Northwest British Columbia Research Articles

Place-Based Environmental Philanthropy: The Role of Community-Based Organizations in the Skeena Watershed

This article explores the role of place-based philanthropy in rural community development through a case study of the Skeena watershed. The Skeena is an ecologically significant region in Northwest British Columbia that is confronting the complex and layered forces of change being experienced by many rural regions in Canada. Through qualitative interviews and document analyses, the article illustrates how a robust ecosystem of environmental community-based organizations (CBOs), funded by philanthropic capital, is extending beyond traditional environmental advocacy to fill important structural gaps in community development. Though pressed by capacity issues, the sector is shifting towards highly integrated and collaborative responses to development pressures and charting alternative pathways for development in the region. The complexity and scope of pressures in the Skeena offer insights for other rural regions and the dynamic potential and challenges associated with place-based philanthropy in community and regional development processes.

Atmospheric rivers impacting western North America in a world with climate intervention

Atmospheric rivers (ARs) impacting western North America are analyzed under climate intervention applying stratospheric aerosol injections (SAI) using simulations produced by the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model. Sulfur dioxide injections are strategically placed to maintain present-day global, interhemispheric, and equator-to-pole surface temperatures between 2020 and 2100 using a high forcing climate scenario. Three science questions are addressed: (1) How will western North American ARs change by the end of the century with SAI applied, (2) How is this different from 2020 conditions, and (3) How will the results differ with no future climate intervention. Under SAI, ARs are projected to increase by the end of the 21st century for southern California and decrease in the Pacific Northwest and coastal British Columbia, following changes to the low-level wind. Compared to 2020 conditions, the increase in ARs is not significant. The character of AR precipitation changes under geoengineering results in fewer extreme rainfall events and more moderate ones.

Evaluating habitat selection models to predict critical habitat for mountain goats in northwest British Columbia

AbstractAnthropogenic activity imposes increasing pressure on wildlife populations globally; these pressures can affect habitat suitability and function, modify wildlife space use, and influence population viability. Native mountain goat (Oreamnos americanus) populations can be negatively affected by anthropogenic disturbance and modify their space use in response to land development and recreational activity. From 2018 to 2020, we studied space use of mountain goats northeast of Smithers, British Columbia, Canada, an area that is subject to increasing anthropogenic development and yearlong recreational activities. We aimed to generate models that would improve our ability to identify habitat for mountain goats relative to existing survey data and established ungulate winter ranges. Using resource selection function (RSF) analyses generated from global positioning system (GPS) collar data, we identified influential habitat covariates and compared these covariates and RSF values to existing habitat models. Additionally, we compared the extent to which our models were congruent with existing resource selection probability functions, were congruent with aerial survey data, and overlapped existing ungulate winter ranges previously derived from predictive models inside and outside of the study area. Overall, our models noted higher RSF values among GPS data relative to aerial survey data for winter months, while results for summer habitats were comparable. In extending our RSFs outside of the study area and evaluating the overlap with ungulate winter ranges in adjacent areas, values were similar, albeit lower, as is expected given that the models were developed elsewhere. Ultimately, these models, combined with existing methods, improve the accuracy and reliability of identified, important areas of habitat for mountain goats. We recommend that the RSF models generated here be used in conjunction with aerial survey data and existing methods to delineate ungulate winter ranges for mountain goats in similar eco‐regions in British Columbia. The models developed here support existing methods that have been used to delineate or validate ungulate winter ranges for mountain goats in British Columbia and help facilitate mitigation measures to support the continued use of important winter habitat and significant landscape features that play a role in ensuring population viability and resilience through time.

Promising resilience: Systems and survival after forestry's ends

AbstractEcologists, social scientists, and policymakers alike define “resilience” as the properties that allow complex systems to function in the wake of sudden shocks. While proponents treat these properties as empirical qualities that can be engineered into existence, critics have largely treated government‐organized attempts to do so as consistent with the dismantling of the welfare state. This article offers an ethnographic account of a conservation policy initiative in northwest British Columbia designed to generate consensus‐based quantitative indicators on salmon health. I examine how workshop organizers, emboldened by provocative metaphors of survival and systematicity, mobilize resilience discourse as a platform for social analysis, and urge other researchers to envision how their own work might allow them to transcend institutional attachments altogether. Resilience‐based initiatives have wrought profound changes in experts’ everyday lives, in part by encouraging precariously employed researchers to reimagine their relationships to shrinking government institutions. In addition to naming an emergent political logic for legitimating downsizing and other organizational responses to disasters, I argue that resilience discourse provides the experts entrusted with designing these responses with new grammars for imagining the future viability of their own expertise.

