The most straightforward form of government is a “majority” government. Majorities occur when a single party receives more than 50% of the seats. Minority and Coalition governments occur when a natural majority was not achieved, but what is the difference? What is a Minority Government: A minority government is formed when the party that wins the most seats, but less than 50% of the total, informally agrees to work another party (or parties) on specific areas of agreement to archive…
What happens to oil pipelines in a post oil world? Many people think the massive expenditures in pipelines result in a permanent oil infrastructure. The fact is that pipelines originally constructed to move oil are both reversed and repurposed all the time. The graphic to the right is from 2014 and shows that oil pipeline reversals and repurposing are not new. Here are some real world examples about what happens to old oil/gas pipelines. PIPELINE REVERSALS: Enbridge ‘Line 9’ reversed the…
It has been noted that during the gold rush most miners did not get rich, but the people who sold them their pick axes and dynamite certainty did. In the same vein Google has said it is not those with the most powerful computers that will win in the future, it is those with the most data. Perhaps electric cars are the same. Tesla just released amazing new version 3 electric charging stations in Regina Saskatchewan Canada: “…The new stations…
Proton Technologies of Calgary has taken existing technologies and combined them into a method or ‘process patent’ that gives them exclusive rights to produce hydrogen in the ground. This means that all of the CO2 and other greenhouse gases remain locked in the ground where they have been for millions of years. It also massively reduces the complexity and cost allowing Hydrogen to be produced 80% to 95% cheaper than the current process. At that rate, hydrogen will be several…
A few weeks ago, a small privately held Calgary startup named Proton Technologies announced they were successfully generating cheap hydrogen from old oil fields. Today we interviewed their CEO, Grant Strem, and learned that the company already had net positive cash flow with big plans for the near future. Producing Hydrogen with ZERO Emissions at 20% of the Cost? Keeping the process in the ground means there is no expensive carbon capture requirements. The process, shown to the right, produces…
A analysis by Statistics Canada of 2016 Canadian Provincial budgets shows that Alberta spends an average of 10% more on services than the Canadian average. Albertans spend a shocking 26% more than the Canadian average on Education. Government expense by function per capita, 2016 Alberta Canada Alberta Premium Health $4,944.00 $4,475.00 $ 469.00 Education $3,047.00 $2,455.00 $ 592.00 Economic affairs $2,112.00 $1,275.00 $ 837.00 Social protection $1,393.00 $1,770.00 $ (377.00) General public services $ 947.00 $1,658.00 $ (711.00) Public order…
In a word, yes. Average spending on health care is now over 40% of all Canadian Provincial expenses: “…health care spending as a share of program spending and health care spending as a share of the economy, shows clearly that the last 15 years (ie., between 2001 to 2016) saw provincial governments increase health care spending at an unsustainable pace. Indeed, during this period, health care spending grew by 116.4 percent, outpacing growth in other program spending (94.6 percent) and…
Lets start by explaining that yes, you can acquire Ontario high school credits while in China, mostly through schools that have paid to be be certified by the various Ministries of Education. On its face, that sounds like a good idea for two reasons: It brings in revenue to the school system in the form of certification fees It provides a Canadian ‘how to think’ curriculum in a part of the world where education frequently relates to ‘what to think’ So…
A Canadian company named Proton Technology has developed the worlds first large scale, cheap method of producing ultra-clean hydrogen from oil. “This technique can draw up huge quantities of hydrogen while leaving the carbon in the ground. When working at production level, we anticipate we will be able to use the existing infrastructure and distribution chains to produce H2 for between 10 and 50 cents per kilo. This means it potentially costs a fraction of gasoline for equivalent output” said…
One-China is an understanding that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) under the Communist Party of China (CPC) has complete legal and moral authority over both the Chinese mainland and break away island of Taiwan. How it came to be is a fascinating story but One China has been a diplomatic football ever since it was formulated in the early 1970’s by Chinese and Canadian diplomats. From 1971 through through the early 2000’s regional flair ups have lead many countries to…
‘One China’ is a policy by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that requires other nations to accept that the CCP is rightfully in total control of both the Chinese mainland and the nearby island ‘nation’ of Taiwan. The history of how One China came to be is a fascinating one. Brief History of One China In the early 1900’s China was ruled by the Chinese Nationalist Party (the Kuomintang or KMT) but a civil war began in 1946, after years…
This topic is a departure from our usual focus on politics, tech and China but we thought it made an excellent point in a funny way you would like. As a… lets go with ‘gruff’ person myself, I sadly see tiny parts of Coleman Sweeney in me (pun intended!) and I have signed up for organ donation too. Be an asshole and sign up! In most countries you just have to fill our an organ donor card or sign the…
Canada has a pushy trading partner called China and that “partner” is throwing its weight around currently by: Removing China’s (nasty) ambassador to Canada “…Lu has made a series of damning remarks about Canada-China relations in recent months”… SOURCE . Arresting Canadians in China on what appears to be spurious grounds “…The retaliatory arrest of Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor on spurious national security grounds… have brought Canada-China relations to their lowest ebb since the establishment of diplomatic relations…
China is Canada’s third largest trading partner but it is a very distant third: The US and Europe account for 60% and 8% of Canada’s exports respectively China accounts for just 2.9% of Canada’s exports and 6% of Canada’s imports 25% of those exports are raw “mineral products” like copper and potash 10% of those exports are surface materials like wood, fish, and canola Canada imports three times as much from China as it exports to China Exports to China…
The numbers of oil tanker rail cars being shipped in 2019 and projected for 2020 and beyond are truly staggering. That got us to thinking about how long a train would they make and the results were quite interesting. If all the rail cars carrying crude oil just in 2019, largely from Western Canada, were connected in a single train they would be over 1400 kilometers. That is 50% longer than the distance from Calgary to Vancouver: a crude oil…
Today there are already about 60,000 Chinese manufactured vehicles entering the US and Canadian automobile market each year, some of which may surprise you; Buick Envision ($32,000) Cadillac CT6 Plug-In Hybrid ($75,000) not the standard CT6’s cancelled for US and Canada sales in 2018 Volvo S60 & S90 ($36,000 and $48,000) However, what you don’t see is a single Chinese brand like BYD (serious Telsa competitor), Chery (former Chrysler partner), or Dongfeng (sold 4.1 MILLION cars in China in 2018)…
It will come as no surprise to anyone in the oil sector, or involved in the stock market that Canada exports nearly all of its oil to the United States. What may be surprising is some of the secondary markets. For instance, you can see in the graphic below that The Netherlands and France are Canada’s second and third largest export markets for refined oil (i.e. gasoline, diesel…) Click to expand graphic 2017 Exports From Canada Click to expand…
Canada has a dynamic first world economy but still has its primary exports from primary industries: Click to expand graphic 2017 Exports From Canada In contrast to Canada’s raw material exports, Canada imports mostly finished goods: Click to expand graphic 2017 Imports Into Canada The following graph shows Canada’s imports in red and exports in blue from 1995 through 2017: Click to expand graphic Canada’s Imports and Exports From 1995 to 2017 This data came from MIT’s The Observatory…