Archaeologists Plan to Raise Ancient Hand-Sewn Vessel off Croatia

Courtesy CNRS

PUBLISHED JUN 18, 2023 11:17 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

Marine archaeologists are preparing to raise a hand sewn boat dating back over 3,200 years from the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea, off the coast of Croatia. Raising the vessel will allow for extensive studies of the incredibly well-preserved wreck.

During the first week of July, a team of French and Croatian researchers intend to recover the wreck of the Zambratija boat, a vessel type that is believed to have defined regional shipbuilding between the 12th and 10th centuries BC. The boat, which is the oldest entirely hand-sewn boat ever found in the Mediterranean, has withstood the test of time: seven meters of its original 12-meter length are still remarkably well preserved. It represents a rare example of the ancient shipbuilding tradition of Istria and Dalmatia, two regions on the Croatian coast.

The French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) will be undertaking the project in collaboration with the Archaeological Museum of Istria in Pula, Croatia. The task is bound to be delicate, since the boat is made from pieces of wood that were intricately sewn together using flexible fibers.

Archaeologists believe that sewn boat construction techniques were used in many parts of the world prior to the development of metal fasteners. They continued to be used long after that time for small boats to reduce construction costs. Carefully shaped planks are connected at the edges with overlapping sections, which are sewn together. Scientists have marveled due the sewing technique employed for the assemblage of the planking and the related water tightness, which they describe as unparalleled.

The remains of the boat found are incredibly well-preserved for its age, with stitching still visible in some areas and the frame largely undamaged. Pulling the boat out of the water will enable researchers carry out detailed analysis using modern day technologies, including 3D reconstruction.

CNRS said that once the pieces have been removed and placed in a custom support, the scientists will reconstruct the boat in 3D. This will enable them identify the fibers used for sewing and study the techniques used to shape the wood.

“Handling relics of this caliber is a delicate affair; therefore, every stage of the process will require the utmost care,” said CNRS. Once the analysis is completed, the exceptional vessel and its components will be desalted in Croatia before being taken to Grenoble in 2024, where it will be preserved by the Arc-Nucléart restoration workshop. The ultimate plan is to have the fully-restored boat exhibited in a new maritime heritage museum in Pula, Croatia.

 

NTSB: Oily Rags Caused Total Loss of Luxury Yacht

PUBLISHED JUN 20, 2023 9:42 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

The marine environment takes a toll on coatings, and to keep up with maintenance, most ships' crews use oil-based paints and finishes almost every day that the weather allows. These materials come with an inherent fire risk, the National Transportation Safety Board warned Tuesday, because waste and rags from cleanup can easily combust. For finishes containing linseed oil - a common ingredient in wood finishes - the risk is elevated by the material's tendency to self-heat and ignite. Left alone, a linseed-soaked rag can catch fire without any external source of ignition - as the crew of the yacht Pegasus discovered last year. 

At about 0200 hours on July 15, 2022, a fire broke out aboard the Pegasus at a marina in Gig Harbor, Washington. No one was on board to detect it, and the blaze had about one hour to spread before a bystander noticed and reported it. Another half hour passed before firefighters were able to bring hoses to bear on the blaze. As firefighting went on, Pegasus' stern slipped below, and the bow slowly settled as the boat took on more water. The fire was finally put out at 0430 when the Pegasus' main deck cabin was immersed. 

The wreck was salvaged, and a county fire inspector came aboard to examine the damage. The transom and aft deck were heavily burned, and under a table on the aft deck was a hole burned through into the engine room. Components near the overhead in the engine room were melted, but below they were undamaged, suggesting that the heat came from above. 

The location of the origin of the fire was on the  aft deck, where the owner and his employee had been working the day before the fire. They had been refinishing wood on board the yacht using teak oil, and the employee had taken the towels used to wipe up the excess oil, put them in a plastic bag and set the bag under the table. The teak oil formulation contained linseed oil, and it had a manufacturers' warning about the self-combustion risks of any wastes soaked in the product. 

There were no indications of other possible causes of the fire, and security camera footage from that night showed no signs of human activity. The county fire marshall determined that the oil-soaked rags were the likely cause of the fire, and NTSB agreed. Once the fire started and burned undetected for an hour, NTSB determined, it was unlikely that the yacht could have been saved. The case was very similar to a fire aboard the passenger vessel Safari Spirit in 2012, which likely started when rags soaked in teak oil were laid out to dry and caught fire on a railing. 

