Compared to Venezuelan oilsands crude, according to Prime Minister Mark Carney, Canadian oil is cheaper, cleaner, and “clearly low risk.”
“Canadian oil will be competitive because it is low-risk, clearly low-risk, low cost,” Mr. Carney told a news conference in Paris yesterday. “There’s been huge progress on getting down the costs, and low carbon, which is what the Pathways Project carbon capture will bring.”
The newser was in Paris, France, not Paris, Ont., just in case you wondered. Mostly it ended up being concerned with U.S. President Donald Trump’s designs on Greenland and the likelihood, as stated by Danish PM Mette Frederiksen, that any American military annexation of the huge Arctic island that has been part of the Kingdom of Denmark for more than 300 years would spell the end of NATO. But Mr. Trump’s raid on Venezuela last Saturday has stirred up lots of concern about the future of Alberta’s oilsands as well.
Regardless of where he was, though, you can’t fault the prime minister for making this claim. Ultimately, after all, he’s the guy responsible for managing the national economy and you can’t just pull the plug on Canadian fossil fuel extraction even if you believe that it’s eventually bound to shrink significantly.
That’s why the Liberals never have, despite a parade of lies told by their political opponents in Canadian and Alberta Conservative parties about government policy during the Trudeau years. Instead, as is well known – except here on the Prairies, for some reason – Justin Trudeau himself played a significant role in making it possible to complete the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion project.
At the risk of sounding like one of those nattering nabobs of negativism, while you can make a case for the extraction cost of oil from Alberta’s oilsands being lower than Venezuela’s, despite the latter’s slightly lower viscosity, and while you can argue that Alberta bitumen is cleaner than the Venezuelan variety (if you’re willing to engage in a little unjustified optimism about the viability of carbon capture technology), there’s no way on God’s green earth you can claim any more that the risk is low.
And the reason for that fact can be summed up in two words: Danielle Smith.
Alberta’s premier and her highly irresponsible campaign to enable, legitimize and support Alberta separatism and some of its most unsavoury self-appointed proponents has introduced a very high level of risk to any investments in Alberta, let alone the kind of multi-billion-dollar spending required to build pipelines hither and yon, as Ms. Smith demands, or construct new oilsands extraction mines.
Business, as observers of modern politics anywhere are too well aware, is always screaming about how uncertainty is kryptonite to investment. Personally, I’ve long argued this is an exaggeration, since the kind of uncertainty they’re often screeching about is caused by things like paying employees a living wage or enforcing occupational health and safety regulations.
But, fair enough, if high officials of a provincial government going to talk seriously about breaking up one of the most successful countries on the planet and shoving secession down the throats of a skeptical population in a dubious referendum process, that sure as hell introduces the kind of uncertainty that really will make big business pay attention.
Here’s what Nancy Southern, scion of one of Alberta’s most prominent oligarchical families, said soon after Mr. Carney became prime minister last March: “This discussion of separation should have no oxygen.”
“It’s impacting investments now as we look to having partners for our large projects that are from offshore,” the chair and CEO of ATCO Ltd. told the Calgary annual general meeting of the multinational energy and utilities corporation. “Our Japanese partners or our South Korean partners want to invest in a multi-billion-dollar plant in the heart of Alberta and say, ‘Well, what are the rules going to be? What’s the currency going to be? Is there security around this? Who’s going to trade with this? How do we get to tidewater? …”
And let’s face it, folks, depending on the United States in its current state to solve the problem Ms. Southern accurately identified is not exactly going to reassure potential foreign investors.
It’s also important to note that while the United States’ mentally ill and self-evidently senile head of state is a significant problem for every country in the Americas, including Canada, and every trading country in the world, he is not the biggest cause of the perception of coming political and economic instability in Alberta.
Face it, Mr. Trump, who will be 80 in 158 days and shows obvious signs of both mental and physical decline, isn’t going to be around long enough to complete all his imperialistic projects. The United States may never again be our Best Friend Forever, but there are many reasons to be optimistic that whoever succeeds Mr. Trump will return a certain level of predictability to U.S. policy at home and abroad.
But if Ms. Smith and her United Conservative Cabinet and Caucus persist with their secessionist program, that sure as hell will bring investment to a juddering halt and drive corporate head offices and new projects to other provinces, just as they have already driven an estimated $33-billion in investment away by aping Mr. Trump’s pathological hatred of renewable energy.
