“Alberta’s government will not put Albertans and their businesses at risk of freezing in the dark at -30 C due to the federal government’s proposed unaffordable, unreliable and unconstitutional Clean Electricity Regulations (CERs).”
— Actual Government of Alberta press release, Nov. 27, 2023
I think it’s official, my fellow Albertans.
We have now truly become the embarrassing cousins of Confederation, as someone in Alberta politics was once famously accused of saying.
The government we elected has introduced actual legislation to use its preposterous Alberta Sovereignty Something-Something Act to make a stand against a federal regulation that doesn’t exist yet and isn’t supposed to take effect for more than a decade if it ever does.
And why, pray? Premier Danielle Smith wants us to believe it’s so we won’t risk freezing in the dark in -30 weather in 2035 – assuming, of course, that there still is -30 weather anywhere on earth by then.
This lame talking point would be gaslighting on an epic scale even if the chances of the Liberal Government in Ottawa being defeated in the next general election weren’t widely acknowledged to be better than fair.
Plus, if Pierre Poilievre replaces Pierre Trudeau’s son as prime minister and keeps his promises, then Canada will once again be on its way to becoming an international climate criminal instead of a mere international climate virtue signaller that has its own overpriced bitumen pipeline on the side.
Mind you, nearly a dozen years is plenty of time for Canadians to elect the Conservatives and toss them out again, so I guess a Premier who thinks ivermectin might cure COVID can’t be too careful.
To say the introduction of the first Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act resolution in the Alberta Legislature yesterday is performative is the understatement of the year, and the year is almost over.
The United Conservative Party Government’s press release complains that breaking federal laws can come with criminal penalties, so the UCP Caucus in the Legislature (plus “Independent” Lacombe-Ponoka MLA Jennifer Johnson, no doubt) wants us to think it can make federal laws go away by waving a wand and muttering an incantation.
(Don’t try to invoke this legislative #Kudatah formula at home, folks, even with an Alberta law – the courts take a dim view.)
I suppose this is what happens when you elect people as premier who used to be associated with groups like the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (Jason Kenney) and the Fraser Institute (Danielle Smith).
Instead of policy, you get stunts.
Meaningful? Not very.
Will Ottawa respond? I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t even acknowledge.
Why bother? They can deal with it when someone actually breaks the clean electricity regulations, whatever form they may take, nearly a dozen years down the line when Danielle Smith is unlikely to be the premier of Alberta anymore.
Pressed hard by reporter Dean Bennett of The Canadian Press at yesterday morning’s oxymoronic “embargoed news conference,” a shouty Premier Smith feigned anger at the feds, but then admitted it’s mostly for show.
Mr. Bennett: “You don’t actually need the Sovereignty Act for any of this. What it does though is it actually draws more attention to it.”
Ms. Smith (smirking): “Sure!”
Mr. Bennett: “But that’s not what the Sovereignty Act was supposed to be about.”
Ms. Smith: “What did you think the Sovereignty Act was supposed to be about? Of course it was!”
I’ll tell you one thing. Utilities Minister Nathan Neudorf and Environment Minister Rebecca Schulz – both reasonably sensible people who have lent their names to this gong show – have ruined their reputations. I’d be shocked if anyone ever takes either of them seriously again.
They’re both going the way of Energy Minister and twice-failed UCP leadership candidate Brian Jean, who at least has enough money to move to one of his houses in a country where nobody knows his name the minute he decides to re-retire.
It might have been my imagination, but both ministers looked a trifle bilious at the news conference, as if wishing they could think of a way to leave the room in a hurry.
Ms. Smith’s UCP Government plans to do some very bad things like hijacking Albertans’ Canada Pension Plan savings and privatizing great swaths of public health care. But this announcement is more like the chaff you dump out of an airplane to confuse the enemy’s radar.
The only interesting thing yesterday was that Crown corporation the government has proposed to do its lawbreaking for it – possibly in part because electricity generation corporations have told it to forget about them breaking any federal laws.
University of Calgary economics professor Blake Shaffer wondered on social media if “the Alberta government’s plan to get around currently draft regulations that if legislated won’t bind for another 12 years is to destroy private sector investor confidence by pitching a crown corp to nationalize the sector’s assets?”