NTSB reminded mariners to follow manufacturers' instructions for disposing of oil-based paint and finish wastes, and in particular to avoid piling up or bagging oil-soaked rags, which allows heat to build up and increases the risk of self-ignition.

 

Three Vietnamese Fishermen Beat the Odds of Survival at Sea

A survivor rescued off Tran Van Thoi on Sunday (Courtesy Vietnam Border Guard)

PUBLISHED JUN 20, 2023 10:42 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

In the past three weeks, three Vietnamese fishermen each defied the odds and survived hours or days in the water after going overboard, making national headlines for "miraculous" rescues.

On June 1, fisherman Tran Van Viet was under way on a fishing boat off the coast of Vietnam's Ben Tre province. Viet was working abovedecks, drying squid, when he slipped and fell over the side. No one saw or heard him go over, and he was left adrift. Without food, water or floatation aids, he stayed afloat on his own for nearly four full days until he was rescued by another fishing boat, he told Vietnamese media. He was taken ashore to a border guard station on Phu Quy Island, 45 nm off the coast, and then transferred onwards for medical care. Except for sunburns and fish bites, he was none the worse for wear, and he was released to his family on June 6. He does not intend to return to fishing, he told local outlet Nhan Dan. 

In a separate but similar rescue carried out Sunday, the cargo ship Oriental Star rescued a fisherman who had fallen overboard and gone adrift off Binh Thuan province. The crew spotted a man in the water while they were under way near Phu Quy Island, and the captain ordered them to reverse course to retrieve the survivor. When the ship returned to the previous position, there was no one there, so the crew continued their search into the night. Two hours later, using searchlights, they spotted a fisherman floating in the water, and they pulled him safely aboard. The man had slipped and fallen off his fishing boat, and his crewmates had not immediately noticed that he was missing. He was delivered safely to shore at Phu Quy. 

On the same day, border guards on Vietnam's Gulf of Thailand coastline rescued another man who had jumped off of a fishing vessel in order to escape an abusive work environment. On Sunday morning, the Song Duc border guard station recieved a report that a man had been spotted drifting at sea about three nautical miles off the Tran Van Thoi district, near the tip of Vietnam's southernmost peninsula. The border guards requisitioned a local fishing boat and recovered the survivor from the water after a short search. 

The victim reported that he was new to fishing and had been threatened with beatings while aboard his employer's vessel, so he decided to abandon ship when the moment was right. He prepared some supplies and jumped over the side, drifting for three days before he was discovered. He told his rescuers that he had decided to drink saltwater to quench his thirst - a factor that could have negatively impacted his odds of survival. The circumstances behind his decision to jump overboard are under investigation. 

 

"Underwater Noises" Detected in Search Area for Missing Submersible

OceanGate is operating from the chartered Polar Prince (Miawpukek Horizon Marine Services photo courtesy of OceanGate)

PUBLISHED JUN 20, 2023 4:32 PM BY THE MARITIME EXECUTIVE

 

On Tuesday night, the U.S. Coast Guard reported a possible sign of progress in the search for a missing submersible near the Titanic wreck site in the North Atlantic. A Canadian P-3 maritime patrol aircraft detected "underwater noises" in the search area on Tuesday, the Coast Guard reported.

It is the first clue that responders have found, and underwater ROV search operations were relocated in order to investigate origin of the noises. The initial results of those ROV searches were negative, the USCG said, but the effort continues. 

The U.S. and Canadian teams are being broadly assisted by the U.S. Navy and private teams in what the USCG is calling a “very complex” search with the clock running down with an estimated 40 hours of breathable air remaining inside the submersible.

The search as of midday had covered approximately 7,600 square miles in a position roughly 900 miles east of Cape Code, Massachusetts, and 400 miles south of St. John's, Newfoundland. The USCG is leading the unified command using the best available experts but notes they are looking for a 21-foot submersible in the vast Atlantic. They do not know if the vessel sunk after it lost contact approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes into its dive or if it was able to drop its weights and surface. The five people aboard however are sealed inside and  dependent on the external crew to release them. OceanGate, which built and operates the submersible, estimated to the USCG that there was a maximum of 96 hours of oxygen and the vessel is powered by batteries, but no duration for the batteries has been announced.

