Alberta
The Provincial Government’s 2018 report card on its “made-in-Alberta” energy strategy
From the Province of Alberta
Made-in-Alberta plan protects energy jobs
This year, the province fought to get top dollar for our energy resources by launching a made-in-Alberta strategy to build new pipelines and add value by upgrading more of our oil and gas here at home.
Premier Rachel Notley and her government fought to protect workers and the Canadian economy by taking action in the short, medium and long term.
“For decades, Albertans have been talking about getting more value for our oil here at home. It’s time to stop settling for less. We’re grabbing the bull by the horns with a made-in-Alberta strategy to create more jobs, open new markets for our oil and gas, and make more of the energy products the world needs.”
Major boost to energy upgrading
In the long term, the province doubled support for petrochemical upgrading to $2.1 billion, which will leverage private investment that’s expected to help create about 15,000 jobs.
Alberta also created a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) investment team to work directly with industry on reducing barriers for securing final investment decisions on export projects that will increase the value of Alberta’s natural gas resources.
In response to strong industry encouragement, Alberta is taking action to explore private-sector interest in building a new oil refinery in the province. Building new refining capacity would create good-paying, long-term jobs for Albertans while helping lower the oil price differential over the long term.
“Large industrial value-add energy investments help provide economic resilience and diversification, and create highly skilled, well-paying jobs for decades. Alberta has abundant feedstock, skilled labour and the ability to refine our resources to high-value products the world needs. There is significant international competition for these projects and for Alberta to compete, government and industry must work together. We commend the government’s focus on ensuring that the value of Alberta’s resources stays with Albertans.”
Fighting for pipelines and market access
The government also continued its fight for new pipelines. Premier Notley’s advocacy was instrumental in the federal government’s decision to purchase the Trans Mountain Pipeline. As well, the Premier continues to fight for needed changes on two federal bills:
- Bill C-69, which would create a new, far-reaching impact assessment process for resource development projects.
- Bill C-48, which would impose a moratorium on oil tankers off the north coast of B.C.
This year, the province also launched the nationwide Keep Canada Working campaign to explain to Canadians the benefits of new pipeline access. The latest push includes a real-time lost-revenue counter to show just how much Canadians are missing out on by keeping Alberta’s energy resources landlocked.
“Under Premier Rachel Notley’s leadership, more Canadians than ever before support this project because they know we shouldn’t be selling our products on the cheap. There’s too much at stake. We will keep the federal government’s feet to the fire so that this project isn’t delayed any further.”
Over the medium term, the government took action to build more capacity for moving oil by rail to clear the backlog and stabilize the market. Upwards of 7,000 new rail cars will come online in 2019 to move 120,000 barrels a day out of the province to markets where Alberta oil can earn the best value possible.
In the short term, Premier Notley protected the value of Alberta’s resources by mandating a temporary reduction in oil production. The decision, in response to a historically high oil price differential, has prevented thousands of job losses and helped restore the value of Alberta’s oil. The price gap is caused by the federal government’s decades-long inability to build pipelines.
Saving industry time and money
A more efficient regulatory process means new oil and gas projects can begin operating faster, creating jobs and maintaining competitiveness. The new process is fairer, faster and more accessible, saving industry hundreds of millions of dollars while making the process more transparent and accessible for Albertans. The new approach is expected to save industry $600 million by 2021, and is helping reduce the regulatory review time for an oil sands project from five years to just 15 months.
Strong energy future in the oil sands
Two major oil sands milestones were also celebrated in 2018. Premier Notley and Minister McCuaig-Boyd joined Suncor for the successful startup of the Fort Hills project, which put 7,900 people to work at the peak of construction and is employing 1,400 people full time now that the project is operational.
The government also highlighted a new $400-million investment in the Long Lake South West project by Nexen, a wholly owned subsidiary of CNOOC Ltd. With leading-edge technology, the project illustrates that a major oil sands producer can be both an energy and environmental leader while showing a long-term commitment to creating good jobs in Alberta’s energy sector.
“The Long Lake South West project demonstrates CNOOC Limited’s long-term commitment to the Alberta energy sector. Our oil sands development is an important component of our global portfolio, and through technological advancements we are pleased to be responsibly growing our production while reducing our overall emissions.”
New jobs, private investment in wind power
Private companies are partnering with First Nations to invest close to $1.2 billion in renewable energy projects in Alberta. This helps create new jobs and continues with record-setting low prices for Albertans. These results showcase Alberta as a proud leader in all forms of energy.
The five successful projects are made possible through the latest phase of the Alberta government’s Renewable Electricity Program. They include investments from homegrown Alberta companies, as well as from new investors from across Canada and around the world.
In total, the new developments will create about 1,000 jobs, attract new economic opportunities for Indigenous communities and bring an estimated $175 million in rural benefits over the life of the projects.
From the Fraser Institute
By Matthew Lau
To understand Ottawa’s negative impact on Alberta’s economy and living standards, juxtapose two recent pieces of data.
First, in July the Trudeau government made three separate “economic development” spending announcements in Alberta, totalling more than $80 million and affecting 37 different projects related to the “green economy,” clean technology and agriculture. And second, as noted in a new essay by Fraser Institute senior fellow Kenneth Green, inflation-adjusted business investment (excluding residential structures) in Canada’s extraction sector (mining, quarrying, oil and gas) fell 51.2 per cent from 2014 to 2022.
The productivity gains that raise living standards and improve economic conditions rely on business investment. But business investment in Canada has declined over the past decade and total economic growth per person (inflation-adjusted) from Q3-2015 through to Q1-2024 has been less than 1 per cent versus robust growth of nearly 16 per cent in the United States over the same period.
