trans-mountain-pipeline-logo

Does Alberta Have Both The Legal Authority & The Gumption To Block Oil Shipments To BC?

In a word, yes.

1 – Does Alberta Have the Legal Authority To Block Oil Shipments to British Columbia?

As explained in the video below,  ALL oil and gas products in Alberta used to be COMPLETELY controlled by the Alberta Petroleum Marketing Commission (APMC) which still exists today.  There has been no legal impediments to that process put in place since the APMC was formed in 1973, so yes the Province of Alberta can legally block petroleum shipments to BC.

2 – Would Albertans and Alberta Companies Support Blocking Oil Shipments to British Columbia?

(more…)

professional-protestors-against-free-speech

The National Infrastructure Act: How The Federal Government Can Get Infrastructure Projects Like The Trans Mountain Pipeline Done Fairly

The current Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline debacle agonizingly demonstrates that even medium scale infrastructure projects are easily stalemated in Canada.  This has scared away vast sums of foreign direct investment as investors look for easier, more reliable places to put their money. This is a crisis and it appears Read more…

rachel-notley-john-horgan

12 Things Alberta Can Do To Punish British Columbia For Blocking the Trans Mountain Pipeline

rachel-notley-john-horganMany people, and politicians (which are also people 🙂 ) have suggested that Alberta cut off the oil supply to British Colombia in an effort to punish the BC Premier, John Horgan.  While that is one possibility, there are other things that can be done.

Some options are reasonable, some are draconian and some of them are just not possible.

Here are most of the options available to Alberta:

  1. Block BC Workers – This is possible but not likely:
    • it would be very disruptive to business as the two provinces have a largely integrated work force
    • it would annoy BC workers, many of which are in the oil sector, and they are some of Alberta’s biggest boosters in BC so it would be counterproductive to send them home
      .
  2. bc-site-c-dam-mapNot Buy Electricity From BC – This is doable and in fact has already started
Liuzhou-Forest-City-grounds

In 2018 China Will Add Forest The Size of Ireland & Start Building The Worlds First Forest City

Chinese-soldiers-plant-treesChina’s State Forestry Administration announced that they will add 66000 square kilometers of of trees in 2018 in an effort to reduce pollution.  That is nearly the size of Ireland.  This massive investment is part of their Paris Accord commitment to forest the area about three times the size of the entire United Kingdom by 2030.

To make this happen, China will use state employees and tens of thousands of soldiers.

Liuzhou-Forest-City-groundsPart of this unparalleled tree planting effort will take place in what China calls Forest Cities in 6 key regions of the country:

  • Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region
  • Pearl River Delta in south China
  • Changsha-Zhuzhou-Xiangtan in central Hunan Province
  • Yangtze River Delta
  • northwestern Shaanxi and Gansu provinces
  • the central plains

(more…)

kinder-morgan-trans-mountain-pipeline-map

Twinning the Kinder-Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline Is Now Too Big To Fail

Should the Province of Alberta buy the Trans Mountain Pipeline from Kinder-Morgan if they want to walk away from the project?  That question was posed to Alberta Premier Rachel Notley today and she responded with an emphatic ‘Yes!’.

It has become abundantly clear, whether you are for or opposed to this particular pipeline or not, that having the relatively simple twinning of the existing Trans Mountain pipeline fail to be built would signify the end of even medium scale infrastructure projects in Canada.

kinder-morgan-trans-mountain-pipeline-mapThere will always be interest groups and affected people that have some legitimate claim against a large project.  The standard for projects should not be keeping everyone happy.  The standard for infrastructure projects MUST be if they are in the national interest.  That national interest contains a giant list important factors including:

  • environmental concerns
  • affected citizens needs and wants
  • global competitiveness concerns
  • financial concerns
  • public safety

(more…)

nigerian-dirty-oil

How Killing The Canadian Oil Industry Is a Formula For Environmental Disaster

Today Bloomberg’s Michael Bellusci wrote an article explaining that Canadian oil and gas companies are in deep trouble.  Here is an excerpt:

Canada’s Energy Industry Faces ‘Extinction’ Without M&A, BMO Says

On the same day, Global News reported:

Feds to spend $280k to study why Canada’s oil and gas sector is falling behind

The federal government plans to spend up to $280,000 for a new study on Canada’s competitiveness in the oil and gas industry as investment lags and the United States offers new incentives for companies to move south…iea-world-energy-demand-change-2016-2040
Source: globalnews.ca/news/4123026/oil-and-gas-canada-falling-behind-study/

In general terms the issue is that with low oil prices, oil companies see better places in the world to put their money than Canada.  Oil & Gas “activists” will initially claim a victory here because they have had some impact on making it difficult to get Canadian Oil and Gas to both international and domestic markets.

(more…)

comparison-of-fuel-prices-between-electric-vs-gasoline-vehicles-2018

Are Electric Cars Really Less Expensive To Own & Operate?

If you are interested in fully electric cars or plug-in hybrids there is a myriad of misleading information to wade through.  One of the big questions is, ‘Is it is cheaper to run own and operate an electric car vs a gasoline powered car?’.