Likewise, should they succeed in moving Alberta closer to separation, that will kill the memorandum of understanding on pipeline construction Ms. Smith and the prime minister signed on Nov. 27 last year deader than the proverbial mackerel.
Alberta’s separatists – especially Ms. Smith and her allies in the UCP – are already doing enormous damage. The damage will continue to grow worse if they are allowed to persist.
As Ms. Southern observed, it’s way past time to cut off the oxygen to separatist talk.
If Ms. Smith won’t – and we can safely assume that is going to be the case – she above all others will be the person who history will blame for killing private-sector investment in pipelines and other new Alberta fossil-fuel projects.
Our PM was doing one of the things he does best, sounding reassuring and calm. Now what was it that Kipling said about keeping your head when all about you … ?
Certainly Trump and our Lady Macbeth of the Northern MAGA are not known for keeping calm, but going off on whatever unpredictable tangent catches their fancy in the moment and that they feel may be politically beneficial. However, in her defense at least she has never hinted at nationalizing or heavily taxing oil companies. So in the eyes of the US oil industry, we probably still remain a much better choice than the South American country that may have just exchanged one mercurial strong man for another.
Although I do agree that Smith’s continued stirring the separatist pot to try appease the extremists that have now taken over her party is not helpful. It may cause cautious oil companies like Imperial Oil to high tail it back to Toronto if things start to get too unsettled. Or maybe they will just continue to move more of their Calgary staff to the US, as they are already doing. Probably no need even for a Canadian office then, as an independent Alberta could soon be absorbed by its bigger southern neighbour.
So if we want calm and stability, we should stick with the country we already have.
The oil from Alberta isn’t cleaner, simply because of the process used to extract it. In Alberta, tailings ponds are present, as is multiple abandoned oil wells, which is the fault of Ralph Klein, and this has an astronomical cost of $300 billion to rectify, with inflation factored in. Carbon sequestration is an absolute myth, and has no proven effectiveness, and is quite expensive. Danielle Smith is supporting these separatists, and this will be the detriment of investment in Alberta. It will end up costing us billions of dollars in lost investment. With Donald Trump, the sooner he exits from power, the better. He is causing more and more harm.
I don’t understand why you Albertans are so fixated on pipelines when the real ongoing demand for oil sands is in asphalt binder for road construction around the world. It’s inert. It’s handled like regular cargo and is much, much more valuable than a barrel of oil.
There’s an Alberta company working on this right now.
The world is electrifying but still needs roads.
Alton: We’re not known for clear thinking or respect for facts here in ‘Berta. We’re very proud of how angry we get, though. DJC
I can see how you liberals are scared. You’re running and you’re making excuses. Trump is still kicking butt. The liberals here have been knocked out. And most of them in politics are not gonna run for another term because they know they’re dirty. Make up your stories whatever. Everyone is discovering the truth.
Note to readers: One of the flaws with the WordPress platform is that while it requires an email address from commenters, the address doesn’t have to be a real one. “Judy” – maybe a press secretary in a UCP minister’s office, but I’m just guessing – has commented using a fake, that is not existent, email address. I mention this only so that regular commenters won’t waste their time responding to a soulless bot. I have published it, though, to illustrate the quality commentary that often emanates from UCP supporters in this forum. DJC
Killing private-sector investment isn’t the only thing history will blame Marlaina for. Public healthcare and education, the renewable energy industry in Alberta, human rights for immigrants and trans people, respect for first nations, clean water downstream from eastern slope coal mines, respect for the rule of law, and transparency in government procurement will also fall victim to her malice and incompetence.
Whether or not Trump is going to seed, retires, is forced out, hands off to Vance, loses to the DNC etc doesn’t matter. He’s just the naked face of American Imperialist monopolistic capitalism (for 150 years) now staggering through a collapsing, debt-ridden, empire. Thus the flailing insanity of snatching Maduro, bombing Nigeria, funding the Middle East pitbull, Israel and numerous other war crimes and losing foreign wars the USA has been involved with for half a century.
That’s what Smith hitched her separatist star to–and Carney is either informing her of the facts of where international capital is placing its bets or playing by the Art Of War and not interrupting her while she makes her mistakes. Either way, she’s sunk. There’s no way he’s letting her waltz with a chunk of the CPP unless he’s a complete idiot. And while I have mega-issues with the guy, I don’t think he’s stupid. (Hey Carney, where’s the housing?)
