Energy
A federally guaranteed Indigenous loan program is reconciliation progress, but only if it respects Indigenous agency
Roger Marten, right, Chief of Cold Lake First Nations, and Curtis Monias, centre, Chief of Heart Lake First Nation, speak after Cenovus CEO Alex Pourbaix announces an initiative focused on Indigenous communities. Photo from The Canadian Press.
From EnergyNow.ca
Indigenous communities are increasingly becoming partners and owners in major natural resource projects across the country.
Resource Works has been excited to be involved in that movement through our annual Indigenous Partnerships Success Showcase, where we convene Indigenous experts to discuss Indigenous partnerships in major projects and across the Canadian economy.
Under a proposed federal program, even more, Indigenous communities could become partners and even owners in major natural resource projects, from oil to natural gas and liquified natural gas (LNG).
Back in 2010, the proposed Northern Gateway oil pipeline from Alberta to Kitimat offered a 10% equity stake in the project to participating Indigenous groups. Yet despite having significant support, there was also considerable Indigenous opposition to the project. Ultimately, the project was killed when Prime Minister Trudeau banned oil tanker traffic on BC’s northern coast.
Fast forward twelve years, and the Coastal GasLink (CGL) natural gas pipeline and the LNG Canada project are nearing completion. In fact, CGL finished laying the last of its pipe in the ground in October 2023, completing a truly herculean engineering task, the first energy pipeline to the coast in decades. Despite some Indigenous opposition, CGL has the support of the elected councils of all 20 First Nations along the route and has offered an option for First Nations to purchase a 10% equity share in the pipeline.
Coastal GasLink will feed LNG Canada, the largest private sector investment in Canadian history. That project will turn CGL’s natural gas into liquid, where it can be shipped more densely to Asia to help replace coal, especially in industrial applications, and reduce global carbon emissions.
While CGL and LNG Canada near completion, two more proposals for LNG projects in BC are coming onto the scene. A historic first, these projects are led by First Nations: the Cedar LNG project near Kitimat from the Haisla Nation and Ksi Lisims LNG in Northern BC from the Nisga’a Nation.
A third LNG project, Woodfibre LNG, was approved by the Squamish Nation in the first-ever Indigenous environmental impact review and is now beginning construction.
Indigenous involvement – and leadership – in major energy projects has arrived. Indigenous LNG is Canadian LNG, and Canadian LNG has become Indigenous LNG. This is a global first.
Beyond natural gas and LNG, the Trans Mountain oil pipeline expansion project from Alberta to Burnaby is anticipating completion in March 2024. The expansion triples the pipeline’s capacity, the only oil pipeline to Canada’s West coast.
While there has been Indigenous opposition to this project, there has also been support, including formal agreements and billions in contracting deals for Indigenous businesses during construction. In fact, several Indigenous groups are working to acquire an equity stake in the pipeline.
Historic restrictions in the Indian Act mean Indigenous peoples face enormous barriers in raising or borrowing money to finance equity partnerships. Yet the ability to purchase equity in major projects is to enter the big leagues of economic development and wealth generation.
The federal government is expected to announce a guaranteed loan program that will enable Indigenous Peoples to finally bypass these structural obstacles and purchase equity shares in resource projects. Alberta and Saskatchewan already have their own programs, and the federal government has a lot to learn from them, particularly Alberta’s Alberta Indigenous Opportunities Corporation.
Supporters of such programs point out that Ottawa, without spending a cent of taxpayers’ money, could backstop loans to Indigenous communities. It’s a low-risk mechanism and another way to support economic reconciliation.
Unfortunately, there is uncertainty about whether this federal initiative will allow all projects to be supported. There are reports that Ottawa will exclude oil and gas projects from the guaranteed-loan program, in favour of exclusively renewable and green energy projects.
Indigenous groups argue that they can make up their own minds on what to invest in.
Four Indigenous groups have told the prime minister: “This program cannot be driven by an ‘Ottawa-knows-best’ policy approach – the judgement of Indigenous Nations about projects to pursue must be respected. . . . We believe that this initiative is not only a practical step towards reconciliation but an opportunity to demonstrate Canada’s commitment to a just future for First Peoples.”
If this loan program is created, it should be up to Indigenous peoples to decide what they want to get involved in. If we are in an era of reconciliation, shouldn’t we empower Indigenous Peoples to be decision-makers?
We can do big things as a country when we partner with Indigenous peoples. But we need to ground our policies in a positive framework that builds agency.
For many Indigenous peoples, that starts with charting their own economic destiny, including in natural resources.
Margareta Dovgal is Resource Works’ Managing Director and Event Lead for the Indigenous Partnerships Success Showcase
Alberta
REPORT: Alberta municipalities hit with $37 million carbon tax tab in 2023
Grande Prairie. Getty Images photo
From the Canadian Energy Centre
Federal cash grab driving costs for local governments, driving up property taxes
New data shows the painful economic impact of the federal carbon tax on municipalities.
Municipalities in Alberta paid out more than $37 million in federal carbon taxes in 2023, based on a recent survey commissioned by Alberta Municipal Affairs, with data provided to the Canadian Energy Centre.
About $760,000 of that came from the City of Grande Prairie. In a statement, Mayor Jackie Clayton said “if the carbon tax were removed, City property taxes could be reduced by 0.6 per cent, providing direct financial relief to residents and businesses in Grande Prairie.”
Conducted in October, the survey asked municipal districts, towns and cities in Alberta to disclose the amount of carbon tax paid out for the heating and electrifying of municipal assets and fuel for fleet vehicles.
With these funds, Alberta municipalities could have hired 7,789 high school students at $15 per hour last year with the amount paid to Ottawa.
