process.

“We are in the final stages of deciding whether one of Canada’s biggest infrastructure projects — a proposed new bitumen pipeline to the west coast — could be a project of national interest,” said Carney.

The prime minister added the project would diversify the Canadian economy and create nearly 150,000 jobs across the country.

If the oil pipeline project gets the fast-track designation, it will join a coterie of natural gas, mining and transmission projects meant to be built faster to help boost Canada’s economy and reduce the country’s reliance on the U.S. as a trading partner.

Canada created a major projects office last year and passed legislation to expedite major projects to combat U.S. President Donald Trump’s much more aggressive global trade stance and steep American tariffs on Canadian goods.

The expected announcement comes in the middle of provincial and municipal elections in B.C., in which the two leading parties, the NDP and the Conservatives, have both said they would expand natural resource projects.

Hamish Telford, a political scientist at the University of the Fraser Valley, says that leaves a potential opening for a party such as the B.C. Greens to capitalize on a platform of protecting the environment.

“I think the Greens are going to be the only ones taking exception with (the oil pipeline project), and there’s reason to believe that there is a small constituency right now in British Columbia who are concerned about this,” said Telford.

But Telford said he suspected that for most people, it won’t be a major election issue.

The B.C. Greens did not immediately respond to questions this week on the oil pipeline to Roberts Bank, but have voiced strong opposition to a new oil pipeline to the B.C. coast.

The NDP, under David Eby, have said it will not to stand in the way of a southern route for a new pipeline.

Eby took the stand after Carney announced an infrastructure agreement this summer with B.C. that includes billions of federal money for an electrical transmission line in northern B.C., a copper mine, the George Massey tunnel upgrade, an expansion of the Roberts Bank port corridor. That expansion is backed by a $10-billion commitment from Ottawa. In addition, B.C. won an agreement to not allow the proposed oil pipeline to terminate on the north coast.

In a statement from the B.C. Conservatives, campaign officials said leader Lorne Doerkson supports getting Canadian resources to market, and supports the oil pipeline.

“A pipeline to Roberts Bank means jobs and investment for both our province and the country, and the revenue to pay for hospitals and services British Columbians count on.”

The southern route was announced in July by Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.

The project faces obstacles, including environmental and First Nation concerns, reports that the project is not needed, and a lack of signed support from oil producers.

Both the Tsawwassen and Musqueam First Nations, whose territories encompass lands and waters at or near the marine terminal, have said they have had early conversations with the federal government on the project but are awaiting details.

The proposed pipeline and oil-shipping terminal will be 90 per cent owned by the Alberta government through its petroleum marketing commission and by Canada through its ownership of the pipeline company Trans Mountain. The Pembina Pipeline Corp. has taken a 10 per cent stake.

The pipeline would largely follow the existing Trans Mountain oil pipeline from Alberta south through B.C., with a 2.6 square kilometre terminal in Delta that will include storage tanks and two berths that can accommodate supertankers.

Misty MacDuffee, director of the wild salmon program for the Raincoast Conservation Foundation, said the environmental group has major concerns about the pipeline project, particularly if is fast-tracked with a watered-down environmental assessment.

MacDuffee noted that only 15 per cent of the Fraser River estuary remains, and more industrial development will only add to the already significant impacts on salmon, orcas and other wildlife such as birds.

Roberts Bank already contains the Tsawwassen ferry terminal and the Roberts Bank superport that houses the Deltaport container terminal, a coal terminal, and is the site of a planned second container terminal.

“If they build a deepsea port where you can bring (very large oil tankers) into the Fraser Estuary, that is massive dredging, that is concrete islands. That footprint would destroy what is the remaining habitat that is left in this estuary,” said MacDuffee.

With files from Bloomberg News