The search on the surface is being led by the USCG using C130 aircraft with both visual surveys and radar in hopes that the craft is on the surface. The Canadian Coast Guard also has a plane flying over the area. In addition, the USCG and Canadians are dropping and monitoring sonar buoys from P3 aircraft in hopes of picking up tapping or other sounds from the submersible.

The surface search is complicated by weather in the region. According to the USCG, it was foggy with limited visibility yesterday but improved today. Seas are considered normal at five to six feet with 15 mph winds. One of the members of the expedition had reported Sunday that they were expecting a break in the weather Monday to start their dive, which might be the only one for 2023 due to weather conditions.

OceanGate is leading the underway search because according to the Coast Guard they are most familiar with the site. The company is using a chartered former Canadian Coast Guard vessel the Polar Prince. They have been joined by the Deep Energy, a 636-foot pipe-laying vessel that was operating in the area which has ROV capabilities. The ROV was deployed and surveying as of midday, but the USCG noted that it has “limited capabilities.” 

The French Ministry of Oceans announced on Tuesday that they were deploying assets to aid in the search. The search and survey vessel Atalante has reportedly been dispatched. It is managed by the Ifremer research institute, which has previously dived on the Titanic and is also sending a team due to arrive on Wednesday to operate an additional ROV at the site. 

Media reports are now saying that the five people aboard the submersible include British businessman and explorer Hamish Harding, who had been posting on social media about the trip, along with businessman Shahzada Dawood and his teenage son Suleman Dawood. Other are believed to be French explorer Paul-Henry Nargeolet and the most recent reports are saying the final spot was occupied by the CEO and founder of OceanGate, Stockton Rush. In addition, there is a pilot for the submersible.

The search is gathering worldwide attention while raising many questions about the unregulated submersible industry. David Pogue, a CBS News correspondent, is reporting that OceanGate also briefly lost contact with the submersible for approximately five hours during a 2022 dive. OceanGate previously said the Titan is such new technology that it “falls outside of the existing industry paradigm.”

During the briefing on Tuesday, Capt. Jamie Frederick of the First Coast Guard District refused to speculate on what would be required to recover the submersible. He said all efforts are focused on finding the Titan at this point.

 

High government spending means more inflation? It's complicated, economists say

Nojoud Al Mallees, The Canadian Press

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre's attempt to block the federal government's budget bill from passing earlier this month is the latest example of government spending coming under scrutiny amid high inflation. 

And while most fiscal experts agree that government spending can fuel inflation, economic research suggests the link between the two is more complex. 

The leader of the opposition demanded the federal government present a plan to balance its budget, or his caucus would filibuster the bill. He argued that by running deficits, the government was driving up inflation and forcing the Bank of Canada to keep interest rates high. 

His demands were ultimately not met and the budget bill passed in the House of Commons. 

But the scrutiny on government spending is far from over as inflation remains elevated and the Bank of Canada is at risk of raising interest rates again after hiking its key rate to 4.75 per cent earlier this month.

At the same time, economists say government spending can affect both demand and supply in the economy, making its total impact on inflation more difficult to read. 

Western University economics professor Stephen Williamson said the notion that more government spending equals more inflation is "something you might teach in, like a second-year (university) class."

"It's more complicated," he said. 

There are competing theories on the issue, he says, with mixed findings in economic literature. 

Take, for example, a new study from the Bank of Canada that looks at U.S. data on inflation and government spending. It found a rise in government expenditure can actually push down inflation.  

The study published earlier this month — co-authored by the central bank's Yinxi Xie and Chang Liu from the National University of Singapore — focuses specifically on government spending on goods and services, leaving out transfer payments to people and businesses.

"Our results run counter to the conventional wisdom that fiscal expansions are inflationary," the authors wrote. 

"We find that inflation falls following an increase in government expenditure and that the effect is relatively persistent, lasting for about one and a half years." 

The researchers suggest that a rise in government spending can reduce inflation by boosting employment levels, therefore increasing supply in the economy.

University of Calgary economics professor Trevor Tombe said that according to this theory, people choose to work more when government spending rises because they anticipate taxes to rise as well.  

"This is presented as somewhat counterintuitive results, that an increase in government spending can lower inflation," Tombe said. 