Before we get into the numbers, you need to be aware of two things:

  1. Most electric vehicles are plugged in at work during the day at no additional cost to the employee
  2. The price of electricity varies from city to city, so it is difficult to say definitively one way or the other

The most accurate, generalized, answer is to say electrified and gasoline vehicles are very competitive with each other and one does not (yet) have a major cost advantage over the other.

I drive a Cadillac ELR with a 60KM+ range (average of 55KM in winter and 65KM range in summer) before my gasoline engine generator kicks in.  Because I used to track my expenses and my kilometers, I can say with certainty that the ELR save me:

  1. about $1700/year in fuel costs. Like many, I seldom plug it in at home and on the rare occasion that I do my solar panels provide about 50% of electricity.  I do 95% of my car charging at work, at no extra cost.
  2. Nearly all electric vehicles have ‘regenerative braking’ which uses the electric motor to slow the car.  The physical brakes are seldom used and I expect that the factory set of brakes will last the life of the car.  That saves a few hundred dollars.
  3. Because the gasoline engine generator in my plug-in hybrid Cadillac ELR is seldom used I will only get an oil change every 18 months or so.  If the car was fully electric, I would never get an oil change.  This saves both money and time… which to me is more money.
  4. For the reasons above, I expect the exhaust system and other consumables (spark plugs, air filters…) will last dramatically longer than a regular car.  All of this saving money.

We have two interesting sets of numbers for you to review.  From the new for 2018 book ThePriceOfCarbon.com comes an interesting info-graphic:

comparison-of-fuel-prices-between-electric-vs-gasoline-vehicles-2018

(more…)

The Price of Carbon in Saskatchewan

Dr David Maenz is interviewed on CBC Regina radio. The discussion is on climate change, his new book The Price of Carbon, and how the Saskatchewan Provincial government is handling the Canadian Federal Governments demand for a price on carbon.

A Rational, Fact Based Review of Global Warming & Its Practical Solutions

Below is an 11 minute interview with Dr. David Maenz about his new book The Price of Carbon.  Unlike all climate change books we have reviewed in the past, The Price Of Carbon is the first one to pull together the serious science of Global Warming from Earths formation until today, explain the three likely outcomes of Global Warming, and then detail the PRACTICAL solutions to the issue.

This book is definitely not a casual read but for the educated person that is still open to thinking about this critical issue, it will be an eye opener:

(more…)

10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Oil & Gas Industry in 2018

The Oil & Gas industry has more than its fair share of misinformation directed at it.  This site is intended to expose and explore facts and so as part of our new series on the Oil & Gas industry we thought you would like a quick run down of some interesting facts:

      1. LNG Does Not Burn: Companies compress Natural Gas into what is known as Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) it is much easier to move and store.  However, one concern that is often heard relates to how dangerous LNG (think of an LNG tanker as a floating bomb or an LNG pipeline as scary torch), but LNG is safer than nearly any other petroleum product.  It will not burn and if it spills it LNG will quickly clean itself up.  LNG is incredibly safe.  Watch this short fun video:

        .
        (more…)

Will The New Canadian National Projects Review Mechanisms, Resolve Provincial & Municipal Disputes

At the heart of the Canadian Federal Governments announcement today about fixing the process that determines if a large scale project is in the best interest of Canada or not, is a desire to limit ability Provincial, Municipal and interest groups (like ‘First Nations’) to stall approved projects.  The idea is to:

  1. increase consultation so everyone’s voice is heard
  2. set firm and visible rules for industry so that “goal posts” are not being moved after the fact
  3. determine what is in Canada’s best interest, when that interest is at odds with local interest

These are clearly admirable goals.  To achieve those goals there are now going to be three structures that industry must pass through to get Federal Government support:

  1. A new ‘Impact Assessment Agency of Canada‘ will do the preliminary investigation to determine the environmental effects of a project
  2. The existing ‘National Energy Board’ is demoted and renamed ‘Canadian Energy Regulator‘ but still be responsible for determining the technicalities of a project
  3. The ‘Federal Minister of the Environment‘ will have the final say  if a project is viable and in Canada’s interest

So now the questions are, will these changes allow:

  1. Industry to decide that spending many millions of dollars to go through an elongated approval process that will have a definitive outcome be worth while?
  2. Provincial, Municipal and interest groups (like ‘First Nations’) to be heard and listened to?

There has been much debate over the process and all agree something big had to change:

  1. When industry works on large scale projects deemed to be in the Canadian national interest after years of consultation and vetting that are still blocked by local and regional interests, there is a big problem.
  2. When interest groups (i.e. some ‘First Nations’, Municipal governments (i.e. Vancouver) local and Provincial governments (i.e. BC) feel empowered to block large scale projects that adversely affect the rest of the country, there is an even bigger problem.

Dennis McConaghy, a former senior executive at Trans Canada Pipelines thinks these changes will not achieve the desired goals:

(more…)