Rod Northey is a partner in the Toronto office of the firm and a member of the firm’s Environmental Law Group. He is in his 29th year of private practice and certified by the Law Society of Upper Canada as a specialist in environmental law.

Rod's practice focuses on regulatory approvals, hearings and appeals across the full range of approval regimes involving the environment — including environmental assessment, land use, endangered species, cultural heritage, energy, resource extraction, and infrastructure (transportation, energy, waste and water). Clients facing major regulatory challenges - multiple regimes, conflicting standards - retain Rod for his innovative regulatory strategies.

Rod’s strategic work in environmental assessment is widely acknowledged. In August 2016, the federal Minister of the Environment and Climate Change appointed Rod to her expert panel on environmental assessment to carry out a Canada-wide consultation and review of Canada's environmental assessment process. Similarly, in May 2016, the Ontario Minister of Transportation appointed Rod to the GTA West Advisory Panel to conduct a strategic review of a major environmental assessment for future transportation infrastructure in the GTA West corridor.

Ongoing client work has Rod leading legal teams for several major environmental assessments in the transportation, energy and mining sectors across Ontario and in Nunavut:

- Halton Region, the four Halton area municipalities, and Conservation Halton in the Greater Toronto Area in court and before a federal environmental assessment panel over a proposed truck-rail intermodal facility;

- Kitikmeot Inuit Association, as proponent of a first-of-kind deep water port on the Arctic Ocean and all-season 230 km road across Nunavut to provide southern access to Canada's highway network;

- Henvey Inlet First Nation, co-owner of a 300 MW wind farm on its reserve lands, with exclusive responsibility to develop and implement novel environmental assessment, protection and permitting laws under the federal First Nations Land Management Act;

- Marten Falls First Nation, working with the Province of Ontario, as proponent of environmental assessments for new all-season roads within Ontario's Ring of Fire area in northern Ontario.

Other current work includes cultural heritage legal work for the Town of Oakville before Ontario courts and tribunals, and integrated water management for the City of Thunder Bay before Ontario courts and multiple regulators respecting water takings, dam management, hydroelectric power, and fisheries.

As litigation counsel, Rod has been involved in dozens of tribunal and court appeals, including more than 40 reported environmental law decisions. His litigation experience includes acting as co-counsel for Suncor Energy Services through Ontario's first renewable energy approval hearing, and leading City of Burlington's lead team for a 100-day hearing over resource extraction on the Niagara Escarpment involving retaining and preparing expert witnesses in land use, hydrogeology, hydrology, wetlands, endangered species, air quality, and human health.

Throughout his career, governments have retained or appointed Rod to expert panels on environmental law reform. He was a member of the 2004 Ontario executive panel appointed by the Minister of the Environment to reform environmental assessment for green energy, transit and waste management. He was also a member of the task force to develop Ontario's two million acre greenbelt around Toronto. He has been retained by the federal government to deal with law reform on the precautionary principle, applying environmental assessment to Crown corporations, and applying environmental assessment to projects outside Canada. He has also been invited to appear before Parliamentary committees on constitutional law and environmental assessment.

Rod is author of the annual Guide to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act (LexisNexis Canada), as well as the 1995 Annotated Canadian Environmental Assessment Act and EARP Guidelines Order (Carswell). He is author of law journal articles on the integration of environmental and land use planning law, federalism and environmental law, the role of municipalities in Canada's energy strategies, and the fading role of alternatives in federal environmental assessment. Rod is also an adjunct faculty member for a course on environmental protection for Osgoode Hall Law School's LLM program.

Rod is recognized by his peers in national and international listings, including Lexpert, Who’s Who Legal: The International Who’s Who of Business Lawyers and Canada’s Best Lawyers.

Outside his legal practice, Rod is past-chair of the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation and the Greenbelt Fund.