Or, as Alberta Federation of Labour President Gil McGowan observed, this “sounds completely out of character … unless companies like ATCO actually WANT to be bought out by the government. Do they want to cash out before the global energy transition gets real?”
This makes some sense. The new Crown corporation could subsidize the fossil fuel industry as the rest of the world invests more heavily in renewables, gas supplies grow, and prices accordingly plunge. As The Breakdown put it on social media: “Dani will make sure that natural gas has a perpetual market in Alberta at all costs.”
This topic certainly preoccupied the rather feisty reporters who showed up for the news conference, which makes it interesting to listen to if you can stand the premier’s strident gaslighting about the need to keep using gas to keep the lights on.
This is exactly what Albertans got by putting in these phony Conservatives and Reformers into power in Alberta. It’s going to be one gigantic mess. A real ugly mess. The UCP never will take responsibility for what is self inflicted harm to our power grid in Alberta. The origins of it come from Ralph Klein, when he deregulated electricity. Shady backroom deals with power company CEOs also happened when he was premier. Both of these things cost us at least $40 billion or more. I recall reading about MLAs who were in Peter Lougheed’s government, and they said that electricity deregulation was a very stupid thing to do. Power engineers have also come to that conclusion. Utility companies, such as TransAlta, were playing games with power price manipulation. The UCP were doing very shady moves, which also drove up the costs of power in Alberta so much more. Economic witholding is one of them. That cost has been pegged at an astonishing price of nearly $100 billion. It’s never the fault of the UCP. They have to blame someone else. In this case, its the Liberals in Ottawa. If Pierre Poilievre gets into power, we can only imagine what kind of damage he will create. Massive job losses, by defunding the CBC, and a whole bunch of other problems. Lawyers will be rich from the Sovereignty Act, but Albertans will end up being the losers, from having to pay for this.
Smith, who although inconsistent, but sometimes knows how to permanently agitate and stir up the base, seems to have found a perfect straw man here. As said, a law not yet proclaimed that will not be effective for many years. I suppose you can’t be punished for breaking a law that is not in effect and does not yet apply. Likewise, I can’t get a speeding ticket if I am only going over the limit in my imagination. So this is truly performative art as politics. Will Smith be brave enough to challenge something that actually exists already? I have my doubts, but I suppose we will see.
It is very unlikely Trudeau will be PM in 2035 and I doubt Smith will be Premier then either. If recent UCP history is any guide, their Premiers melt down faster than an unstable isotope. I give her two to three years.
Interestingly, we will now have a crown corporation in the power business, like most other provinces including the ones to our left and to our right. I suppose some lucky unsuccessful UCP candidate from the last election who hasn’t managed to already get a position with one of the many governmenr agencies, boards or commissions, will now have a nice job. However, this might be a bit unsettling for our large lucrative private utility companies. Forget 2035, we already have high electricity prices now and that’s due to ineffective UCP regulation now, not what the Federal government may do in the future. Of course picking a fight with the Feds gives Smith a nice distraction from this.
While we are at it setting up crown corporations, what’s next for Smith – public auto insurance? If that happened, I bet some of her supporters would have a stroke!
Hello Dave
Very succinct. Thanks.
Danielle Smith reminds me of Ralph Klein with her stupid smirk. It was easy to tell when Ralph Klein was lying, and up to no good, when he had a stupid smirk on his face. It’s baffling how people fell for his lies. Danielle Smith is also lying, and the look on her face, and her body language gives it away. People are falling for her lies too. What good is it doing them? Recently, I just looked at my power bill. It isn’t cheap, and Justin Trudeau, or even Rachel Notley, have nothing to do with it being so expensive. What will these people say when their power bills climb even further, they have other large costs, and have to pay out of their own pockets for healthcare in Alberta? If they have no doctor, because they left Alberta, what will these people do? This is what the results are for people supporting these phony Conservatives and Reformers. The very ones that Peter Lougheed had warned us about.
I’ve noticed more consistent power outages in the middle of the summer when the temperature is above average and hot. I’ve also been wondering when any politician from any side would be willing to suggest commemorating the greatest loss of Canadian life in a single event, the 2021 heat dome. Oh well, we get an attention seeker as leader instead. Maybe she’ll fake cry for us again.
