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Calgary Company Gets Provincial Boost To Revolutionize Pipeline Safety

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Hifi Engineering Building New Leak Detection Technology in Calgary.

Huge Potential Implications for Alberta and Canada.

Those who oppose using pipelines to move oil and gas products typically point to the risk of leakage.   A Calgary-based start up called Hifi Engineering has set out to revolutionize pipeline safety detection by finding the problems before a leak occurs.

Hifi is hoping to give a big boost to the pipeline industry and now the Province of Alberta has decided to boost Hifi in its efforts.  Support through the Alberta Small Business Innovation and Research Initiative (ASBIRI) at Alberta Innovates will help Hifi double its workforce over the next three years.

Alberta Small Business Initiative

Minister Deron Bilous and Steven Koles, President and CEO of HiFi Engineering

Hifi plans to develop the new leak detection technology in Alberta and export their product to monitor thousands of kilometers of pipeline worldwide.

Through the ASBIRI program, they are beginning that expansion at TransCanada Corp., Enbridge Inc. and GE Canada, and anticipate a significant increase in future work on new and retrofitted pipelines.

Alberta’s Economic Development Minister says Hifi’s technology will create jobs.

“We’re proud to help homegrown HiFi Engineering bring their new leak-detection technology to some of the biggest players in the oil-and-gas industry. Together, we are growing our economy, creating new jobs and ensuring Alberta continues to be the energy and environmental leader the world needs for the 21st century.” 

Deron Bilous, Minister of Economic Development and Trade

Hifi’s patented High Fidelity Dynamic Sensing (HDS™) technology will be used to detect various events and leaks with dramatically higher sensitivity than existing leak detection systems can provide – saving oil-and-gas companies money and protecting the environment.

Testing locations include both ends of the Keystone pipeline, which will run from Hardisty, Alberta to Houston, Texas, as well as Enbridge’s new Norlite pipeline, which went into service this year.

“We are very pleased to be part of the ASBIRI program and collaborating with Enbridge and TransCanada. Hifi is ready to showcase our HDS technology performance on these projects to prove our technology is indeed world class, outperforms other alternatives, and is ready to assist the industry in path to improved safety.”

Steven Koles, President and Chief Executive Officer of HiFi Engineering

Alberta Innovates invested $2.4 million into the project. The investment from industry partners totals $7.3 million, with a specific requirement for industry to contribute approximately 25 per cent from the design stage onward.

“We are looking forward to seeing Hifi’s technology perform on our Norlite pipeline. We understand this will be one of the longest installations of Hifi technology to-date, and we are looking forward to a successful collaboration with Hifi as they optimize and refine their system for real-world monitoring of pipelines. We are hopeful this technology can provide Enbridge with enhanced leak detection capability and complement performance of our current systems and multi-layered approach to pipeline safety.”

Barry Callele, Director of Pipeline Control Systems and Leak Detection at Enbridge

“This is another important step in our ongoing partnership with Enbridge and the Government of Alberta to rigorously test new technology and implement it on our pipelines when it can add another layer to our comprehensive pipeline safety and leak detection program. We look forward to seeing how Hifi’s unique sensing technology performs in real time as we continue to evaluate how it can be deployed most effectively on our pipeline systems in the future.”  

Erik Tatarchuk, Vice President of Liquid Pipeline Operations, Transcanada

Click play on the video below to learn more about this ground breaking “Alberta” technology.

For more information about Hifi click here to visit their website.

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Automotive

Auto giant shuts down foreign plants as Trump moves to protect U.S. industry

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Quick Hit:

Stellantis is pausing vehicle production at two North American facilities—one in Canada and another in Mexico—following President Donald Trump’s announcement of 25% tariffs on foreign-made cars. The move marks one of the first corporate responses to the administration’s push to bring back American manufacturing.

Key Details:

  • In an email to workers Thursday, Stellantis North America chief Antonio Filosa directly tied the production pause to the new tariffs, writing that the company is “continuing to assess the medium- and long-term effects” but is “temporarily pausing production” at select assembly plants outside the U.S.

  • Production at the Windsor Assembly Plant in Ontario will be paused for two weeks, while the Toluca Assembly Plant in Mexico will be offline for the entire month of April.

  • These plants produce the Chrysler Pacifica minivan, the new Dodge Charger Daytona EV, the Jeep Compass SUV, and the Jeep Wagoneer S EV.

