Mike Davies calls for ambition and reform to build a stronger Canada

A shift in ambition

A year after the Trans Mountain Expansion Project came into service, Mike Davies, President and Chief Operating Officer at Trans Mountain, told the B.C. Business Summit 2025 that the project’s success should mark the beginning of a new national mindset — one defined by ambition, reform, and nation building.

“It took fifteen years to get this version of the project built,” Davies said. “During that time, Canadian producers lost about $50 billion in value because they were selling into a discounted market. We have some of the world’s largest reserves of oil and gas, but we can only trade with one other country. That’s unusual.”

With the expansion now in operation, that imbalance is shifting. “The differential on Canadian oil has narrowed by about $13 billion,” he said. “That’s value that used to be extracted by the United States and now stays in Canada — supporting healthcare, reconciliation, and energy transformation. About $5 billion of that is in royalties and taxes. It’s meaningful for us as a society.”

Davies rejected the notion that Trans Mountain was a public subsidy. “The federal government lent its balance sheet so that nation-building infrastructure could get built,” he said. “In our first full year of operation, we’ll return more than $1.3 billion to the federal government, rising toward $2 billion annually as cleanup work wraps up.”

At the Westridge Marine Terminal, shipments have increased from one tanker a week to nearly one a day, with more than half heading to Asia. “California remains an important market,” Davies said, “but diversification is finally happening — and it’s vital to our long-term prosperity.”

Fixing the system to move forward

Davies said this moment of success should prompt a broader rethinking of how Canada approaches resource development. “We’re positioned to take advantage of this moment,” he said. “Public attitudes are shifting. Canadians increasingly recognize that our natural resource advantages are a strength, not a liability. The question now is whether governments can seize it — and whether we’ll see that reflected in policy.”

He called for “deep, long-term reform” to restore scalability and investment confidence. “Linear infrastructure like pipelines requires billions in at-risk capital before a single certificate is issued,” he said. “Canada has a process for everything — we’re a responsible country — but it doesn’t scale for nation-building projects.”

Regulatory reform, he added, must go hand in hand with advancing economic reconciliation. “The challenge of our generation is shifting Indigenous communities from dependence to participation,” he said. “That means real ownership, partnership, and revenue opportunities.”

Davies urged renewed cooperation between Alberta and British Columbia, calling for “interprovincial harmony” on West Coast access. “I’d like to see Alberta see B.C. as part of its constituency,” he said. “And I’d like to see B.C. recognize the need for access.”

He summarized the path forward in plain terms: “We need to stem the exit of capital, create an environment that attracts investment, simplify approvals to one major process, and move decisions from the courts to clear legislation. If we do that, we can finally move from being a market hostage to being a competitor — and a nation builder.”

From the Fraser Institute

By Jake Fuss, Julio Mejía, Elmira Aliakbari, Karen Graham and Jock Finlayson

Ottawa and the four biggest provinces have spent (or foregone revenues) of at least $158 billion to create at most 68,000 “clean” jobs since 2014

Despite the hype of a “clean” economic transition, governments in Ottawa and in the four largest provinces have spent or foregone revenues of more than $150 billion (inflation-adjusted) on low-carbon initiatives since 2014/15, but have only created, at best, 68,000 clean jobs, according to two new studies published by the Fraser Institute, an independent, non-partisan Canadian public policy think-tank.

“Governments, activists and special interest groups have been making a lot of claims about the opportunities of a clean economic transition, but after a decade of policy interventions and more than $150 billion in taxpayers’ money, the results are
extremely underwhelming,” said Elmira Aliakbari, director of natural resource studies and co-author of The Fiscal Cost of Canada’s Low-Carbon Economy.

The study finds that since 2014/15, the federal government and provincial governments in the country’s four largest provinces (Ontario, Quebec, Alberta and British Columbia) combined have spent and foregone revenues of $158 billion (inflation adjusted to 2024 dollars) trying to create clean jobs, as defined by Statistics Canada’s Environmental and Clean Technology Products Economic Account.

Importantly, that cost estimate is conservative since it does not account for an exhaustive list of direct government spending and it does not measure the costs from Canada’s other six provinces, municipalities, regulatory costs and other economic
costs because of the low-carbon spending and tax credits.

A second study, Sizing Canada’s Clean Economy, finds that there was very little change over the 2014 to 2023 period in terms of the share of the total economy represented by the clean economy. For instance, in 2014, the clean economy represented 3.1 per cent of GDP compared to 3.6 per cent in 2023.

“The evidence is clear—the much-hyped clean economic transition has failed to fundamentally transform Canada’s $3.3 trillion economy,” said study co-author and Fraser Institute senior fellow Jock Finlayson.

State of the Green Economy

• The Fiscal Cost of Canada’s Low-Carbon Economy documents spending initiatives by the federal government and the governments of Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta, and Quebec since 2014 to promote the low-carbon economy, as well as how much revenue they have foregone through offering tax credits.
• Overall, the combined cost of spending and tax credits supporting a low-carbon economy by the federal government and the four provincial governments is estimated at $143.6 billion from 2014–15 to 2024–25, in nominal terms. When adjusted for inflation, the total reaches $158 billion in 2024 dollars.
• These estimates are based on very conservative assumptions, and they do not cover every program area or government-controlled expenditure related to the low-carbon economy and/or reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
• Sizing Canada’s Green Economy assesses the composition, growth, share of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) output, and employment of Canada’s “clean economy” from 2014 to 2023.
• Canada’s various environmental and clean technology industries collectively have accounted for between 3.07% and 3.62% of all-industry GDP over the 10-year period from 2014 to 2023. While it has grown, the sector as a whole has not been expanding at a pace that meaningfully exceeds the growth of the overall Canadian economy, despite significant policy attention and mounting public subsidies.
• The clean economy represents a respectable and relatively stable share of Canada’s $3.3 trillion economy. However, it remains a small part of Canada’s broader industrial mix, it is not a major source of export earnings, and it is not about to supplant the many other industries that underpin the country’s prosperity and dominate its international exports.

Jake Fuss

Director, Fiscal Studies, Fraser Institute

Julio Mejía

Policy Analyst

Elmira Aliakbari

Director, Natural Resource Studies, Fraser Institute

Karen Graham

Jock Finlayson

Senior Fellow, Fraser Institute