Localized power outages happen from time to time, such as when lightning strikes a sub-station, or the wind — or a reckless driver — knocks down a power pole. Back in May, when the entire northwest corner of the province seemed to be on fire, a wildfire in the Fox Creek-Little Smoky area burned power poles along Highway 43, taking down power lines and cutting power to hundreds of residents. I drove that highway at the time, and the downed power lines were clearly visible along the highway for many kilometres.
But none of these outages have anything to do with generating capacity, or do anything to support the Premier’s fearmongering about the federal Draft Clean Energy Regulations.
So Gassy Dani is preparing to become Pierre Trudeau II with her National Energy Program for Alberta — national because this thing involves sovereignty? Albertans have spent generations hating the NEP, to the point that Dani’s followers froth at the mouth at the mere mention of the Trudeau name. Do you think they’ll notice that she has turned? And our Canada Pension Plan contributions will finance the whole shebang?
Is buying a twilight industry at a likely extortionate price with purloined seniors’ retirement funds a good idea? Do I have to ask stupid questions?
Do we have to keep pretending that there’s not a pot of our hard-earned pension contributions waiting for each one of these UCPirates once they ram this through?
Jason Kenney wasn’t wrong when he warned of Alberta becoming a banana republic. Tropico isn’t a game anymore. It’s Dani’s mission statement for Alberta. This version features a herd of white elephants that have escaped from her zoo and are trampling everyone who never thought they’d spend their golden years as a Walmart greeter.
I guess installing solar panels and storage batteries to power our heat pumps isn’t enough to ride out this calamity. Dani will force us to use natural gas and let economic witholding rip, plus an added bonus of forcing us to buy the generating stations and utility companies to boot. Thanks for the implied threat not to let us western ba$****$ freeze in the dark, Robber Baron Dani, or should I say Madame Pierre Trudeau II?
It is really rich for the UCP to use the chicken little sky is falling approach to dealing with the feds. Keep in mind that Alberta already pays the highest electricity rates of any province in Canada, so the claim that electricity prices will go through the roof when clean energy is mandated is absurd. This is clearly aa great big failure on the part of the PC’s and UCPers to manage electricity correctly over the last few decades and they continue to refuse to deal with it properly and ultimately we have and are going to pay a hefty price for this mismanagement.
The other real concern is the theft of CPP in favor of an APP. The figures and rationale are total garbage.
The thing people don’t realize is if Smith doesn’t like the rules around paying pensioners the same as CPP, they will no doubt invoke the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act to change things. As they always intended employers will contribute much less, if anything at all, and retirees will get little or nothing once the UCP has thrown away all the assets on risky investments.
OT: I find it amusing that the fake newspaper, Epoch times, has to advertise here to fool people into reading their alt-right dreck.
CX: I should probably address this issue. From time to time people suggest to me that I should ban ads like those of the Epoch Times. However, I have faith in my readers’ ability to tell dross from gold. Moreover, it’s hard (and getting harder) to generate revenue from a blog like this, which is quite a bit of work and includes some expenses such as web hosting for a high-volume site. Nobody except Google is getting rich from Google advertising – leastways, I’m certainly not – but it’s something. So I’m very reluctant to tell them they can’t put whatever they want into those spots. I have always eschewed fund-raisers, Rebel Media style, but the day is coming when I’m either going to have to do that or switch to Substack, which, for a variety of reasons, I really don’t want to do. DJC
You could cross post on substack for folks who want to support you that way, and leave the blog as is…
I’m sure I speak for everyone when I say we really appreciate all that you do.
I didn’t mean to complain about this ad showing on your site. I know that the ads are placed by some agency or other. This ad is in heavy rotation everywhere, which is why I commented on it. I doubt it does any good but I regularly report Epoch Times ads as fake news. Plus, I really find it funny that an alleged news paper has to put click-bait ads up to fool people into going to their fake news site.
CX: No worries. I wasn’t offended. Just a chance to jump on my soapbox. DJC
Jesus, Mary and Joseph and all their carpenter friends, Smith is a squalid nuisance! As for Lorne Gunter, repeating that he is an idiot is akin to bringing coal to Newcastle.
