Alberta
2022 – the year fossil fuels once again became a preferred source of reliable, affordable energy
A worker walks past gas pipes at Uniper’s new LNG import terminal in Wilhelmshaven, northern Germany on December 17, 2022. Getty Images photo
From the Canadian Energy Centre Ltd.
By David Yager
David Yager is an oilfield service executive, oil and gas writer, and energy policy analyst. He is author of From Miracle to Menace – Alberta, A Carbon Story.
The only part of the demise of oil and gas that was successful was reduced supply
It seems like just the other day the wrath of the world was coming down on oil sands and coal.
To protect the atmosphere, Canada has been reducing coal-fired power generation for years. It started in Ontario then moved to Alberta. Saskatchewan is next. New Brunswick is supposed to stop by 2030, but that province claims it can’t be done.
Global coal consumption is rising again because it meets the cost and availability requirement created by energy shortages and rising prices. On December 16, the International Energy Agency reported, “The world’s coal consumption is set to reach a new high in 2022 as the energy crisis shakes markets.”
For energy, the biggest single change in 2022 is the remarkable shift in public attitudes towards fossil fuels.
The global energy complex is under assault by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the exposed shortcomings of wind and solar, years of underinvestment in fossil fuels, and rising inflation and interest rates.
But for the past ten years, there has been an all-out crusade against fossil fuels. Oil company CEOs were branded climate criminals. It was morally reprehensible to own fossil fuel company shares or loan money to oil, gas or coal producers. Elections were won in Canada, the US and in Europe on pledges to replace fossil fuels.
No cost was too great, because the cost of doing nothing thus permitting unchecked climate damage was greater.
What happened? How did the channel change to rapidly? Why after years of public and political attacks on the source of over 80 per cent of the world primary energy, has affordable energy on demand now become more important than where it comes from?
Price, the most fundamental driver of economics and human behavior.
The November 2022 global survey from public opinion research firm IPSOS titled “What Worries The World” tells the story.
IPSOS explains, “This 29-country Global Advisor survey was conducted…among 20,466 adults aged 18-74 in Canada, Israel, Malaysia, South Africa, Turkey and the United States, 20-74 in Indonesia and Thailand, and 16-74 in all 21 other countries.”
IPSOS charts the top six issues for the past two years. Poverty, crime, unemployment and corruption have always been important, and consistently ranked among the top five.
But in November 2020, inflation only registered among eight per cent of respondents. Two years later it is 42 per cent. Coronavirus and the unemployment that accompanied the lockdowns were the top two issues. The others remain in a consistent range.
Two years ago was the peak of the “oil is dead” mantra, and when many bright ideas for a fossil fuel free future were concocted. In a post-pandemic world, multiple voices claimed we must Build Back Better, ensure a Resilient Recovery, engineer the Great Reset.
The plan was to use government policy and borrowed money to create jobs through the large-scale replacement of fossil fuels.
Coined the “energy transition,” it was achievable and inevitable thanks to incredible advances in renewable energy cost and supply. Canada – the world’s fifth largest combined oil and gas producer – could lead the charge with minimal disruption thanks to a new federally-funded retraining program for displaced oil workers. This was called a Just Transition.
What happened?
The invisible hand of Adam Smith punched the world in the nose.
The only part of the demise of fossil fuels that was successful was reduced supply. As the economy recovered, consumers learned the hard way that low carbon energy sources were terribly oversold in terms of reliability, and demand for fossil fuels outstripped supply.
Prices for fossil fuels rose at the same time that inflation and interest rates reduced disposal income.
As demand grew, fossil fuel shortages were reflected in the price. When Russia – one of the world’s largest oil, gas and coal suppliers – invaded Ukraine, the gravity of the situation escalated immediately.
What the IPSOS survey dramatically illustrates is the number one concern for the world as 2022 ends is the rising cost of everything.
We’ve been told repeatedly that continued fossil fuel consumption will cause serious climate disruptions. No expense today will exceed the cost of future damages.
However, the more pressing issue today is still being alive in 2050 because of the rising cost of everything, including energy. Worrying about what the temperature, storm intensity or chemical composition of the atmosphere may be in 28 years has become an unaffordable luxury.
So fossil fuels are once again what they have always been – reliable and affordable sources of energy.
Happy New Year.
Alberta
Media melts down as Danielle Smith moves to end ‘transitioning’ of children in Alberta
From LifeSiteNews
After Alberta’s Danielle Smith put forth legislation to protect kids from being gender ‘transitioned,’ the Canadian media went on a predictable melt down, citing ‘experts’ who blatantly lie to advance the LGBT agenda.
A year after announcing her intention to combat transgender ideology and protect children, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has tabled three pieces of UCP (United Conservative Party) government legislation:
- The Education Amendment Act 2024 will require parental consent for “socially transitioning” children under the age of 16 (changing a child’s name or “preferred pronouns”). The bill also gives parents an “opt-in” option for any sexual or content at school. Smith has emphasized that the Alberta Teaching Profession Commission has the power to discipline teachers if they decide to break the law.
- The Health Statues Amendment Act 2024 will ban the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors, as well as prohibit sex change surgeries on minors.
- The Fairness and Safety in Sport Act will ban trans-identifying men from female sports teams.