For Canada’s extraction sector, as Green documents, federal policies—new fuel regulations, extended review processes on major infrastructure projects, an effective ban on oil shipments on British Columbia’s northern coast, a hard greenhouse gas emissions cap targeting oil and gas, and other regulatory initiatives—are largely to blame for the massive decline in investment.
Meanwhile, as Ottawa impedes private investment, its latest bundle of economic development announcements underscores its strategy to have government take the lead in allocating economic resources, whether for infrastructure and public institutions or for corporate welfare to private companies.
Consider these federally-subsidized projects.
A gas cloud imaging company received $4.1 million from taxpayers to expand marketing, operations and product development. The Battery Metals Association of Canada received $850,000 to “support growth of the battery metals sector in Western Canada by enhancing collaboration and education stakeholders.” A food manufacturer in Lethbridge received $5.2 million to increase production of plant-based protein products. Ermineskin Cree Nation received nearly $400,000 for a feasibility study for a new solar farm. The Town of Coronation received almost $900,000 to renovate and retrofit two buildings into a business incubator. The Petroleum Technology Alliance Canada received $400,000 for marketing and other support to help boost clean technology product exports. And so on.
When the Trudeau government announced all this corporate welfare and spending, it naturally claimed it create economic growth and good jobs. But corporate welfare doesn’t create growth and good jobs, it only directs resources (including labour) to subsidized sectors and businesses and away from sectors and businesses that must be more heavily taxed to support the subsidies. The effect of government initiatives that reduce private investment and replace it with government spending is a net economic loss.
As 20th-century business and economics journalist Henry Hazlitt put it, the case for government directing investment (instead of the private sector) relies on politicians and bureaucrats—who did not earn the money and to whom the money does not belong—investing that money wisely and with almost perfect foresight. Of course, that’s preposterous.
Alas, this replacement of private-sector investment with public spending is happening not only in Alberta but across Canada today due to the Trudeau government’s fiscal policies. Lower productivity and lower living standards, the data show, are the unhappy results.
Author:
From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
By Ray McGinnis
Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert are on trial for conspiracy to commit murder and firearms charges in relation to the Coutts Blockade into mid-February 2022. In opening her case before a Lethbridge, AB, jury on July 11, Olienick’s lawyer, Marilyn Burns stated “This is a political, criminal trial that is un Canadian.” She told the jury, “You will be shocked, and at the very least, disappointed with how Canada’s own RCMP conducted themselves during and after the Coutts protest,” as she summarized officers’ testimony during presentation of the Crown’s case. Burns also contended that “the conduct of Alberta’s provincial government and Canada’s federal government are entwined with the RCMP.” The arrests of the Coutts Four on the night of February 13 and noon hour of February 14, were key events in a decision by the Clerk of the Privy Council, Janice Charette, and the National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister, Jody Thomas, to advise Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to invoke the Emergencies Act. Chief Justice Paul Rouleau, in submitting his Public Order Emergency Commission Report to Parliament on February 17, 2023, also cited events at the Coutts Blockade as key to his conclusion that the government was justified in invoking the Emergencies Act.
Justice David Labrenz cautioned attorney Burns regarding her language, after Crown prosecutor Stephen Johnson objected to some of the language in the opening statement of Olienick’s counsel. Futher discussion about the appropriateness of attorney Burns’ statement to the jury is behind a publication ban, as discussions occurred without the jury present.
Justice Labrenz told the jury on July 12, “I would remind you that the presumption of innocence means that both the accused are cloaked with that presumption, unless the Crown proves beyond a reasonable doubt the essential elements of the charge(s).” He further clarified what should result if the jurors were uncertain about which narrative to believe: the account by the Crown, or the account from the accused lawyers. Labrenz stated that such ambivalence must lead to an acquittal; As such a degree of uncertainty regarding which case to trust in does not meet the “beyond a reasonable doubt” threshold for a conviction.”
On July 15, 2024, a Lethbridge jury heard evidence from a former employer of Olienicks’ named Brian Lambert. He stated that he had tasked Olienick run his sandstone quarry and mining business. He was a business partner with Olienick. In that capacity, Olienick made use of what Lambert referred to as “little firecrackers,” to quarry the sandstone and reduce it in size. Reducing the size of the stone renders it manageable to get refined and repurposed so it could be sold to buyers of stone for other uses (building construction, patio stones, etc.) Lambert explained that the “firecrackers” were “explosive devices” packaged within tubing and pipes that could also be used for plumbing. He detailed how “You make them out of ordinary plumbing pipe and use some kind of propellant like shotgun powder…” Lambert explained that the length of the pipe “…depended on how big a hole or how large a piece of stone you were going to crack. The one I saw was about six inches long … maybe an inch in diameter.”
One of Olienick’s charges is “unlawful possession of an explosive device for a dangerous purpose.” The principal evidence offered up by RCMP to the Crown is what the officers depicted as “pipe bombs” which they obtained at the residence of Anthony Olienick in Claresholm, Alberta, about a two-hour drive from Coutts. Officers entered his home after he was arrested the night of February 13, 2022. Lambert’s testimony offers a plausible common use for the “firecrackers” the RCMP referred to as “pipe bombs.” Lambert added, these “firecrackers” have a firecracker fuse, and in the world of “explosive” they are “no big deal.”
Fellow accused, Chris Carbert, is does not face the additional charge of unlawful possession of explosives for a dangerous purpose. This is the first full week of the case for the defence. The trial began on June 6 when the Crown began presenting its case.
Ray McGinnis is a Senior Fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy who recently attended several days of testimony at the Coutts Two trial.
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