JE: Coals to Newcastle, indeed. Made me laugh out loud, as they say. DJC
The real jewel that Dani covets for her crown? https://youtu.be/tH6xXQdxs5k
Not going to lie, that’s a pretty keen observation by mr McGowan. Would be weird if they had been bleeding albertans white on their utilities since the spring, I’m sure that’s not making a lot of albertans quite angry. Honestly I thought it was to destroy demand for renewables but like, how, Alberta’s economy is way too small to make a serious dent in that, they’ll just sell to someone else. As a cudgel to explain why we are bailing out the former possessions of taxpayers and instead taking them on as a liability goes a lot further imo. Interesting.
Hello DJC and fellow commenters,
Danielle Smith’s retort on the purpose of the Sovereignty Act is, I’m sorry to say, “insane”. Wouldn’t she be better off dealing with actual problems, for example, a lack of doctors, nurses, and probably other health care professionals. I don’t think that the understands anything about her position as the premier of a democratic province. As I have said previously, Danielle Smith seems to think that Alberta is her personal fiefdom and that she is there to put her personal preferences and dangerous delusions about matters such as public health and undemocratic government into policy and legislation. As a province, we are in serious trouble.
The timing makes you wonder from what they’re currently trying to divert attention.
There’s a rumour that she is taking a large number of people to COP28 and probably wasting our money on fossil fuel fossils.
Maybe she plans to make an exhibition of herself there. I’d love to see some of our youth delegates ask her hard questions, but she will just blink and lie.
Ah, but she has a “tell”. You can hear it regularly in her press conferences and the legislature. When she’s under pressure or saying things that *might* be untrue, her voice gets higher and squeakier. At first it sounds like Preston Manning, but then it goes into Minnie Mouse vocal range. Sometimes it is shockingly dramatic, like two different people (e.g. when she was talking about Thomas Mulcair the other day, or in the PC with Rebecca Schultz and Nathan Neudorf). Once you’ve heard it, it’s hard to unimagine the mouse ears.
Michael— short news blurp on the weekend—Protestors out about the logging in the Kaninaskis; affecting the water.( I’m not sure if it was CBC or CTV.)
Then there’s the story of the issue over open pit mining expansion on hold due to unreported discharge into the river.
Cochrane Eagle—
Bill deprives voters of critical information, encourages corruption says St Albert MLA
Bill 8, the Justice Statutes Amendment Act, halts conflict of interest investigations during elections and allows cabinet to set limits on gifts to politicians. ( Stephen Harper will be proud of that one, if not a wee bit envious, he tried). Apparently ‘Patik Phillipe’ watches are going for $110k +, with a few other brands that are house down payment worth.
And I still find it very curious that only the Narwhal has anything about all the crypto mining in Alberta, how much power they use and all the abandoned gas sites that they would like to use, because it’s such a great economic benefit to the municipalities, rather than just sitting ,not being cleaned up.
https://thenarwhal.ca>bitcoin mining
Mining for Bitcoin in Alberta’s Oilsands (Nov 5-2022)
” Karringten estimates there were about 40 crypto mining companies in Alberta and virtually all of them were running off of natural gas. Fossil fuels produce almost 90% of electricity in Alberta. Large companies like Exxon Mobil are also interested in crypto mining.
** funny quote from Jenkins/Link Global , after being shut down for setting up illegally in Sturgeon County,…..”the company is also playing around with the idea of using waste heat emitted from the computer servers to power greenhouses ,bolstering Alberta’s agricultural industry during cold weather, Jenkins said. ”
So don’t worry about freezing after all, with all of DS’s penchant for Bitcoin and that ‘other’ CBC , everyone can just go to the local mine to warm up, and maybe get some fresh peas or pickles; but you might want to check first in the Drumheller area, Hut8’s Alberta Bitcoin mine, running @15% installed Hashrate , due to electrical issues…
(May 9th 2023) Construction of a crypto currency mining operation that will utilise 42MW of power from the new Unit 16 gss-fired power plant in Medicine Hat. A power purchase agreement was signed to provide power at an average rate of 3.5 cents per kilowatt hour. Though from the picture of all the Huts, one wonders about the windmills in the background—just saying!
re: COP-28 , I hope someone reminds Dani & Adriana to take their shawls with them , when in Rome, or some such !
