Andrea C. Akelaitis

Andrea Akelaitis* provides advice and representation on a full range of environmental and regulatory matters.  She is a founding partner of the law firm Letcher Akelaitis LLP in Vancouver, BC.

Ms. Akelaitis has appeared before all levels of British Columbia Courts and is called to the bar in Alberta.  Ms. Akelaitis has acted as advisor and co-counsel on many of British Columbia’s contaminated sites matters including before the Environmental Appeal Board on behalf of the successful party in Seaspan ULC v. Director, Environmental Management Act and Domtar Inc. et al.  Ms. Akelaitis also acted as co-counsel with Mr. Letcher in the recent Alberta Environmental Appeals Board case dealing with brownfield redevelopment, Human Health Risk Assessment and contaminated sites issues, Cherokee Canada Inc. et al v. Director, Red Deer North Saskatchewan Region, Alberta Environment and Parks.

Ms. Akelaitis works in air and odour management regulatory issues and in a range of issues related to recycling and waste management, including composting.  She acted as co-counsel in the leading Canadian odour management decision West Coast Reduction Ltd. v. District Director of the Greater Vancouver Regional District (BC Environmental Appeal Board).

Ms. Akelaitis also works in permitting, compliance, defending environmental prosecutions and environmental assessment regulatory and litigation issues.  She appeared as co-counsel in the B.C. Environmental Appeal Board case Worthington MacKenzie Inc. and Daniel Alexander White v. Director, Environmental Management.  Ms. Akelaitis has also had significant experience working in foreign tort issues concerning environmental law matters.  Ms. Akelaitis has acted for a range of Canada’s leading corporations and has acted for the Nisga’a Nation in litigation involving important aboriginal law and environmental law issues, including project environmental assessment.

Ms. Akelaitis has been recognized for environmental law in Best Lawyers in Canada.  She has authored and presented “Provincial Environmental Law, Regulations and Policy” and “Groundwater, Regulation and Quality Control”.  She has presented on allocating contaminated sites environmental risk for CLEBC, including co-chairing a CLEBC conference on contaminated sites with Mr. Letcher. She delivered a paper on Expert Evidence at the National CBA Environmental Energy and Resources Summit on Environment in the Courtroom in Calgary.  In May 2019, she presented at the CBA National Environmental, Energy and Resources Law Summit on contaminated sites issues.  She has been a keynote speaker at the International Odour Management Conference. In 2019 and 2020, Ms. Akelaitis co-chaired the Pacific Business & Law Institute course on contaminated sites. Ms. Akelaitis is a past appointee of the B.C. Ministry of Environment & Climate Change Strategy to the Board of Directors for the Contaminated Sites Approved Professional Society (CSAP).

*Personal Law Corporation