However, Tombe cautioned against drawing any definitive conclusions from one research finding. 

"Certainly, it's interesting. That's a valuable contribution. But no single paper is the end of the conversation," he said. 

Williamson agreed, noting that the paper doesn't look at government transfers, such as the payments sent out during the COVID-19 pandemic.  

But the idea that government policy can reduce inflation by easing supply is not new. 

Former Bank of Canada governor Stephen Poloz has argued that the federal budget, which focused heavily on growing the green economy,  could actually help reduce inflation by expanding the economy's productive capacity.

And Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland has been quick to quote Poloz in defence of her spending plans. 

As to what drove the current bout of high inflation in Canada and what role government spending had to play, Tombe said that's still an open question. 

"We will be studying this period for decades to come," Tombe said. 

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 19, 2023.

U.S. Federal Reserve is rethinking how it supervises banks. One option: hire behavioural scientists

Katanga Johnson and Jonnelle Marte, Bloomberg News

The U.S. Federal Reserve is weighing whether to bring on some unconventional employees to help improve bank oversight: behavioural scientists.

The Fed is considering the additions to help plug gaps in supervision exposed by the collapses of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank earlier this year, its top regulator of lenders said on Tuesday. The behavioral scientists could balance teams now dominated by lawyers and economists.

“We are going to conduct a project that looks system-wide at areas where we can enhance our supervisory culture, behavior, practices and tools, and also where we need to change regulation over the next six months,” Michael Barr, the vice chair for supervision, said at an event hosted by the New York Fed. “I am considering implementing a more multidisciplinary lens — including on-boarding behavioural scientists — who will help inform how we move forward on bank supervision.” 

Barr has called for an extensive reevaluation of requirements for U.S. financial firms as regulators said the failures of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank exposed lapses in oversight. In particular, he said in April that the Fed would reevaluate how it supervises and regulates a bank’s management of interest-rate liquidity risks. 

 

Canada's oil output would plummet by 2050 in a net-zero world, new modelling shows

The Canadian Press

New modelling from the Canada Energy Regulator suggests Canadian oil production will plummet by 2050 if the world achieves its Paris target of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions within that time.

The report, released Tuesday, marks the first time the regulator has presented a long-term outlook for Canadian energy using net-zero as a baseline. 

It paints a picture of a dramatically different energy sector, especially if the world is successful in reaching its 2050 climate targets and holding global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming.

In that scenario, in which domestic and global climate policy successfully reduces the world's emissions to net-zero, the Canada Energy Regulator says global fossil fuel use will drop by 65 per cent from 2021 to 2050.

That would prompt a collapse in global oil prices, to as low as US$35 per barrel by 2030 and US$24 per barrel by 2050, it says.

The report concludes that as a result of these low prices, Canadian crude oil production would fall to 1.2 million barrels per day by 2050, 76 per cent below 2022 levels. 

"In a net-zero world, not only for Canada but for the rest of the planet, the supply and demand dynamic that we see today will be very different in the future," Canada Energy Regulator chief economist Jean-Denis Charlebois told reporters Tuesday.

“Because there will be less demand for hydrocarbons, producers of hydrocarbons will need to be increasingly efficient at managing their costs in order to remain competitive.”

The regulator also modelled two other scenarios — one in which Canada achieves net-zero by 2050, but large developing countries like China and India move at a slower pace. 

In that scenario, the CER said global oil prices will likely remain above US$60 per barrel all the way to 2050, with Canadian oil production declining by just 22 per cent.

The report also looked at what would happen in a "business as usual" case, which assumes no additional efforts to reduce emissions beyond what is already in place, and no further attempts to reach Paris climate targets.

In that scenario, Canadian oil production would actually rise to reach 6.1 million barrels per day by 2050 — 20 per cent higher than in 2022.

Charlebois told reporters the three scenarios laid out are models, not forecasts, and the regulator has not made any predictions about which is most likely to become reality.

“At the end of the day, we don’t comment or opine on the likelihood of it happening," he said.

"It remains to be seen whether it will actually look that way in the real world.”

But he acknowledged that under the global net-zero scenario, the rapid decline in oil prices would put pressure on Canadian companies to drastically reduce their costs in order to remain profitable.

And he said that could put pressure on higher-cost producers, especially oilsands companies which are more carbon-intensive than conventional producers and face steeper costs to lower their emissions.