What is she up to ?? take your pick….at this point, 1yr in, imo, she’s out T- d’rump…
Michael, they are trying to cement a shaky hold on power by chasing (quixotic) windmills. There are a lot of pressing issues and immediate issues this government needs to deal with. But they refuse, and the voters, yes even the rural ex-socreds will realize they have been had.
At this point, the more sensible members of the UCP caucus must be hoping that something happens to boss.
Last summer’s ill fated cabinet shift, that was supposed to restore PMJT’s fortunes, completely made it to the point of underwhelming. Worse, the Liberal back benches were livid at so many of them being overlooked for promotion. Trudeau maybe worried about Skippy Pollivere, but it’s his own MPs who are rumbling.
Now that the Carbon Levy is now for the carving up, what’s to stop an outright revolt? Maybe once someone steps forward and presents themselves as a credible alternative to Trudeau.
Until then … popcorn.
Old Copy Editor here: UCP? Or LPC? DJC
Somewhat interchangeable, if you ask me. It would be better if they branded themselves as YouSeePee or ElPeeCee. The latter is meant to tag them as something along the lines of that weird coalition for the hell of it that was once known as the PRI in Mexico. As for the former, what you see, it what you get… really
While all the focus is on oil, gas and coal, there may be a wild card coming long before 2035. As my alias denotes, I reside in Cowville Sur le Bow. We’ve had a few mild days recently and I have been rollin’ along the bike path as often as possible..
Guess what? You can almost walk across the Bow in Riverbend. We had a water advisory this past summer and the winter weather forecast is for very little snow. Ergo, water will likely become even more scarce.
So what or who will win? The citizen who enjoys clean, reliable water from their tap? Or the extraction companies that demand water to ensure their profits and grease a few palms? My bet is on the average citizen and this will be Smith’s Rubicon.
So while oil executives stated that Ottawa’s targets could be met using green energy Smith cancels the increase of green energy and attacks Ottawa for trying to promote their targets and ignored the fact that it was her pal Ralph Klein who gave us the highest costing electricity in Canada. Making up her stupid comments about people being fired if the targets weren’t met after she was the one who deliberately created the mess to make certain they couldn’t be. I wonder how stupid she thinks we are? But then she knows, she got elected didn’t she?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VHXJ2lM0ITQ
Dolly says it so much better than I ever could.
In his reply to Christina above, Michael raises the question of a diversion. I don’t know if this is the plan, but the entire Sovereignty Act issue has very effectively distracted attention from the discussion of Alberta creating a crown corporation to buy up gas fired generating plants.
Personally, I am getting a mental image of utility companies commiserating to Danielle Smith about how the CERs are going to leave them stuck with millions (billions?) of dollars worth of fossil fuel burning assets that will soon be worthless. Yes, they can switch to renewable energy sources to generate electricity, and will eventually save money buy not paying for fossil fuels to do the generating, but the fact remains that they will still have the once valuable generators sitting worthless.
What a bonus for them if they can get the government to pay them for these worthless assets! And if Danielle Smith can buy them up and package it as a stand up to Ottawa gesture, her base will even love her for doing it.
And we thought Ms. Smith’s Tylenot venture was a waste of money.
I don’t recall any other provinces besides the Twins of Locklandia passing a ‘sovereignty act’—not even Quebec (it had referenda instead). Danielle’s is pure bombast swinging at air, but Scott Moe’s is actually on a collision course with the law. Why?
Both provinces have petroleum industries, but Saskatchewan’s is comparatively tiny— the Bitumen Mines of Albetar have much more at stake with respect GHG emissions-policy (like, in a dozen year, maybe). And the Saskatchewan Party government is definitely on cruise-control (whereas the partisan right in its big sister’s province is on out-of-control, having been denounced, defeated, shotgun-wedded, schismatic and commandeered for a dozen years). So why is Saskatchewan spearheading this cruising-for-a-bruising with Ottawa?
I suppose it wants to ally with its stronger, richer neighbour, ostensibly for their mutual protection (which is really what confederation is all about—if one isn’t too myopic to see it). But even if both are frightened by writing on the wall they don’t want to see— ‘peak-oil’ by the end of the decade, transport-electrification motoring along faster than many thought and most even know about, and the Reform faction of the CPC now isolated in its western Prairie redoubt since Erin O’Toole fell on his sword in order the eastern wing of the party achieved moderate parity, not to mention the general decline and resulting tumult in virtually all parties of the right in the Western World as climate-change disasters and income inequities become more undeniable—it remains a puzzle why either would contemplate secession in these circumstances.
