In Canada, as in many other developed nations, natural resource development projects meeting certain criteria are required to undergo an environmental assessment (EA) process to determine potential human and ecological health impacts. As part of the Canadian EA process, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency generally considers submissions by members of the public and experts. While the allowance of external submissions during EA hearings forms an important component of a functional participatory democracy, little attention appears to have been given regarding the quality of such EA submissions. In particular, submissions to EA hearings by prominent individuals and/or groups may be weighted more heavily in the overall decision making framework than those from non-experts. Important questions arise through the allowance and consideration of external submissions to EAs, such as whether inaccuracies in any such submissions may misdirect the EA decision makers to reach erroneous conclusions, and if such inaccuracies do result in sub-optimal EA processes, how the issues should be addressed. In the current work, a representative recent external submission from a prominent public individual and group to the Shell Canada Jackpine Mine Expansion (JPME) Project EA hearings was examined. The case study submission to the JPME EA hearings appears to contain a number of significant scientific errors and/or ambiguities, demonstrating that the EA process in Canada appears to allow potentially flawed submissions from prominent individuals and/or groups, and these problematic submissions may result in unnecessary delays, expenses, or even erroneous decisions. From a public policy perspective, it is desirable that the Canadian EA process be reformed to minimize contributions that may not result in an accurate assessment of the underlying science for the project(s) under consideration.