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Alberta

Billion dollar boost to oilfield service contractors to put thousands of Albertans to work in the next month

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From the Province of Alberta

$1 billion program to create 5,300 jobs

A new program will provide the energy industry with access to up to $1 billion, creating jobs to immediately get Albertans back to work.

 

The Site Rehabilitation Program – mainly funded by the federal government’s COVID-19 Economic Response Plan – will provide grants to oilfield service contractors to perform well, pipeline, and oil and gas site reclamation work. Starting now, the program is expected to create about 5,300 direct jobs and lead to the cleanup of thousands of sites.

This work will be done in Alberta, putting Albertans back to work. The program will also provide additional economic benefits, such as indirect employment, helping support various sectors of Alberta’s economy – including restaurant and hotel workers, and many other businesses – as it begins to reopen and recover after the effects of COVID-19.

“Alberta’s energy industry is the largest subsector of Canada’s economy, as well as one of its biggest job creators. We are creating almost 5,300 jobs for Alberta’s energy workers, while completing important work decommissioning and reclaiming abandoned pump jacks, pipelines and wells. This will ensure that sites are properly addressed, benefiting landowners and Albertans across the province.”

Sonya Savage, Minister of Energy

This program will launch on May 1, with an initial focus on providing grants to service companies that have been significantly impacted by the unprecedented economic downturn. The program will provide funds in $100-million increments.

The first $100 million will be available for service companies to do eligible work anywhere in the province. Future increments may be allocated for work conducted in specific regions within the province, directing funds where they can have the most significant environmental benefits.

All laws, regulations, directives, and environmental and occupational health and safety standards, including physical distancing and COVID-19-related health guidelines, must be followed in carrying out the work.

Quick facts

  • The Site Rehabilitation Program will provide grants of between 25 and 100 per cent of total project costs – depending on the ability of the oil and gas company responsible for the site to help pay for cleanup – and will be paid directly to the oilfield service company completing the work.
  • Contractors can apply for a grant online during the following dates and must meet all eligibility and project requirements:
  • May 1-31: Open to service companies significantly impacted by the unprecedented economic downturn for contracts of up to $30,000 per application across Alberta. This $100-million increment will focus on projects that are eligible for 100 per cent government funding.
  • May 15 to June 15: Open to service companies for contracts of up to $30,000 and eligible for 100 per cent funding. This $100-million increment will focus on sites where some operators have failed landowners and where government is paying compensation to landowners as required under the Surface Rights Act.
  • Future increments will be developed for larger projects.
  • Application and eligibility information, as well as the online application portal, is available at alberta.ca/siterehab.
  • Grant-funded work must be done in Alberta, putting Albertans to work.
  • Eligible work includes:
  • closure work on inactive wells and pipelines, including remediation and reclamation
  • removal of abandoned in-place pipelines
  • Phase 1 and 2 environmental site assessments
  • Alberta has a strong regulatory system requiring that the thousands of oil and gas structures across the province – including pump jacks, pipelines, and wells – be properly decommissioned and their sites brought back to a land condition similar to the state they were in before the infrastructure was built. This work ensures that the sites are safe for landowners and Albertans and there are no negative impacts to the environment.

After 15 years as a TV reporter with Global and CBC and as news director of RDTV in Red Deer, Duane set out on his own 2008 as a visual storyteller. During this period, he became fascinated with a burgeoning online world and how it could better serve local communities. This fascination led to Todayville, launched in 2016.

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Alberta

Low oil prices could have big consequences for Alberta’s finances

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From the Fraser Institute

By Tegan Hill

Amid the tariff war, the price of West Texas Intermediate oil—a common benchmark—recently dropped below US$60 per barrel. Given every $1 drop in oil prices is an estimated $750 million hit to provincial revenues, if oil prices remain low for long, there could be big implications for Alberta’s budget.

The Smith government already projects a $5.2 billion budget deficit in 2025/26 with continued deficits over the following two years. This year’s deficit is based on oil prices averaging US$68.00 per barrel. While the budget does include a $4 billion “contingency” for unforeseen events, given the economic and fiscal impact of Trump’s tariffs, it could quickly be eaten up.

Budget deficits come with costs for Albertans, who will already pay a projected $600 each in provincial government debt interest in 2025/26. That’s money that could have gone towards health care and education, or even tax relief.

Unfortunately, this is all part of the resource revenue rollercoaster that’s are all too familiar to Albertans.