It’s probably not gone unnoticed by the most prominent principals of the conservative “Resistence” that Landlockia is now bookended by NDP-governed provinces with Premier Kinew’s recent win in Manitoba (not sure Kinew’s indigenaity is a factor for Moe, but First-Nation issues are probably as, if not more, important in Saskatchewan, and Wab’s win must surely be an inspiration to FN political activism there).
Finally, Moe’s piling-onto the gender pronoun issue with the sincerest form of flattery to New Brunswick premier Blaine Higgs is, to me, conspicuous: that looks like what politicians do to distract from other, more serious political weaknesses (in this case at the expense of gender-nervous public school students). Higgs’ Conservative government sure has dug in at least one of its heels while heeling a hornet-nest with the other on pronouns. I don’t know what they are up to, but ginning some divisiveness in a province with some pretty nasty sentiments between a diversity of parties in the assembly might be their (Higgs’) insurance that, if their party is reduced to a minority again (like it was in the previous mandate), they can depend, like they did last time, on the more reactionary of the fringe parties to support them (Higg’s Conservatives). But Moe’s assembly is not so diverse as Higgs’.
I think Alberta and Saskatchewan’s chest-thumping betrays their inner fear and insecurity about federal emissions-reduction policy (although you might not know it by Danielle’s recent bluster, they did lose their SCoC challenge on the constitutionality of the federal carbon tax) and what that will do to their respective petroleum industries. Yes, Saskatchewan’s is much smaller and, for that reason, it is much weaker than its sister (oops!—I mean, sibling…) to the west. On that account it makes sense to ally with the stronger interest.
But you have to wonder why Moe is threatening to not pay the federal carbon tax—which would be, as the SCoC confirmed, against the law—and taking a much bigger risk than Alberta. Perhaps it’s to impress the stronger partner. After all, the noise from the Wild Rose province is bound to get louder and Saskatchewan wouldn’t want to be drowned out. It hasn’t been all that long since it was an NDP province itself.
But longer ‘n’ Alberta. At least its something…
In the wrestling world it is called Kayfabe.
Playing around with electrical companies and using them for political purposes and rewarding their friends always makes for entertaining events.
Sounds like Smith took a page or two out of some B.C. play books.
Back in the day, B.C. had a private corporations, B.C. Electric which included a gas division, a bus division, and of course the electrical division.
Paid good wages, benefits. President: Dal Grauer. Day after Dal Grauer’s funneral, WAC Bennett, Premier, expropriated B.C. Electric, renamed it B.C. Hydro, eventually spun off the gas division to Fortis and some, bus division into part of the Transit conglomate. WAC then went on a dam building spree, which flooded much land, made some very unhappy, employed a lot of dam builders and on we rocked and rolled. Electrcity rates weren’t bad.
Along comes Gordon “el gordo” Campbell the B.C. Lieberal premier who decides B.C. doesn’t have enough electricity and decides we’ll have run of the river projects. A lot of companies and indiviuals came out a head but not the fish. He ordered B.C. Hydro to buy electricity from the run of the river projects for 12 cents a kilowatt, and then sell it to consumers for 3 cents a kilowatt. thenn along comes christy clark who decides to build Site C dam for billions. Horgan is elected and decides to continue the dam. Don’t know if it ever will be finished or filled with water, but Alberta could source electrcity from Site C is and when it ever gets finished. Of course it has gone billions over budget.
So whatever Smith is up to with energy in Alberta, consumers need to be really careful These things cost billions and billions put into energy is not money going into health care and education.
I think this is drafted to draw attention away from the REAL PROBLEM IN ALBERTA’S ELECTRICITY GRID: We’re paying four times what other, greener provinces do for power. No breaks for seniors, businesses of ANY SIZE, and the rest of us stupid consumers. Economic Withholding is the problem. I’m a little more cynical. Dani’s jacked up the prices for those who’ve chosen the right path to greening the world…electric car buyers. And it’s still cheaper than gasoline.
Our issue is the fuel required to generate power. Wind, solar and geothermal require no fuel at all.
“We cannot pollute our way out of Climate Change.”. I said that.