Potential for Volcanogenic Massive Sulfide Mineralization at the A6 Anomaly, North-West British Columbia, Canada: Stratigraphy, Lithogeochemistry, and Alteration Mineralogy and Chemistry

The Middle Jurassic A6 Anomaly is located 30 km southeast of Eskay Creek, north-central British Columbia and consists of thick, altered felsic igneous rocks overlain by a mafic volcano-sedimentary package. Lithogeochemistry on igneous rocks, X-ray diffraction on altered felsic units, and electron probe microanalysis and secondary ion mass spectrometry on illite and quartz were applied to explore the volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) potential, characterize alteration, and determine fluid conditions at the A6 Anomaly. Lithogeochemistry revealed calc-alkaline rhyodacite to trachyte of predominantly FII type, tholeiitic basalts with Nb/Yb < 1.6 (i.e., Group A), and transitional to calc-alkaline basalts and andesites with Nb/Yb > 2.2 (i.e., Group B). The felsic units showed weakly to moderately phyllic alteration (quartz–illite with minor orthoclase and trace chlorite–pyrite–calcite–barite–rutile). Illite ranged in composition from illite/smectite (K = 0.5–0.69 apfu) to almost endmember illite (K = 0.69–0.8 apfu), and formed from feldspar destruction by mildly acidic, relatively low temperature, oxidized hydrothermal fluids. The average δ18O composition was 10.7 ± 3.0‰ and 13.4 ± 1.3‰ relative to Vienna Standard Mean Ocean Water for illite and quartz, respectively. Geothermometry involving illite composition and oxygen isotope composition on illite and quartz yielded average fluid temperatures of predominantly 200–250 °C. Lithogeochemical results showed that the A6 Anomaly occurred in a late-Early to Middle Jurassic evolving back-arc basin, further east then previously recognized and in which transitional to calc-alkaline units formed by crustal assimilation to enriched Mid-Ocean Ridge Basalt (EMORB) (i.e., felsic units, Group B), followed by thinning of the crust resulting in tholeiitic normalized MORB basalts (i.e., Group A) with a minor crustal component. The alteration assemblage is representative of distal footwall alteration, and metal transport in this zone was limited despite favorable temperature, pH, and redox state, indicating a metal depleted source (i.e., felsic units).

Fractured alliance: state-corporate actions and fossil fuel resistance in Northwest British Columbia, Canada

The northwest region of British Columbia, Canada has been at the center of multiple fossil fuel projects over the past decade as corporations have sought access to the coastline in order to export their products. Analyzing the dynamics of how and why groups and communities responded to two specific fossil fuel projects, we address the question: why did the "unlikely alliance" formed at the local level in northwest B.C. to resist the Enbridge oil pipeline project fracture just a few years later in the case of the LNG Canada/Coastal GasLink Liquefied Natural Gas project and pipeline project? We argue that the fracturing arose in part because of historic vulnerabilities of the resource periphery, and the legacy of settler colonial governance but also because state and corporate actors used their powers to increase the financial incentives for communities to support LNG projects, to change the discourse on fossil fuels by promoting the concept of LNG as "clean"energy, deflecting attention from the fracking of natural gas, and to isolate environmental organizations by casting them as "outsiders." The findings contribute to the literature by analyzing the reasons not only for the formation but also for the fragility and fracturing of alliances in contemporary energy politics.

Amphibian chytrid prevalence on boreal toads in SE Alaska and NW British Columbia: tests of habitat, life stages, and temporal trends.

