Alberta
Thank the beetle and deadwood ‘fuel’ that should have been cleared
By Josh Andrus
Originally posted in the Western Standard
Parks Canada officials admit they failed to conduct controlled burns of dead pine trees, which now pose a significant fire risk.
While Ottawa fixates on climate change rhetoric, their neglect of forest fire prevention has left Alberta’s landscapes vulnerable to devastation.
Last week, a shining beacon of the beauty of our province was partially destroyed as a wildfire burned through the picturesque town of Jasper. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the victims.
Thankfully there has been no reported loss of life. But many people’s livelihoods have been wiped out. The question is how did this happen, and what could have been done to prevent it?
Smokey Bear’s famous saying was: “Only you can prevent forest fires.” And, in this case, proactive measures certainly could have made a difference.
Unfortunately, the entire federal government seems to have forgotten Smokey’s key point. Fire prevention on national park land is federal jurisdiction.
In 2022, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault was informed that Parks Canada managers had not taken adequate precautions to protect the Town of Jasper from wildfires, according to documents obtained by Blacklock’s Reporter. At that time, Parks Canada officials admitted they had failed to conduct controlled burns of dead pine trees, which posed a significant fire risk.
“A mountain pine beetle infestation has brought significant changes to forests in Alberta, including Jasper National Park, with consequences for wildfire risk,” Guilbeault was informed.
Almost half of Jasper’s Whitebark Pine forest, 44%, was infected by beetles. However, few steps were taken to reduce the risk to the Town of Jasper with controlled burns of the surrounding forest, records show.
“Fire has not yet been applied for Whitebark Pine restoration,” stated a 2022 implementation report. “Mechanical thinning has been completed in 1.6 hectares, which is a small area relative to the amount of Whitebark Pine habitat.”
No reason was given for failing to take precautions. Since the fire, Guilbeault has made no public mention of the management reports.
Even though federal officials, including his department, knew the raging pine beetle was a serious hazard, Guilbeault blamed climate change: “As we are seeing in Canada and all around the world, we are seeing more and more aggressive forest fires,” he said on a media call on Monday.
Landon Shepherd, Incident Commander for Parks Canada, also attributed the intensity of the blazes to climate change: “This isn’t meant to be a discussion about climate change, but anyone who’s involved in fire management can tell you that things have become more difficult, especially in the last five years, to manage impacts.”
The 2022 warnings were not the first time concerns about a lack of fire prevention in national parks have been raised.
In 2018, CBC reported concerns from experts. Emile Begin and Ken Hodges, foresters for 40 years who had been studying Jasper National Park, found multiple issues with the forest that make it susceptible to a fire.
“You have fire suppression that has occurred for many years — therefore, you get a lot of dead fuel that would have been consumed by a natural process,” Hodges said. “The mountain pine beetle adds even more fuel to the situation.”
“You’ve got a major catastrophe on your hands if you get a match thrown into that.”
When pressed about the concerns, Alan Fehr, a superintendent for Jasper National Park, said: “We’re quite comfortable with where we are with our own emergency planning and evacuation planning.”
Hodges disagreed: “The potential that’s out there is actually scary. Hopefully, we’re wrong.”
Despite the repeated warnings of potential devastation due to forest management practices, Ottawa continues to point to climate change as the cause of the fires.
The Alberta government has been preparing, and increased its firefighting budget by more than 50% to $155.4 million this year. Alberta’s firefighting budget is now the highest it has ever been (despite misinformation about cuts.)
However, without proper fire prevention on national park land, blazes can become out of control quickly — as the warnings indicated.
Smokey Bear would be horrified. Clearly, Ottawa needs to spend less time interfering in provincial jurisdiction and more time focusing on things that actually are federal jurisdiction, like fire prevention in national parks.
Their inability to see the forest through the trees and take legitimate action to protect our national parks from the fury of an out-of-control wildfire demonstrates a degree of ineptitude that is, quite frankly, shocking.
Ottawa needs to stay in its lane and focus on its own jurisdiction, and they need to stop blaming climate change for their own ineptitude.
Alberta
Alberta court upholds conviction of Pastor Artur Pawlowski for preaching at Freedom Convoy protest
From LifeSiteNews
Lawyers argued that Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s sermon was intended to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, but the statement was characterized as a call for mischief.
An Alberta Court of Appeal ruled that Calgary Pastor Artur Pawlowski is guilty of mischief for his sermon at the Freedom Convoy-related border protest blockade in February 2022 in Coutts, Alberta.
On October 29, Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Gordon Krinke sentenced the pro-freedom pastor to 60 days in jail for “counselling mischief” by encouraging protesters to continue blocking Highway 4 to protest COVID mandates.
“A reasonable person would understand the appellant’s speech to be an active inducement of the illegal activity that was ongoing and that the appellant intended for his speech to be so understood,” the decision reads.
Pawlowski addressed a group of truckers and protesters blocking entrance into the U.S. state of Montana on February 3, the fifth day of the Freedom Convoy-styled protest. He encouraged the protesters to “hold the line” after they had reportedly made a deal with Royal Canadian Mounted Police to leave the border crossing and travel to Edmonton.
“The eyes of the world are fixed right here on you guys. You are the heroes,” Pawlowski said. “Don’t you dare go breaking the line.”
