The British Columbia company that operates Canada’s largest container terminal is suing the federal government to keep five years of greenhouse gas emissions data secret.
GCT Canada Limited Partnership says the Minister of Environment and Climate Change wants to release emissions data from the Deltaport facility south of Vancouver under the federal Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program.
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The company claims in an application to the Federal Court that the information is a “trade secret” and that publishing it would cause financial loss and damage to the company’s “competitive position.”
“GCT Canada continually negotiates with existing clients to renew agreements or negotiates with potential new clients,” the application says. “Current and potential clients place increasing importance on sustainability issues for those they contract with, including (greenhouse gas) emissions from the container terminals they use.”
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If its emissions data is published and its competitors’ data is not, GCT Canada says this would “interfere with these negotiations.”
The company says it provided data spanning 2017 to 2022 to Environment and Climate Change Canada, but the ministry rejected a request to keep the data confidential in February.
GCT Canada says in the judicial review application that the ministry is wrongly singling out Deltaport and that no facilities run by competitors are required to report emissions figures.
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“Publishing the (greenhouse gas) information would make Deltaport the only container terminal in Canada to publish this type of information,” the application says.
The application says emissions data is treated confidentially by all container terminal operators in the Canadian market.
The company says its emissions data could be used by competitors, customers and others to cause the company losses.
GCT Canada spokesperson Marko Dekovic said in an interview Monday that when the company asked for the data to be kept confidential, the government refused and that the company’s “only remedy was to seek this judicial review.”
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Dekovic said GCT Canada was unable to identify any other container terminal operators that had been asked to provide emissions data for publication under the reporting program, which could give the impression that their emissions are somehow higher. higher than others without possibility of comparison.
“Since there are no others, that information would be in a vacuum,” he said.
Dekovic said there is no timeline for when the court will be able to rule on the request.
The Environment Ministry referred its comments to Transport Canada, which is not named in the judicial review application.
GCT Canada also operates the Vanterm container terminal in Vancouver.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 8, 2024.
© 2024 The Canadian Press