I don’t know how he’ll shut down the separatists but maybe he’s set the CSIS hounds on following the money. Maybe he’ll come forward in public with the results or maybe…they’ll just quietly go away due to their funds being cut off at the bank level.
If he’s serious about his so-called Nation Building Plans ™ he’s going to have to shut down this clown show because it won’t just affect Alberta’s ability to attract investment–it makes Canada itself look unstable and destroys *his* plans.
He’ll probably do it quietly by manipulating the mainstream media and other soft power efforts along with economic pressure because he doesn’t want to be labelled a dictator. The same soft power efforts now devoted to AI generated slop all over YouTube making Great Claims of all the Great Things Carney’s doing (none of it supported by facts) to put the USA in its place and claim Canada is better off economically than it actually is.
This is a little far fetched and I thank you for your patients. I firmly believe, that Smith, Rath and the UPC board are being offered a carrot of some type to, not only separate, but to break-up Canada so Trump can assimilate us. If I go back in history, Hitler and Stalin had an initial agreement to carve-up Europe, each having their own little empire. With the events of the past number of years and with Trumps reluctance to support Europe, NATO and the UN, I can’t help to wonder if Putin, Trump and Jinping have made a similar agreement. To carve up and control their own part of the globe. As far as investing in Alberta goes, we’re too unstable. You can’t blame anyone, for not wanting to invest, except Smith and her dweebs.
Back in July of 2023, our beloved premier said to a reporter: “Of course I’m going to take advice from CEOs,” she said. “Who else would I take advice from?”
Two and a half years later she has answered her own rhetorical question.
https://albertapolitics.ca/2023/07/smith-to-alberta-of-course-im-going-to-take-advice-from-ceos-who-else-would-i-take-advice-from/
Best article I have read in a long long time. Step up Pathways group. Now it is your turn.
The fundamental nature of business is deception. This is why lawyers are indispensable to the rulers of commerce. Which means that they are never certain of anything beyond the insider information they use to fix their bets in financial “markets”. And even with that privileged wisdom, they still manage to produce colossal failures like Enron, or the total collapse of the US banking system in 2008 and again in 2018. The notion that business people from South Korea and Japan are fretting about the internal politics in Canada is a knee-slapper. Both states are literally CIA constructs.
I anticipate Queen Danielle’s appointment to the Senate is only weeks away. They’re waiting for some to retire/die/give up.
Just curious!!! What if King Donnie decided that another Obama policy needs to be scrapped, because, you know, it is an Obama policy! The one I am thinking of is the 260,000 barrels per day of Condensate from the Excited States to oil extractors in Alberta so that it can be mixed with the tar so that the diluted bitumen can be shipped through pipelines. Could there be enough of the light oil for mixing coming from within Alberta [and B.C. possibly] to make up the difference?
“Dictator oil” is no longer being bandied about as a reason Alberta’s diluted bitumen is superior to all other oil on the planet and in the history of planets. Why? Is Alberta oil no longer free and democratic because our premier slaps the notwithstanding clause on children, teachers and anyone else who catches her eye? Is it because we’re learning about some pretty nasty Sopranos-style intimidation tactics just a few steps away from our provincial government? Maybe we have dictator oil now, or maybe it’s dictator-light, mob boss, gangster oil. Who knows, but surely we’ll have to find some way to unload the stuff now that the Venezuelan oil held back by sanctions is about to be loaded on ships to flood the world market. It’s a good thing we didn’t let oil companies pay royalties in kind. Oh, wait. We did do that? Quick, build an emergency pipeline to tidewater to dump it before Albertans find out!
Can someone please tell me how much oil is presently sitting in storage from Alberta’s royalty-in-kind scheme, how much stored oil we are projected to have short-term and long-term, what it is worth now with Venezuela’s stored supply about to hit the market and how this will affect our provincial budget?
So much for the story that Alberta will somehow face no consequences in the short- and medium-term from the US oil seizure. The harm to Canada’s and Alberta’s economies might be a secondary side effect, not the original purpose of this US action, but a bonus.
That Venezuelan oil is going to market on ships, just like it has until now, only much more of it on many more US ships. Pipelines are pipe dreams for Alberta. Negative pricing ahead?
What do we have left? An agriculture industry that in the southern half of the province is about to be poisoned with selenium? Everything is going according to plan. More reasons to give up, roll over and secede? Go Dani! Roll out the welcome mats.