Thomas Kierans

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Thomas William Kierans, FCSCE, P. Eng. is an engineer and innovator. He is the originator and principal proponent of the Great Recycling and Northern Development Canal or GRAND Canal.

Kierans is a Montreal native and 1939 McGill University Mining Engineering graduate. As a student he prospected by canoe and bush aircraft across Canada’s northlands. From graduation to 1967 he lived in Sudbury, Ontario working for eighteen years at Inco mines, smelters, and refineries and specializing in industrial safety and rock mechanics. From 1957 to 1967 he was mining and water resources consulting engineer and visited most mines in Canada twice each year. That experience led him to decide that his eventual home would be in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Kierans recognized the increasing greenhouse effects since the 1930s “dust bowl” were a clear indication that fast-growing Canadian and United States populations would require a new, large, controllable, environment-friendly source of fresh water to stabilize shared Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River water levels and flows and end widespread and worsening water deficits and flooding in both nations. To meet this need, Kierans used proven Netherlands and California experience to design his Great Recycling And Northern Development (GRAND) Canal concept in the 1950s. This would recycle (not divert) some of the now huge and harmful run-off to Canada’s Hudson Bay to the Great Lakes from a new sea-level freshwater dike-enclosure in James Bay. This should substantially increase Canada’s freshwater supply and improve Hudson Bay and east coast environments, fisheries and shipping. However, despite Quebec’s past Premier Bourassa’s and prominent engineering groups’ endorsement of detailed study of his concept, as well as an invitation to outline it to the American Society of Civil Engineers in 2001, some Canadian authorities unfortunately fail to understand basic differences between run-off recycling as opposed to potentially harmful headwater diversions or simply fear any joint water management with the U.S.^{[citation needed]}

In 1967, he was invited by project owner CFLCo to be Mining Engineer responsible for underground design at the 5500MW Churchill Falls Hydropower Project in Labrador. His duties were expanded to include project safety and environment protection. He organized detailed studies on the environmental impacts of diverting some of the Naskaupi River headwaters to the project’s Smallwood Reservoir.

In 1973, he was appointed Professor of Engineering at Memorial University of Newfoundland. While at MUN he worked with Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro on the 1975 attempt at a hydropower only crossing of the Strait of Belle Isle, chaired the Environmental Committee on Brinco’s Kitts-Michelin uranium project, and was on the Editorial Board of the American Society Of Civil Engineers’ Manual on Nuclear Structures And Materials. In 1978 he proposed comprehensive underground and surface development of St. John’s Southside Hills and founded Friends Of St. John’s Harbour, the first public group to promote much-needed clean-up of that historic Canadian seaport. He was the founding Chairman of the Newfoundland and Labrador Peat Association and worked with MUN and several industry representatives to initiate the University’s Seabright Corporation cooperation with industry.

In 1978, he retired from MUN to be the Director of the Alexander Graham Bell Institute of Cape Breton University. In 1983 he founded Deltaport Limited to create a very large, mid-ocean, floating, sea and air base using tetrahedral space frames. A floating dock built for such research on the MUN side of St. John’s Long Pond is still in use for recreational purposes. From 1989 to ‘91 he was technical advisor to Canada’s Environment Department for the Fixed Link to Prince Edward Island. He is a life member of the Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Newfoundland and Labrador (PEG-NL), Canadian Society Of Civil Engineers (CSCE), the Canadian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, and other professional groups. He was awarded PEG-NL’s Order Of Merit for 2000 and in 2001 received a CSCE fellowship. He currently authors three websites that reflect his interest in large-scale joint North American water management, floating mid-ocean sea-air bases, and the proposed Newfoundland-Labrador fixed link.