The NDP insists it now has more evidence indicating the Yukon Party is secretly planning for a fracking industry in the Yukon.

A copy of an email circulated Tuesday by the New Democrats has deputy minister George Ross of the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources discussing a “pilot fracking/science project” in the Kotaneelee gas field with EFLO Energy Yukon.

It discusses the need to enter into an oil and gas agreement with the Liard First Nation.

The email says it’s not the government’s intention to say it is proceeding with hydraulic fracturing.

Rather, it’s a move designed to do the work so that they can keep fracking “on the table for the future (eg no moratorium etc).”

NDP Environment critic Kate White raised the email Tuesday with Energy Minister Scott Kent in the legislature.

“The minister has told us that there aren’t any applications to frack, but why won’t he tell us that he is pushing a fracking pilot project behind the backs of Yukoners?” White asked.

“Despite leaked documents and tightly scripted talking points, the Yukon Party is determined to force fracking onto a community that has clearly said no.”

Kent told the legislature the Yukon Party is working diligently on its response to the report delivered in January by the legislative committee that was tasked with examining the risks and benefits of hydraulic fracturing in the Yukon.

The government, he said, has zero-tolerance for misinformation.

Rather, it’s looking at the science and potential economic benefits the oil and gas industry can create as it prepares its response to the report.

In an interview this morning, Kent said the issue of a pilot fracking project was raised with him by a party after the committee report was filed, though he declined to identify the party.

He said it’s a suggestion worthy of further consideration since all the necessary equipment and other infrastructure was already in place at the Kotaneelee gas field in southeast Yukon.

But after evaluation, the proposal was removed from further consideration, he said.

Kent said today the Yukon Party will be delivering its response to the committee’s report within the next two weeks.

White said in an interview after question period that it’s pretty clear Premier Darrell Pasloski and his government are bent on having an oil and gas industry in the Yukon that includes hydraulic fracturing.

There was the accidental release recently of confidential documents that department officials were preparing for the minister to explain the government’s pro-development position, she said.

She pointed out how the premier made mention in his budget speech last Thursday of funding provided to Northern Cross Yukon and the Vuntut Development Corp. to explore the possibility of operating a refinery in the Eagle Plains area.

There was the lightning-fast environmental and socio-economic assessment of Yukon Energy’s new LNG generating plant, said White.

Now, she said, there’s the email.

White said EFLO Yukon, which purchased the Kotaneelee gas field in 2012, is on record as saying it wants to explore opportunities in the gas field using unconventional drilling methods – fracking.

“So the question has always been what has the government promised them, what has the Yukon Party promised them?” she said.