Tracking and understanding variation in pathogens such as Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), the agent of amphibian chytridiomycosis which has caused population declines globally, is a priority for many land managers. However, relatively little sampling of amphibian communities has occurred at high latitudes. We used skin swabs collected during 2005-2017 from boreal toads Anaxyrus boreas (n = 248), in southeast Alaska (USA; primarily in and near Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park [KLGO]) and northwest British Columbia (Canada) to determine how Bd prevalence varied across life stages, habitat characteristics, local species richness, and time. Across all years, Bd prevalence peaked in June and was >3 times greater for adult toads (37.5%) vs. juveniles and metamorphs (11.2%). Bd prevalence for toads in the KLGO area, where other amphibian species are rare or absent, was highest from river habitats (55.0%), followed by human-modified upland wetlands (32.3%) and natural upland wetlands (12.7%)-the same rank-order these habitats are used for toad breeding. None of the 12 Columbia spotted frogs Rana luteiventris or 2 wood frogs R. sylvatica from the study area tested Bd-positive, although all were from an area of low host density where Bd has not been detected. Prevalence of Bd on toads in the KLGO area decreased during 2005-2015. This trend from a largely single-species system may be encouraging or concerning, depending on how Bd is affecting vital rates, and emphasizes the need to understand effects of pathogens before translating disease prevalence into management actions.

Amenity Migration Revisited

AbstractThe dismantling of government research throughout rural North America has altered the ways environmental scientists understand their ties to rural places like northwest British Columbia. As growing numbers of researchers have leveraged their professional mobility to move to small mountain towns and other rural locales—a process known as “amenity migration”—many have increasingly described their role in these transformations through idioms of personal commitment and individual expertise. At times, these articulations have overshadowed other migratory strategies enacted in response to the neoliberalization of resource extraction and environmental governance in the region, including those of First Nations technicians and blue collar workers in extractive industries. The kinds of jobs that draw experts to live and work in places like northwest British Columbia have shifted away from full‐time government positions into consulting and contract work. In the process, researchers’ growing tendency to present their movements as intentional processes has obscured the ways neoliberal reform redistributes compulsion and choice among residents of the new rural north.

The extent to which an unforeseen biotic disturbance can challenge timber expectations

Forest pathogens are one of the key drivers of the dynamics and diversity of forested landscapes, contributing to structural and compositional complexity at multiple scales in space and time. Growth and yield models help guide forest management decisions but the roles of abiotic and biotic disturbance agents including pathogens are often overlooked. In our study of mid-rotation spruce plantations in northwest British Columbia (BC), Canada, we examine the influence of tomentosus root disease on the oldest managed stands in a previously unmanaged landscape allowing us to witness pathogen expression in a first rotation setting over the longest duration available. Our 10 one-hectare stem-mapped plots capture the spatial variability of root disease expression and their large size, coupled with their random selection without any prior knowledge of the pathogen, make our study unique. We found tomentosus root disease accounted for nearly 90% of both the number and the volume of spruce trees that died and that the incidence of the disease more than doubled over a 16-year period from stand age ~30–46. The volume growth of trees that were initially healthy but became infected was 17% less than that of the trees that remained healthy, while the volume growth of trees that were infected since plot establishment was 28% less than that of trees that remained healthy. We found a weak relationship between infected stumps from the previous stand and the condition of trees surrounding those stumps at age 30, but more critically we found a similarly weak relationship between infected trees at age 30 and the condition of the neighbouring trees 16 years later. Using the growth and yield model TASS II v2.7.75, we found model projections of spruce volume exceeded measured plot volume by an average of 30.5%. TASS is based on the same foundational tenets that are the dominant paradigm in forestry where the prediction of forest growth is based on the assessment of site index (dominant stand height and age), Eichhorn’s rule (which implies that when the dominant tree height is known, stand yield can be easily estimated now and then projected into the future), and the thinning response hypothesis. Our results reflect the influential role of a forest pathogen that is operating on a different scale and following a different set of rules. This, in combination with the unexpected behaviour of the forest pathogen itself, represents a multifaceted challenge in forecasting forest growth.