The cost on municipalities includes:
Lloydminster: $422,248
Calgary: $1,230,300 (estimate)
Medicine Hat: $876,237
Lethbridge: $1,398,000 (estimate)
Grande Prairie: $757,562
Crowsnest Pass: $71,100
Red Deer: $1,495,945
Bonnyville: $19,484
Hinton: $66,829
Several municipalities also noted substantial indirect costs from the carbon tax, including higher rates from vendors that serve the municipality – like gravel truck drivers and road repair providers – passing increased fuel prices onto local governments.
The rising price for materials and goods like traffic lights, steel, lumber and cement, due to higher transportation costs are also hitting the bottom line for local governments.
The City of Grande Prairie paid out $89 million in goods and services in 2023, and the indirect costs of the carbon tax “have had an inflationary impact on those expenses” in addition to the direct costs of the tax.
In her press conference announcing Alberta’s challenge to the federal carbon tax on Oct. 29, 2024, Premier Danielle Smith addressed the pressures the carbon tax places on municipal bottom lines.
“In 2023 alone, the City of Calgary could have hired an additional 112 police officers or firefighters for the amount they sent to Ottawa for the carbon tax,” she said.
In a statement issued on Oct. 7, 2024, Ontario Conservative MP Ryan Williams, shadow minister for international trade, said this issue is nationwide.
“In Belleville, Ontario, the impact of the carbon tax is particularly notable. The city faces an extra $410,000 annually in costs – a burden that directly translates to an increase of 0.37 per cent on residents’ property tax bills.”
There is no rebate yet provided on retail carbon pricing for towns, cities and counties.
In October, the council in Belleville passed a motion asking the federal government to return in full all carbon taxes paid by municipalities in Canada.
The unaltered reproduction of this content is free of charge with attribution to the Canadian Energy Centre.
Energy
Global fossil fuel use rising despite UN proclamations
From the Fraser Institute
By Julio Mejía and Elmira Aliakbari
Major energy transitions are slow and take centuries, not decades… the first global energy transition—from traditional biomass fuels (including wood and charcoal) to fossil fuels—started more than two centuries ago and remains incomplete. Nearly three billion people in the developing world still depend on charcoal, straw and dried dung for cooking and heating, accounting for about 7 per cent of the world’s energy supply (as of 2020).
At the Conference of the Parties (COP29) in Azerbaijan, António Guterres, the United Nations Secretary-General, last week called for a global net-zero carbon footprint by 2050, which requires a “fossil fuel phase-out” and “deep decarbonization across the entire value chain.”
Yet despite the trillions of dollars already spent globally pursuing this target—and the additional trillions projected as necessary to “end the era of fossil fuels”—the world’s dependence on fossil fuels has remained largely unchanged.
So, how realistic is a “net-zero” emissions world—which means either eliminating fossil fuel generation or offsetting carbon emissions with activities such as planting trees—by 2050?
The journey began in 1995 when the UN hosted the first COP conference in Berlin, launching a global effort to drive energy transition and decarbonization. That year, global investment in renewable energy reached US$7 billion, according to some estimates. Since then, an extraordinary amount of money and resources have been allocated to the transition away from fossil fuels.
According to the International Energy Agency, between 2015 and 2023 alone, governments and industry worldwide spent US$12.3 trillion (inflation-adjusted) on clean energy. For context, that’s over six times the value of the entire Canadian economy in 2023.
Despite this spending, between 1995 and 2023, global fossil fuel consumption increased by 62 per cent, with oil consumption rising by 38 per cent, coal by 66 per cent and natural gas by 90 per cent.
And during that same 28-year period, despite the trillions spent on energy alternatives, the share of global energy provided by fossil fuels declined by only four percentage points, from 85.6 per cent to 81.5 per cent.
This should come as no surprise. Major energy transitions are slow and take centuries, not decades. According to a recent study by renowned scholar Vaclav Smil, the first global energy transition—from traditional biomass fuels (including wood and charcoal) to fossil fuels—started more than two centuries ago and remains incomplete. Nearly three billion people in the developing world still depend on charcoal, straw and dried dung for cooking and heating, accounting for about 7 per cent of the world’s energy supply (as of 2020).
Moreover, coal only surpassed wood as the main energy source worldwide around 1900. It took more than 150 years from oil’s first commercial extraction for oil to reach 25 per cent of all fossil fuels consumed worldwide. Natural gas didn’t reach this threshold until the end of the 20th century, after 130 years of industry development.
Now, consider the current push by governments to force an energy transition via regulation and spending. In Canada, the Trudeau government has set a target to fully decarbonize electricity generation by 2035 so all electricity is derived from renewable power sources such as wind and solar. But merely replacing Canada’s existing fossil fuel-based electricity with clean energy sources within the next decade would require building the equivalent of 23 major hydro projects (like British Columbia’s Site C) or 2.3 large-scale nuclear power plants (like Ontario’s Bruce Power). The planning and construction of significant electricity generation infrastructure in Canada is a complex and time-consuming process, often plagued by delays, regulatory hurdles and substantial cost overruns.
The Site C project took around 43 years from initial feasibility studies in 1971 to securing environmental certification in 2014. Construction began on the Peace River in northern B.C. in 2015, with completion expected in 2025 at a cost of at least $16 billion. Similarly, Ontario’s Bruce Power plant took nearly two decades to complete, with billions in cost overruns. Given these immense practical, financial and regulatory challenges, achieving the government’s 2035 target is highly improbable.
As politicians gather at high-profile conferences and set ambitious targets for a swift energy transition, global reliance on fossil fuels has continued to increase. As things stand, achieving net-zero by 2050 appears neither realistic nor feasible.
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