“In the two net-zero scenarios, we see conventional production being more resilient than oilsands production," Charlebois said.

The Pathways Alliance, a consortium of oilsands companies, has pledged to reach net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. However, it has said the carbon capture and storage network it wants to build in order to help it reach that goal will cost $16.5 billion.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 20, 2023.

Wind power seen growing ninefold as Canada cuts carbon emissions

Brian Platt, Bloomberg News

Canada is set for massive growth in wind power generation as it moves toward net zero emissions by 2050, a new report by the country’s energy regulator suggested.

The report models how energy consumption is expected to change under various scenarios as the world reduces its carbon emissions, and it projects electricity use will more than double in Canada from now until mid-century.

“Among all technologies, wind contributes the greatest amount of new generation by 2050, increasing ninefold from current levels,” the Canada Energy Regulator said, using a scenario it calls “global net zero” that assumes the world acts quickly enough to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2050.

The regulator’s model sees the greatest amount of new wind power being built in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Ontario.

Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson said he wasn’t surprised to see the emphasis on wind generation, given how much it’s come down in cost. Building it out quickly will be a challenge, he acknowledged, but he sees it as achievable — despite the controversy that large-scale wind projects often prompt in neighboring communities.

“Some of this will also come from offshore wind, which perhaps in terms of public acceptance is easier, because it’s a long way offshore,” he said by phone Tuesday. “Those are often very large facilities, and Canada has been a little bit slower on the offshore than our European counterparts.”

Solar power will grow at a much slower pace than wind power, the report projects, eventually making up 5 per cent of generation by 2050.

Hydroelectricity increases by 26 per cent in the modeling, though largely confined to provinces that already have significant hydro projects. Natural gas abated by carbon capture would become a key source of power in Alberta and Saskatchewan, eventually representing 13 per cent of generation in those provinces.

Nuclear generation in the form of small modular reactors will grow in the period between 2040 and 2050, the report forecasts, largely in Ontario where nuclear power already forms the backbone of the electricity system.

Fossil fuel use, meanwhile, will drop by 65 per cent in Canada by 2050 under the global net-zero scenario. In another scenario where Canada achieves net zero but the rest of the world moves more slowly, fossil fuel use still drops by 56 per cent. That’s because of a massive switchover to electric vehicles, heat pumps for home heating and industrial use of electricity rather than fossil fuels.

“In many instances, using electricity is much more efficient than using fossil fuels, and contributes to energy use decreasing by 22 per cent from 2021 to 2050 in the global net-zero scenario,” the regulator said.

Still, fossil fuels remain a sizable part of Canada’s energy mix, and the regulator sees carbon capture as a key technology for getting to net zero — especially for power generation, oil and gas production, and the cement, chemicals, iron and steel sectors. 

The modeling shows Canada’s electricity system actually becomes a net negative factor on emissions after 2035 due to the use of biomass electricity plants with carbon capture. Those plants help Canada’s emissions by “capturing and permanently storing the CO2 which would otherwise be released naturally when the plants die,” the report said.

All of this, however, will come with a political fight.

The leaders of Alberta and Saskatchewan, two conservative-leaning prairie provinces, have repeatedly warned that Canada’s target of a net zero electricity grid by 2035 isn’t achievable.

“I’ve already raised it with my provincial counterparts that if we need to develop a coalition so that we can fight back against Ottawa, if need be, then that’s what we’re going to do,” Alberta Premier Danielle Smith told reporters at an energy show in Calgary last week.

Wilkinson and Smith met Monday night for about two hours, and Wilkinson said he felt they’re making progress even if they’ll never fully agree on some areas.

“I think it was a very constructive conversation, I think we’re both looking to find pathways through which we can actually get to a similar place on things like clean electricity,” Wilkinson said. 

In general, he said, provincial governments are “increasingly seeing that their economic prospects are going to be tied to having a clean grid.”

IMF applauds Canada's climate action, warns of 'race to the bottom' with subsidies

Nojoud Al Mallees, The Canadian Press

The International Monetary Fund warns that Canada's green subsidies could stoke an international race to the bottom, even as it credits the country for a "multipronged" approach to addressing climate change. 

The international agency published Tuesday the preliminary findings of its staff from an official visit to Canada.