Pleistocene glacial cycles and physical barriers influence phylogeographic structure in Black-capped Chickadees (Poecileatricapillus), a widespread North American passerine

The nonmigratory Black-capped Chickadee (Poecile atricapillus (Linnaeus, 1766)) has a continent-wide distribution extending across large parts of North America. To investigate the phylogeographic structure and verify possible refugia during the last glacial maximum, we sequenced a 678 bp region of the mitochondrial control region from 633 Black-capped Chickadees at 35 sites across North America and performed paleoecological distribution modeling. Two genetically distinct groups were found using multiple analyses: one in Newfoundland (Canada) and a widespread continental group, with additional substructure evident in western continental populations. While gene flow is low throughout the range, it is especially low in peripheral populations. The Newfoundland population has remained isolated from continental populations for at least 65 000 years and contains a number of fixed nucleotide differences. Within the continental populations, Black-capped Chickadees are subdivided into Pacific Coast, Alaska (USA), southeast Rockies, and main-northeast groups consistent with late Pleistocene vicariance events. Evidence of secondary contact was identified between Pacific and main-northeast populations in northwest British Columbia (Canada) and between southeast Rockies and main-northeast groups in Montana (USA). Paleoecological distribution modeling predicted suitable habitat in Alaska, off the coast of Newfoundland, and several locations across the southern United States during the last glacial maximum, whereas suitable habitat during the last interglacial was more similar to the contemporary distribution.

Elevated Magmatic Sulfur and Chlorine Contents in Ore-Forming Magmas at the Red Chris Porphyry Cu-Au Deposit, Northern British Columbia, Canada

The Red Chris porphyry Cu-Au deposit is located in the Stikinia island-arc terrane in northwest British Columbia. It is hosted by the Red Stock, which has five phases of porphyry intrusions: P1, P2E, P2I, P2L, and P3. New U-Pb dating of zircon shows that these intrusions were emplaced over a similar to 10 m.y. period, with P1 intruded at 211.6 +/- 1.3 Ma (MSWD = 0.85), P2I at 206.0 +/- 1.2 Ma (MSWD = 1.5), P2L at 203.6 +/- 1.8 Ma (MSWD = 1.5), and P3 at 201.7 +/- 1.2 Ma ( MSWD = 1.05). The ore-forming event at Red Chris was a short-lived event at 206.1 +/- 0.5 Ma (MSWD = 0.96; weighted average age of three Re-Os molybdenite analyses), implying a duration of Zircons from P1 to P3 porphyry rocks have consistently high Eu-N /Eu-N* ratios (mostly > 0.4), indicating that their associated magmas were moderately oxidized. The magmatic water contents estimated from plagioclase and amphibole compositions suggest H2O contents of similar to 5 wt %. Taken together, the P1 to P3 porphyries are interpreted to be moderately oxidized and hydrous. The porphyry phases are differentiated by sulfur and chlorine contents. The SO3 contents of igneous apatite microphenocrysts from the mineralization-related P2 porphyries are higher (P2E: 0.28 +/- 0.10 wt %, n = 19; P2I: 0.32 +/- 0.17, n = 15; P2L: 0.29 +/- 0.18 wt %, n = 100) than those from the premineralization P1(0.11 +/- 0.03 wt %, n = 34) and postmineralization P3 porphyries (0.03 +/- 0.01 wt %, n = 13). The chlorine contents in apatite grains from the P2E, P2I, and P2L porphyries are 1.47 +/- 0.22 (n = 19), 0.82 +/- 0.10 (n = 15), and 1.47 +/- 0.28 wt % (n = 100), also higher than those from P1 (0.51 +/- 0.3 wt % Cl, n = 34) and P3 (0.02 +/- 0.02 wt % Cl, n = 17). These results imply that the sulfur and chlorine contents of the P2 magmas were higher than in the P1 and P3 magmas, suggesting that elevated magmatic S-Cl contents in the P2 porphyries may have been important for ore formation. Although the process that caused the increase in sulfur and chlorine is not clear, reverse zoning seen in plagioclase phenocrysts from the P2 porphyry, and the occurrence of more mafic compositions in P2L, suggest that recharge of the deeper magma chamber by a relatively S-Cl-rich mafic magma may have triggered the ore-forming hydrothermal event.