After Pawlowski’s sermon, the protesters remained at the border crossing for two additional weeks. While his lawyers argued that his speech was made to encourage protesters to find a peaceful solution to the blockade, the statement is being characterized as a call for mischief.
Days later, on February 8, Pawlowski was arrested – for the fifth time – by an undercover SWAT team just before he was slated to speak again to the Coutts protesters.
He was subsequently jailed for nearly three months for what he said was for speaking out against COVID mandates, the subject of all the Freedom Convoy-related protests.
In Krinke’s decision, he argued that Pawlowski’s sermon incited the continuation of the protest, saying, “The Charter does not provide justification to anybody who incites a third party to commit such crimes.”
However, defence lawyer Sarah Miller pointed out that that Pawlowski’s sermon was protected under freedom of speech, an argument that Krinke quickly dismissed.
“While the appellant is correct that peaceful, lawful and nonviolent communication is entitled to protection, blockading a highway is an inherently aggressive and potentially violent form of conduct, designed to intimidate and impede the movement of third parties,” he wrote.
Pawlowski was released after the verdict. He has already spent 78 days in jail before the trial.
Pawlowski is the first Albertan to be charged for violating the province’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act (CIDA), which was put in place in 2020 under then-Premier Jason Kenney.
The CIDA, however, was not put in place due to COVID mandates but rather after anti-pipeline protesters blockaded key infrastructure points such as railway lines in Alberta a few years ago.
Clean Energy Fuels CEO Andrew Littlefair, Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose, and Mullen Group chairman Murray Mullen attend the opening of a new Clean Energy/Tourmaline compressed natural gas (CNG) fuelling station in Calgary on Oct. 22, 2024. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
From the Canadian Energy Centre
New compressed natural gas fueling stations in Grande Prairie and Calgary join new stop in Edmonton
Heavy-duty truckers hauling everything from restaurant supplies to specialized oilfield services along one of Western Canada’s busiest corridors now have more access to a fuel that can help reduce emissions and save costs.
Two new fuelling stations serving compressed natural gas (CNG) rather than diesel in Grande Prairie and Calgary, along with a stop that opened in Edmonton last year, create the first phase of what proponents call a “natural gas highway”.
“Compressed natural gas is viable, it’s competitive and it’s good for the environment,” said Murray Mullen, chair of Mullen Group, which operates more than 4,300 trucks and thousands of pieces of equipment supporting Western Canada’s energy industry.
Right now, the company is running 19 CNG units and plans to deploy another 15 as they become available.
“They’re running the highways right now and they’re performing exceptionally well,” Mullen said on Oct. 22 during the ribbon-cutting ceremony opening the new station on the northern edge of Calgary along Highway 2.
“Our people love them, our customers love them and I think it’s going to be the way for the future to be honest,” he said.
Heavy-duty trucks at Tourmaline and Clean Energy’s new Calgary compressed natural gas fuelling station. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
According to Natural Resources Canada, natural gas burns more cleanly than gasoline or diesel fuel, producing fewer toxic pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to climate change.
The two new CNG stops are part of a $70 million partnership announced last year between major Canadian natural gas producer Tourmaline and California-based Clean Energy Fuels.
Their deal would see up to 20 new CNG stations built in Western Canada over the next five years, daily filling up to 3,000 natural gas-fueled trucks.
One of North America’s biggest trucking suppliers to businesses including McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, Subway and Popeye’s says the new stations will help as it expands its fleet of CNG-powered vehicles across Canada.
Amy Senter, global vice-president of sustainability with Illinois-based Martin Brower, said in a statement that using more CNG is critical to the company achieving its emissions reduction targets.
For Tourmaline, delivering CNG to heavy-duty truckers builds on its multi-year program to displace diesel in its operations, primarily by switching drilling equipment to run on natural gas.
Between 2018 and 2022, the company displaced the equivalent of 36 Olympic-sized swimming pools worth of diesel that didn’t get used, or the equivalent emissions of about 58,000 passenger vehicles.
Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose speaks to reporters during the opening of a new Tourmaline/Clean Energy compressed natural gas fuelling station in Calgary on Oct. 22, 2024. Photo courtesy Tourmaline
Tourmaline CEO Mike Rose noted that the trucking sector switching fuel from diesel to natural gas is gaining momentum, notably in Asia.
A “small but growing” share of China’s trucking fleet moving to natural gas helped drive an 11 percent reduction in overall diesel consumption this June compared to the previous year, according to the latest data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
“China’s talking about 30 percent of the trucks sold going forward are to be CNG trucks, and it’s all about reducing emissions,” Rose said.
“It’s one global atmosphere. We’re going to reduce them here; they’re going to reduce them there and everybody’s a net winner.”
Switching from diesel to CNG is “extremely cost competitive” for trucking fleets, said Clean Energy CEO Andrew Littlefair.
“It will really move the big rigs that we need in Western Canada for the long distance and heavy loads,” he said.
Tourmaline and Clean Energy aim to have seven CNG fuelling stations operating by the end of 2025. Construction is set to begin in Kamloops, B.C., followed by Fort McMurray and Fort St. John.
“You’ll have that Western Canadian corridor, and then we’ll grow it from there,” Littlefair said.
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