Dr. Jill Blakley PhD, MCIP, RPP

I hold a Ph.D. in Geography (University of Saskatchewan) specializing in environmental impact assessment. I’ve been a faculty member of the Department of Geography and Planning since 2009 and recently served as Interim Vice Dean Faculty Relations in the College of Arts and Science (Jan 2022 - Sept 2023), a role that I enjoyed immensely. I also enjoyed serving as Acting Vice Dean Academic in 2016.

My research program centers on cumulative effects assessment (CEA) and strategic environmental assessment, particularly as applied to regional-scale natural resource development programs and mega-projects. I am lead editor of the 2021 Handbook of Cumulative Impact Assessment, part of an international series of Handbooks on best practice in impact assessment (Edward Elgar Publishing, UK). This book features cutting-edge knowledge and practices contributed by more than 40 authors from nine counties. I am co-lead editor of an edited volume with Aimee Craft, University of Ottawa, called In Our Backyard: The Keeyask Exerperience (University of Manitoba Press), which profiles the legacy of cumulative impacts on people and lands affected by more than 60 years of hydro-electric development in northern Mantioba. This book was the best selling paperback non-fiction book for McNally Robinson Winnipeg for two reporting periods in 2022. Aimee and I have another edited volume forthcoming entitled Mega-Projects and Extractivism in Indigeounous Territories: What is Good Development? (UBC Press).

My early work includes a series of papers and technical reports that helped crystalize regional strategic environmental assessment (RSEA) in concept and practice in Canada and internationally. These papers informed national policy guidance for RSEA endorsed by the Canadian Council of Ministers of Environment, and Alberta Environment’s Land Use Framework for the northeast oil sands development area and province-wide. This work also subsequently informed the development of Transport Canada's National Framework for assessing the cumulative effects of marine shipping; the call for RSEA in Ontario’s Ring of Fire region; the call for better CEA of Ontario’s Deep Geologic Repository project; and a new vision for impact assessment Canada, crystalized in Building Common Ground, the final report of the expert panel mandated by the Canadian Minister of Environment and Climate Change. My team is currently synthesizing lessons from more than 60 cases of regional assessment across Canada and internationally to foster CEA best practices.      

My academic and professional experience spans the areas of environmental impact assessment, regional and urban planning, and natural resources management. Over the past twenty-five years, I’ve provided expertise to the International Association for Impact Assessment; the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment; the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada; the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency; Transport Canada; Parks Canada; the Wildlife Conservation Society (Canada); Alberta Environment; the Manitoba Clean Environment Commission; Manitoba Hydro; BC Hydro; the Public Interest Law Centre of Manitoba; the Consumers Association of Canada (Manitoba chapter); Pape Salter Teillet LLP Barristers and Solicitors; Fisheries and Oceans Canada; the Canadian International Development Agency; the Canadian Institute of Planners, the File Hills Qu'Appelle Tribal Council; Four Rivers Environmental Services, Matawa First Nations, the City of Saskatoon; and the City of Edmonton, among others.