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Energy

Did the Environment Minister announce the end of Alberta’s Oil and Gas Industry at COP 27?

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Steven Guilbeault (center) arrested after climbing the CN Tower for a Greenpeace protest on July 16, 2001.

PHOTO BY AARON HARRIS/THE CANADIAN PRESS

News Release From the Alberta Institute

Stop The Federal Cap On Oil And Gas

This week, Environment and Climate Change Minister, Steven Guilbeault, effectively announced the end of Alberta’s oil and gas industry.

In Egypt, at COP27, he announced that his government will cap oil and gas sector emissions from the end of next year, and work to reduce them after that.

Remember, even Justin Trudeau said that no country would find 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground and just leave them there.

But that, of course, was before he was Prime Minister.

Radical environmental activist Steven Guilbeault does believe we should leave 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground.

Now, yes, technically, he said he would cap and reduce emissions, not oil and gas production, and some energy companies are confident they can find efficiencies to allow them to continue producing some oil and gas without increasing emissions.

But anyone who’s been in the game long enough has seen the goalposts moved often enough to recognize another goalpost shifting when they see it, and that’s exactly what happened today.

How so?

Well, you would think Minister Guilbeault’s friends in the eco-activist industry – the same people who just a few years ago were calling for this cap on emissions – would be happy about this week’s announcement, wouldn’t you?

But no, these same people who were calling for exactly this policy just a few years ago actually attacked his announcement.

They think that this week’s announcement – the policy they were calling for until recently – is woefully inadequate.

They now want, you guessed it, a cap on production.

They don’t actually care about the level of carbon emissions, they don’t actually care whether emissions go down, they want the amount of oil and gas producedto go down.

This, fellow Albertans, is what Alberta is up against.

The radical eco-activist environmental movement doesn’t want Alberta’s oil and gas industry to be more environmentally friendly, they want Alberta’s oil and gas industry to die.

Meanwhile, having shifted the goalposts a dozen times already – the federal government’s environmental policies are as close to a complete ban on oil and gas as you can get, without actually banning it.

One more goalpost shift, and it will be an outright ban.

The environmental groups are pushing for that last final goalpost shift.

And Albertans are just supposed to trust the federal government that, despite all the previous times they shifted the goalposts, this time they definitely won’t.

The time to stand up for Alberta, and stand up for Albertans is now.

If we don’t do so right now, it might be too late.

In the 1980s, Alberta Premier, Peter Lougheed, fought for – and won – an amendment to the Canadian Constitution – Section 92A – that gave Alberta (and the other Provinces) the exclusive right to explore, develop, conserve, and manage their natural resources.

This amendment made clear that these resources belonged to the Provinces, not the federal government, and Alberta would not have signed on to the Constitution had that clause not been included.

Justin Trudeau and Steven Guilbeault do not believe in that clause in the Canadian Constitution.

They have already ignored it many times, and intend to continue to ignore it.

Justin Trudeau’s view is that Alberta can do whatever we want with our resources… as long as whatever we want to do is exactly what the federal government wants us to do.

And the federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change’s view is that we should leave them in the ground – all of them.

Enough is enough.

Now is the time for every Albertan – and the Alberta government – to stand up to the federal government.

If you agree, please join our campaign to stop the federal cap on oil and gas:

Please also consider forwarding this email to your friends, family, colleagues, and every Canadian.

Regards,

The Alberta Institute Team

Business

Premiers fight to lower gas taxes as Trudeau hikes pump costs

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From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Jay Goldberg 

Thirty-nine hundred dollars – that’s how much the typical two-car Ontario family is spending on gas taxes at the pump this year.

You read that right. That’s not the overall fuel bill. That’s just taxes.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau keeps increasing your gas bill, while Premier Doug Ford is lowering it.

Ford’s latest gas tax cut extension is music to taxpayers’ ears. Ford’s 6.4 cent per litre gas tax cut, temporarily introduced in July 2022, is here to stay until at least next June.

Because of the cut, a two-car family has saved more than $1,000 so far. And that’s welcome news for Ontario taxpayers, because Trudeau is planning yet another carbon tax hike next April.