The town that said “No” to the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline: The Kitimat plebiscite of 2014

In April 2014 the residents of the district of Kitimat in northwest British Columbia voted in a plebiscite to oppose the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline designed to transport bitumen from Canada’s oil sands to the west coast for export to Asia. This was remarkable for two reasons. Firstly, exercising direct democracy through the holding a plebiscite is a rare event in Canada, even more so for a project over which the district actually has no jurisdiction even though Kitimat is the proposed pipeline's terminus. Secondly, the planned industrial town, built in the 1950s to support Alcan's smelting operations, has historically been a “pro-industry” town. This paper examines (i) how Kitimat became the only community on the proposed pipeline route to hold a plebiscite; (ii) how a small, local NGO opposed, and defeated, the world's largest oil pipeline company in the plebiscite; and (iii) the implications of this case for our understanding of scale and jurisdiction.

Critical levels and loads and the regulation of industrial emissions in northwest British Columbia, Canada

Northwest British Columbia, Canada, a sparsely populated and largely pristine region, is targeted for rapid industrial growth owing to the modernization of an aluminum smelter and multiple proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities. Consequently, air quality in this region is expected to undergo considerable changes within the next decade. In concert, the increase in LNG capacity driven by gas production from shale resources across North America has prompted environmental concerns and highlighted the need for science-based management decisions regarding the permitting of air emissions. In this study, an effects-based approach widely-used to support transboundary emissions policy negotiations was used to assess industrial air emissions in the Kitimat and Prince Rupert airsheds under permitted and future potential industrial emissions. Critical levels for vegetation of SO2 and NO2 and critical loads of acidity and nutrient nitrogen for terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems were estimated for both regions and compared with modelled concentration and deposition estimates to identify the potential extent and magnitude of ecosystem impacts. The critical level for SO2 was predicted to be exceeded in an area ranging from 81 to 251 km2 in the Kitimat airshed owing to emissions from an existing smelter, compared with <1 km2 in Prince Rupert under the lowest to highest emissions scenarios. In contrast, the NO2 critical level was not exceeded in Kitimat, and ranged from 4.5 to 6 km2 in Prince Rupert owing to proposed LNG related emissions. Predicted areal exceedance of the critical load of acidity for soil ranged from 1 to 28 km2 in Kitimat and 4–10 km2 in Prince Rupert, while the areal exceedance of empirical critical load for nutrient N was predicted to be greater in the Prince Rupert airshed (20–94 km2) than in the Kitimat airshed (1–31 km2). The number of lakes that exceeded the critical load of acidity did not vary greatly across emissions scenarios in the Kitimat (21–23 out of 80 sampled lakes) and Prince Rupert (0 out of 35 sampled lakes) airsheds. While critical loads have been widely used to underpin international emissions reductions of transboundary pollutants, it is clear that they can also play an important role in managing regional air emissions. In the current study, exceedance of critical levels and loads suggests that industrial emissions from the nascent LNG export sector may require careful regulation to avoid environmental impacts. Emissions management from LNG export facilities in other regions should consider critical levels and loads analyses to ensure industrial development is synergistic with ecosystem protection. While recognizing uncertainties in dispersion modelling, critical load estimates, and subsequent effects, the critical levels and loads approach is being used to inform regulatory decisions in British Columbia to prevent impacts that have been well documented in other regions.

Upper-crustal cooling of the Wrangellia composite terrane in the northern St. Elias Mountains, western Canada

This study presents the long-term exhumation history of the Wrangellia composite terrane of the remote and ice-covered northern St. Elias Mountains in southwest Yukon, northwest British Columbia, and adjacent Alaska. Detrital zircon and apatite fission-track age distributions are presented from 21 glacial catchments. The detrital sampling approach allows for a large spatial coverage (∼30,000 km 2 ) and access to material eroded beneath the ice. An additional five bedrock samples were dated by zircon fission-track analysis for a comparison with detrital results. Our new thermochronology data record the Late Jurassic–mid-Cretaceous accretion of the Wrangellia composite terrane to the former North American margin and magmatism, which reset the older thermal record. The good preservation of the Jurassic–Cretaceous record suggests that Cenozoic erosion must have been limited overall. Nonetheless, Eocene spreading-ridge subduction and Oligocene–Neogene cooling in response to the ongoing Yakutat flat-slab subduction are evident in the study area despite its inboard position from the active plate boundary. The results further indicate an area of rapid exhumation at the northern end of the Fairweather fault ca. 10–5 Ma; this area is bounded by discrete, unmapped structures. The area of rapid exhumation shifted southwest toward the plate boundary and the center of the St. Elias syntaxis after 5 Ma. Integrating the new data with published detrital thermochronology from the southern St. Elias Mountains reveals an evolving concentration of deformation and exhumation, possibly within a large-scale, transpressional structure providing important constraints for geodynamic models of syntaxes.