"Canada's actions to meet its climate commitments and to incentivize investment in green sectors are welcome, although the design of some incentives could pose some risks," the report says. 

The IMF applauded Canada's climate action, including its carbon-pricing regime and 2023 federal budget investments in the green economy. 

But it called for better international co-ordination to avoid a "race to the bottom" where countries compete over investments with even larger subsidies. 

"Moreover, the current strong focus on electric vehicles — and their batteries in particular — as key to Canada’s green industrial development will require a cautious approach given rapid technological change," the report says. 

It also says Canada should consider a standard incentive regime to promote fairness and transparency, instead of negotiating company-specific packages.

The preliminary report comes as the Liberal government makes historic investments in the green economy and is enticing automakers such as Stellantis and Volkswagen with billions of dollars in subsidies.

The IMF staff also provided some analysis of the current economic situation in Canada, noting the Bank of Canada's recent rate hike was warranted, given the economy has more steam than anticipated.

On the fiscal policy front, the IMF says government spending should remain tight to help bring inflation down. It's also recommending better fiscal anchors, or rules, to balance spending with revenues. 

"While Canada's public debt is relatively low in international comparison, it remains substantially above pre-pandemic levels," the report says. 

The international agency says Canada should work to rebuild its fiscal buffer, which would allow government to address any future crises that require higher spending. 

The IMF also called for more action to address housing affordability and boost supply, including increased co-ordination on housing policy between levels of government and stakeholders. 

"While the Housing Accelerator Fund, introduced in the 2022 budget to provide incentives for municipalities to expand housing supply, is a step in the right direction, more needs to be done to expedite permitting and promote densification," the report says. 

In a news release, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland welcomed the IMF's findings, which she said "highlighted Canada's resilient economy, stable fiscal outlook, clean economy plan and actions to improve housing affordability."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 20, 2023.

 

Ottawa aims to shed more light on how well airports are working, as travel ramps up

Christopher Reynolds, The Canadian Press

Travellers make their way through Pearson International Airport in Toronto Monday, Nov. 14, 2022.

 THE CANADIAN PRESS/Cole Burston

 

The federal government moved this week to bolster accountability at airports, introducing new legislation that would compel them to cough up more information on their performance.

Tabled in the House of Commons on Tuesday, the bill paves the way for new rules requiring airports and other airport operators to create service standards and publish data that can be compared against those benchmarks.

The standards could track outcomes ranging from security screening wait times to how long it takes luggage to reach the carousel.

“It’s no secret that the challenges of the last few years have impacted transportation systems here in Canada and globally. As we head into another busy travel season, we have seen how a disruption at one end of the system can have effects across the entire network," Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said in a release.

"Together, the measures in this proposed legislation will help create a more accountable, transparent and accessible national transportation system that meets the needs of Canadians.”

It is not clear from the bill whether violations of the service standards would be penalized.

Arriving just before the House rises for the summer, the legislation also comes as air travel ramps up for the summer after a year of airport chaos and flight delays during busy travel seasons.

Last month, the National Airlines Council released a report calling on Ottawa to implement “shared accountability” in aviation, with the goal of smoother travel — and across-the-board responsibility for flight disruptions.

The proposals landed precisely three weeks after the House of Commons tabled legislation to overhaul passenger rights. Post-pandemic travel turmoil last summer and over the winter holidays prompted the Liberal government to lay out sweeping changes to Canada's passenger rights charter in an effort to tighten compensation loopholes and toughen penalties.

The airline council recommendations include strikingly similar language to that of Tuesday’s legislation around imposing “service standards” on industry players, which range from airports to Nav Canada and the Canada Border Services Agency.

“They may have internal key performance indicators ... but there's no accountability for them. There's certainly no public reporting on them,” council CEO Jeff Morrison said in a phone interview on May 11.

“Even if, let's say, an airport had a particular standard of getting your luggage through its luggage belt in a certain period of time, we don't know what that is.”

Known as Bill C-52, the legislation also sketches out a plan to consult the public on airspace changes affecting noise near airports, to require airports to report on pollution reduction plans and to compel service providers to submit accessibility data to the government.

Almost certain not to pass before the House rises for its break, the bill further aims to enhance transparency on how a port sets its fees by mandating port authorities “to follow certain principles when establishing or changing” them. It also spells out a process to challenge newly set fees via the country’s transport regulator.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 20, 2023.