Together, these three bills represent the most definitive pushback against gender ideology in Canada by any premier. Smith’s decision to announce her intent to pursue such legislation and then wait has turned out to be politically savvy—it has given the UCP government a good look at the LGBT response, and during that time the U.K.’s Labour government has successfully fought to maintain a similar ban in the courts and publicly rebutted many of the scare tactics used by LGBT activists.
Smith and the UCP are thus walking into this debate with eyes wide open, and are clearly certain that the public is on their side (it is) and that the legislation can survive the court challenges surely coming from LGBT activists. The policies are clearly popular with the UCP party’s base, who handed Smith a staggering 91.5% approval rating in her leadership review at UCP gathering in Red Deer last Saturday.
The party also passed 35 policy resolutions, including several that indicate the UCP’s willingness to go further in fighting transgender ideology, with resolutions that would restrict “exclusively female spaces” like bathrooms and changerooms to females and designating transgender surgeries as “elective cosmetic procedures” not funded by the taxpayer. The motions received near-unanimous support.
The Canadian press, unsurprisingly, is working hard to present policies that the vast majority of Canadians support as an attack on fundamental norms (albeit norms that only surfaced in the last few years and were never presented to voters). Global News ran the headline: “Alberta unveils 3 sweeping bills affecting trans and gender-diverse youth.” It is important to note that the press accepts the premises of transgender ideology as the starting point for their reporting, with heavy usage of nonsensical phrases like “gender-diverse youth,” which implies that there are many genders.
In fact, Global News and other Canadian outlets trotted out talking points that have been definitively rebutted by the U.K.’s Cass Review and multiple medical studies—in fact, even the New York Times has been reporting on the permanent harms of puberty blockers over the past several years. An example from Global News:
Alberta parents of gender-diverse youth like Haley Wray believe the new laws will give kids less choice — especially when it comes to health-care that is not permanent but instead, gives kids time to work through their identity struggles.
‘Hormone blockers are a very valuable tool,’ Wray said, explaining they have a very small window of effectiveness to pause, but not prevent, puberty. ‘It is reversible because nothing changes. And what that does is it allows youth and families to have that that pause, that break to explore further, validate, understand what this means and know that permanent changes aren’t happening.’
Wray believes the proposed legislation will make the province a less safe place for tens of thousands of Alberta kids who aren’t straight. It’s why, Wray says, a growing number of families with transgender children are now grappling with whether Alberta is a place they can stay. ‘I know people who have, and I know people who genuinely feel like there is likely nowhere to go,’ she said.
This is incorrect. Puberty blockers cause permanent damage, and children may be rendered permanently sterile after taking them for a relatively short period of time. Puberty is not something that can be “paused,” and it frequently causes irreversible rather than reversible damage. Smith and her government understand this, which is why they have decided to pass this legislation—not, as nearly every press outlet claimed, to “target trans youth,” but to protect them.
The CBC chimed in with sentences like this one:
Terms like ‘biological female’ and ‘biological male’ can be used to imply that transgender people are still their assigned sex at birth, despite their identity.
To translate: a scientifically accurate and precise statement is now an ideological one, but inherently ideological language invented by the transgender movement over the past decade is, in fact, technically accurate. People can identify as anything they want; it is irrelevant to their biology. The CBC presents pointing this out as some sort of propagandistic attack on vulnerable people.
Fortunately, Smith appears to know what she’s doing here. She’s taken her time to ensure that the legislation she has put forward will pass, and that it is defensible in court. Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe, who has just led the Saskatchewan Party to its fifth straight majority government, is of a similar mind—he’s promised to put forward legislation protecting female spaces as a matter of first priority. It took long enough, but Canada’s conservatives are finally starting to move.
Alberta
Alberta calling for federal election! Premier Smith demands feds scrap dangerous oil and gas production caps
Premier Danielle Smith, Minister of Environment and Protected Areas Rebecca Schulz and Minister of Energy and Minerals Brian Jean issued the following statement on the proposed federal oil and gas production cap:
“This production cap will hurt families, hurt businesses and hurt Canada’s economy. We will defend our province, our country and our Constitutional rights.
“Make no mistake, this cap violates Canada’s constitution. Section 92A clearly gives provinces exclusive jurisdiction over non-renewable natural resource development yet this cap will require a one million barrel a day production cut by 2030.
“The evidence is overwhelming. Three reports from reputable firms have shown that these regulations will sucker-punch Canada’s economy, a million barrels cut every day according to S&P Global, $28 billion a year in lost GDP according to Deloitte, and up to 150,000 lost jobs according to the Conference Board of Canada.
“The losses to GDP mean billions a year will disappear from the economy. Billions that won’t be going towards new schools, hospitals and roads, all for a reckless ideological scheme that will not reduce global emissions.
“Ultimately, this cap will lead Alberta and our country into economic and societal decline. The average Canadian family would be left with up to $419 less for groceries, mortgage payments and utilities every month. Canadian parents and workers will suffer while Justin Trudeau outsources the duty to provide safe, affordable, reliable and responsibly produced oil and gas to dictators and less clean producers around the world. We could be the solution. Instead, Ottawa would rather sacrifice our ability to lead.
“Tweaks won’t work. This cap must be scrapped. Alberta’s government is actively exploring the use of every legal option, including a constitutional challenge and the use of the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act. We will not stand idly by while the federal government sacrifices our prosperity, our constitution and our quality of life for its extreme agenda.”
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