BC Gas Czar Resigns Abruptly

Dave Nikolejsin, BC’s deputy minister for natural gas development since 2015, resigned abruptly from his position on June 5, ending a 31-year career in the BC civil service. A replacement has not been named.

No official notice was issued by BC’s energy, mines and petroleum resources ministry, but according to media reports, Nikolejsin told a close friend he was leaving to pursue opportunities in the private sector.

Nikolejsin has long been a staunch supporter of natural gas and LNG development in BC, and was widely credited for helping the LNG Canada consortium get its 14mn mt/yr liquefaction project at Kitimat, on BC’s north coast, to a final investment decision in 2018.

“That project embodies the triple word score of being net good for the environment, good for the economy, and embraced (largely) by First Nations,” he wrote in a letter sent to colleagues after his departure.

Throughout his tenure, Nikolejsin made several trips – primarily to Asia – touting the environmental benefits of using low-carbon BC LNG over high-carbon fuels like coal.

“BC is well endowed with natural resources that the world needs,” Nikolejsin wrote in the letter. “If those resources don’t come from a place like BC that has extremely strong environmental standards, they will come from somewhere else.”