Resource revenue (including oil and gas royalties) is inherently volatile. In the last 10 years alone, it has been as high as $25.2 billion in 2022/23 and as low as $2.8 billion in 2015/16. The provincial government typically enjoys budget surpluses—and increases government spending—when oil prices and resource revenue is relatively high, but is thrown into deficits when resource revenues inevitably fall.

Fortunately, the Smith government can mitigate this volatility.

The key is limiting the level of resource revenue included in the budget to a set stable amount. Any resource revenue above that stable amount is automatically saved in a rainy-day fund to be withdrawn to maintain that stable amount in the budget during years of relatively low resource revenue. The logic is simple: save during the good times so you can weather the storm during bad times.

Indeed, if the Smith government had created a rainy-day account in 2023, for example, it could have already built up a sizeable fund to help stabilize the budget when resource revenue declines. While the Smith government has deposited some money in the Heritage Fund in recent years, it has not created a dedicated rainy-day account or introduced a similar mechanism to help stabilize provincial finances.

Limiting the amount of resource revenue in the budget, particularly during times of relatively high resource revenue, also tempers demand for higher spending, which is only fiscally sustainable with permanently high resource revenues. In other words, if the government creates a rainy-day account, spending would become more closely align with stable ongoing levels of revenue.

And it’s not too late. To end the boom-bust cycle and finally help stabilize provincial finances, the Smith government should create a rainy-day account.

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Alberta

Governments in Alberta should spur homebuilding amid population explosion

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From the Fraser Institute

By Tegan Hill and Austin Thompson

In 2024, construction started on 47,827 housing units—the most since 48,336 units in 2007 when population growth was less than half of what it was in 2024.

Alberta has long been viewed as an oasis in Canada’s overheated housing market—a refuge for Canadians priced out of high-cost centres such as Vancouver and Toronto. But the oasis is starting to dry up. House prices and rents in the province have spiked by about one-third since the start of the pandemic. According to a recent Maru poll, more than 70 per cent of Calgarians and Edmontonians doubt they will ever be able to afford a home in their city. Which raises the question: how much longer can this go on?

Alberta’s housing affordability problem reflects a simple reality—not enough homes have been built to accommodate the province’s growing population. The result? More Albertans competing for the same homes and rental units, pushing prices higher.

Population growth has always been volatile in Alberta, but the recent surge, fuelled by record levels of immigration, is unprecedented. Alberta has set new population growth records every year since 2022, culminating in the largest-ever increase of 186,704 new residents in 2024—nearly 70 per cent more than the largest pre-pandemic increase in 2013.

Homebuilding has increased, but not enough to keep pace with the rise in population. In 2024, construction started on 47,827 housing units—the most since 48,336 units in 2007 when population growth was less than half of what it was in 2024.

Moreover, from 1972 to 2019, Alberta added 2.1 new residents (on average) for every housing unit started compared to 3.9 new residents for every housing unit started in 2024. Put differently, today nearly twice as many new residents are potentially competing for each new home compared to historical norms.

While Alberta attracts more Canadians from other provinces than any other province, federal immigration and residency policies drive Alberta’s population growth. So while the provincial government has little control over its population growth, provincial and municipal governments can affect the pace of homebuilding.

For example, recent provincial amendments to the city charters in Calgary and Edmonton have helped standardize building codes, which should minimize cost and complexity for builders who operate across different jurisdictions. Municipal zoning reforms in CalgaryEdmonton and Red Deer have made it easier to build higher-density housing, and Lethbridge and Medicine Hat may soon follow suit. These changes should make it easier and faster to build homes, helping Alberta maintain some of the least restrictive building rules and quickest approval timelines in Canada.

There is, however, room for improvement. Policymakers at both the provincial and municipal level should streamline rules for building, reduce regulatory uncertainty and development costs, and shorten timelines for permit approvals. Calgary, for instance, imposes fees on developers to fund a wide array of public infrastructure—including roads, sewers, libraries, even buses—while Edmonton currently only imposes fees to fund the construction of new firehalls.

It’s difficult to say how long Alberta’s housing affordability woes will endure, but the situation is unlikely to improve unless homebuilding increases, spurred by government policies that facilitate more development.

Tegan Hill

Director, Alberta Policy, Fraser Institute

Austin Thompson

Senior Policy Analyst, Fraser Institute
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