Spore Dispersal byDothistroma septosporumin Northwest British Columbia

We studied spore dispersal by Dothistroma septosporum, causal agent of a serious outbreak of red band needle blight in lodgepole pine plantations in northwest British Columbia. Spore abundance was assessed at different distances and heights from inoculum sources and microclimatic factors were recorded during two consecutive years. Conidia were observed on spore traps from June to September during periods of rainfall. It was rare to detect spores more than 2 m away from inoculum sources. The timing and number of conidia dispersed were strongly tied to the climatic variables, particularly rainfall and leaf wetness. Should the trend toward increased spring and summer precipitation in the study area continue, the results suggest that disease spread and intensification will also increase. Increasing the planting distances between lodgepole pine trees through mixed species plantations and overall reduction in use of lodgepole pine for regeneration in wet areas are the best strategies to reduce the spread of the disease and enhance future productivity of plantations in the study area.

2014 Economic Developer of the Year Award Winners

Since 2009, TEDC has entered into four joint ventures with private sector partners to provide civil construction services, security services, general contracting, and IT and business process outsourcing services. Cando Economic Developer of the Year Award Winner Community Category Nisga'a Lisims Government Economic Development As a fully integrated part of northwest British Columbia's economy, the Nisga'a Nation boasts abundant natural resources, water supply, and full road accessibility. The primary industries in the Nass Valley area are fishing and forestry, complemented by employment in the government, education, and health care sectors. Since becoming effective in 2000, the Nisga'a Final Agreement secured the Nisga'a Nation's 2000 square kilometres of land, and all of the resources within. The framework was created as a way for the Nation to overcome barriers and limitations in economic development. Since completing this prosperity framework, the Nisga'a Lisims Government has developed many new businesses.

Warmer and wetter might not be better

As the climate continues to change, gaps in our understanding of how the altered environment will affect forest hosts and their pathogens widen. In some areas pathogens thought to be present for centuries are changing their behaviour. Dothistroma needle blight caused by the fungus Dothistroma septosporum in northwest British Columbia (BC), Canada, is a good example. In this area both the pathogen and the host, lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta var. latifolia), are considered native species, but here Dothistroma has been responsible for killing mature host trees, which is unprecedented. A plausible link between warmer, wetter summers and directional climate change has been suggested as the primary driver. Those environmental conditions appear to be affecting the host/pathogen relationship for other diseases in the neighbouring central interior of BC including comandra blister rust (Cronartium comandrae). Disrupted host/pathogen relationships tend to favour the short-lived more adaptable pathogens rather than their long-lived hosts. These changes in forest health have not been well accounted for in fields of forest science that have been built on stability and predictability.&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp;

“A strange enough way”: An embodied natural history of experience, animals and food on the Teslin Trail

This essay focuses on the use and abuse of animals and how the social and economic changes introduced by the gold rushers altered relationships between animals and humans in Northwest British Columbia and southern Yukon Territory during the haphazard scramble northward to the Klondike. I suggest that the embodied experience of life on the trail was articulated and mediated through the human–animal relationships forged out of necessity on the makeshift trails to the Klondike, built together by the boots of miners and the overburdened animals that moved goods through the northern plateaus. The animals brought into the Stikine performed two functions: vital roles of pack animals and, once their locomotive value was exhausted, as imported meat and by-products to be sold at market. I argue that the intimate and corporeal connections between humans and wildlife can mediate the experience of nature in unfamiliar and precarious places. In this sense, the very materiality of animals was essential for the maintenance of health and well-being and became the primary physical and emotional mechanism for rendering the extraordinary experience of the Teslin Trail into terms more easily rationalized and commodified by miners, merchants and local populations caught up in the epochal transformation brought into being in the closing years of the nineteenth century.