Diving Deeper:

On Wednesday afternoon in the White House Rose Garden, President Trump announced sweeping new tariffs aimed at revitalizing America’s auto manufacturing industry. The 25% tariffs on all imported cars are part of a broader “reciprocal tariffs” strategy, which Trump described as ending decades of globalist trade policies that hollowed out U.S. industry.

Just a day later, Stellantis became the first major automaker to act on the new policy, halting production at two of its international plants. According to an internal email obtained by CNBC, Stellantis North American COO Antonio Filosa said the company is “taking immediate actions” to respond to the tariff policy while continuing to evaluate the broader impact.

“These actions will impact some employees at several of our U.S. powertrain and stamping facilities that support those operations,” Filosa wrote.

The Windsor, Ontario plant, which builds the Chrysler Pacifica and the newly introduced Dodge Charger Daytona EV, will shut down for two weeks. The Toluca facility in Mexico, responsible for the Jeep Compass and Jeep Wagoneer S EV, will suspend operations for the entire month of April.

The move comes as Stellantis continues to face scrutiny for its reliance on low-wage labor in foreign markets. As reported by Breitbart News, the company has spent years shifting production and engineering jobs to countries like Brazil, India, Morocco, and Mexico—often at the expense of American workers. Last year alone, Stellantis cut around 400 U.S.-based engineering positions while ramping up operations overseas.

Meanwhile, General Motors appears to be responding differently. According to Reuters, GM told employees in a webcast Thursday that it will increase production of light-duty trucks at its Fort Wayne, Indiana plant—where it builds the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra. These models are also assembled in Mexico and Canada, but GM’s decision suggests a shift in production to the U.S. could be underway in light of the tariffs.

As Trump’s trade reset takes effect, more automakers are expected to recalibrate their production strategies—potentially signaling a long-awaited shift away from offshoring and toward rebuilding American industry.

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Business

‘Time To Make The Patient Better’: JD Vance Says ‘Big Transition’ Coming To American Economic Policy

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JD Vance on “Rob Schmitt Tonight” discussing tariff results

 

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Hailey Gomez

Vice President JD Vance said Thursday on Newsmax that he believes Americans will “reap the benefits” of the economy as the Trump administration makes a “big transition” on tariffs.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1,679.39 points on Thursday, just a day after President Donald Trump announced reciprocal tariffs against nations charging imports from the U.S. On “Rob Schmitt Tonight,” Schmitt asked Vance about the stock market hit, asking how the White House felt about the “Liberation Day” move.

“We’re feeling good. Look, I frankly thought in some ways it could be worse in the markets, because this is a big transition. You saw what the President said earlier today. It’s like a patient who was very sick,” Vance said. “We did the operation, and now it’s time to make the patient better. That’s exactly what we’re doing. We have to remember that for 40 years, we’ve been doing this for 40 years.”

“American economic policy has rewarded people who ship jobs overseas. It’s taxed our workers. It’s made our supply chains more brittle, and it’s made our country less prosperous, less free and less secure,” Vance added.

Vance recalled that one of his children had been sick and needed antibiotics that were not made in the United States. The Vice President called it a “ridiculous thing” that some medicines invented in the country are no longer manufactured domestically.

“That’s fundamentally what this is about. The national security of manufacturing and making the things that we need, from steel to pharmaceuticals, antibiotics, and so forth, but also the good jobs that come along when you have economic policies that reward investing in America, rather than investing in foreign countries,” Vance said.

WATCH:

With a baseline 10% tariff placed on an estimated 60 countries, higher tariffs were applied to nations like China and Israel. For example, China, which has a 67% tariff on U.S. goods, will now face a 34% tariff from the U.S., while Israel, which has a 33% tariff, will face a 17% U.S. tariff.

“One bad day in the stock market, compared to what President Trump said earlier today, and I think he’s right about this. We’re going to have a booming stock market for a long time because we’re reinvesting in the United States of America. More importantly than that, of course, the people in Wall Street have done well,” Vance said.

“We want them to do well. But we care the most about American workers and about American small businesses, and they’re the ones who are really going to benefit from these policies,” Vance said.

The number of factories in the U.S., Vance said, has declined, adding that “millions of workers” have lost their jobs.

“My town [Middletown, Ohio], where you had 10,000 great American steel workers, and my town was one of the lucky ones, now probably has 1,500 steel workers in that factory because you had economic policies that rewarded shipping our jobs to China instead of investing in American workers,” Vance said. “President Trump ran on changing it. He promised he would change it, and now he has. I think Americans are going to reap the benefits.”

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