Navigating jurisdiction: local and regional strategies to access economic benefits from mineral development

AbstractThis article examines how concepts of territory and scale are used to create places of benefit from resource activities in remote rural regions. Our case study of mineral development in northwest British Columbia compares the experiences of First Nation, municipal and regional governments in accessing economic benefits from mineral development. Territorial land claims are changing the multi‐scalar jurisdictional hierarchy and the socio‐spatial relations between senior levels of government, resource companies, and local communities. The territorial rights of First Nation governments provide the political leverage to negotiate with companies seeking to “earn a social license” to operate within their territories. Municipal and regional governments, however, are restricted by their role in the multi‐scalar jurisdictional hierarchy. In response, municipal and regional governments are devising strategies to capture economic benefits. We discuss three economic development strategies used to access benefits from mineral development activities: negotiating commitments during the environmental assessment process, investment attraction strategies, and lobbying the provincial government for a share of the resource revenues generated from mining. These strategies reflect the political and economic context for local government in remote resource‐dependent regions and the changing socio‐spatial relations between senior levels of government, resource companies, and First Nation, municipal and regional governments.

Timing of terminal Pleistocene deglaciation at high elevations in southern and central British Columbia constrained by 10Be exposure dating

The Cordilleran Ice Sheet (CIS) covered most of British Columbia and southern Yukon Territory at the local Last Glacial Maximum (lLGM) during Marine Oxygen Isotope Stage 2. However, its subsequent demise is not well understood, particularly at high elevations east of its ocean-terminating margin. We present 10Be exposure ages from two high-elevation sites in southern and central British Columbia that help constrain the time of initial deglaciation at these sites. We sampled granodiorite erratics at elevations of 2126–2230 m a.s.l. in the Marble Range and 1608–1785 m a.s.l. in the Telkwa Range at the western margin of the Interior Plateau. The erratics at both sites are near ice-marginal meltwater channels that delineate the local ice surface slope and thus the configuration of the ice sheet during deglaciation. The locations of the erratics and their relations to meltwater channels ensure that the resulting 10Be ages date CIS deglaciation and not the retreat of local montane glaciers. Our sample sites emerged above the surface of the CIS as its divide migrated westward from the Interior Plateau to the axis of the Coast Mountains. Two of the four samples from the summit area of the Marble Range yielded apparent exposure ages of 14.0 ± 0.7 and 15.2 ± 0.8 ka. These ages are 1.8–3.0 ka younger than the well-established lLGM age of ca 17 ka for the Puget lobe of the CIS in Washington State; they are 1.7 ka younger than the lLGM age for the Puget lobe if a snow-shielding correction to their uncertainty-weighted mean age is applied. The other two samples yielded much older apparent exposure ages (20.6 ± 1.4 and 33.0 ± 1.5 ka), indicating the presence of inherited isotopes. Four samples collected from the summit area of the Telkwa Range in the Hazelton Mountains yielded well clustered apparent exposure ages of 10.1 ± 0.6, 10.2 ± 0.7, 10.4 ± 0.5, and 11.5 ± 1.1 ka. Significant present-day snow cover introduces a large uncertainty in the apparent exposure ages from this site. A snow-shielding correction based on present-day snow cover data increases the uncertainty-weighted mean exposure age of the Telkwa Range erratics to 12.4 ± 0.7 ka, consistent with deglacial 14C ages from areas near sea level to the west. Our exposure ages show a thinning of the southern portion of the CIS shortly after the lLGM and persistence of a remnant mountain ice cap in the central Coast Mountains into the Younger Dryas Chronozone. Our data also show that the summit area of the Marble Range was ice-covered during the lLGM. The presence of an ice body of considerable dimension in north-central British Columbia until, or possibly even after, the Younger Dryas highlights the need for geomorphological and geochronological studies of the ice dispersal centre over the Skeena Mountains in northwest British Columbia and the need for better understanding of the response of the CIS to Lateglacial climate fluctuations.