Trudeau has raised the overall tax burden at the pumps every April for the past five years. Next spring, he plans to raise gas taxes by another three cents per litre, bringing the overall gas tax burden for Ontarians to almost 60 cents per litre.

While Trudeau keeps hiking costs for taxpayers at the pumps, premiers of all stripes have been stepping up to the plate to blunt the impact of his punitive carbon tax.

Obviously, Ford has stepped up to the plate and has lowered gas taxes. But he’s not alone.

In Manitoba, NDP Premier Wab Kinew fully suspended the province’s 14 cent per litre gas tax for a year. And in Newfoundland, Liberal Premier Andrew Furey cut the gas tax by 8.05 cents per litre for nearly two-and-a-half years.

It’s a tale of two approaches: the Trudeau government keeps making life more expensive at the pumps, while premiers of all stripes are fighting to get costs down.

Families still have to get to work, get the kids to school and make it to hockey practice. And they can’t afford increasingly high gas taxes. Common sense premiers seem to get it, while Ottawa has its head in the clouds.

When Ford announced his gas tax cut extension, he took aim at the Liberal carbon tax mandated by the Trudeau government in Ottawa.

Ford noted the carbon tax is set to rise to 20.9 cents per litre next April, “bumping up the cost of everything once again and it’s absolutely ridiculous.”

“Our government will always fight against it,” Ford said.

But there’s some good news for taxpayers: reprieve may be on the horizon.

Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s promises to axe the carbon tax as soon as he takes office.

With a federal election scheduled for next fall, the federal carbon tax’s days may very well be numbered.

Scrapping the carbon tax would make a huge difference in the lives of everyday Canadians.

Right now, the carbon tax costs 17.6 cents per litre. For a family filling up two cars once a week, that’s nearly $24 a week in carbon taxes at the pump.

Scrapping the carbon tax could save families more than $1,200 a year at the pumps. Plus, there would be savings on the cost of home heating, food, and virtually everything else.

While the Trudeau government likes to argue that the carbon tax rebates make up for all these additional costs, the Parliamentary Budget Officer says it’s not so.

The PBO has shown that the typical Ontario family will lose nearly $400 this year due to the carbon tax, even after the rebates.

That’s why premiers like Ford, Kinew and Furey have stepped up to the plate.

Canadians pay far too much at the pumps in taxes. While Trudeau hikes the carbon tax year after year, provincial leaders like Ford are keeping costs down and delivering meaningful relief for struggling families.

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Economy

Gas prices plummet in BC thanks to TMX pipeline expansion

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From Resource Works

By more than doubling capacity and cutting down the costs, the benefits of the TMX expansion are keeping more money in consumer pockets. 

Just months after the Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) project was completed last year, Canadians, especially British Columbians, are experiencing the benefits promised by this once-maligned but invaluable piece of infrastructure. As prices fall when people gas up their cars, the effects are evident for all to see.

This drop in gasoline prices is a welcome new reality for consumers across B.C. and a long-overdue relief given the painful inflation of the past few years.

TMX has helped broaden Canadian oil’s access to world markets like never before, improve supply chains, and boost regional fuel supplies—all of which are helping keep money in the pockets of the middle class.

When TMX was approaching the finish line after the new year, it was praised for promising to ease long-standing capacity issues and help eliminate less efficient, pricier methods of shipping oil. By mid-May, TMX was completed and in full swing, with early data suggesting that gas prices in Vancouver were slackening compared to other cities in Canada.

Kent Fellows, an assistant professor of Economics and the Director of Graduate Programs for the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary, noted that wholesale prices in Vancouver fell by roughly 28 cents per litre compared to the typically lower prices in Edmonton, thanks to the expanded capacity of TMX. Consequently, the actual price at the gas pump in the Lower Mainland fell too, providing relief to a part of Canada that traditionally suffers from high fuel costs.

In large part due to limited pipeline capacity, Vancouver’s gas prices have been higher than the rest of the country. From at least 2008 to this year, TMX’s capacity was unable to accommodate demand, leading to the generational issue of “apportionment,” which meant rationing pipeline space to manage excess demand.

Under the apportionment regime, customers received less fuel than they requested, which increased costs. With the expansion of TMX now complete, the pipeline’s capacity has more than doubled from 350,000 barrels per day to 890,000, effectively neutralizing the apportionment problem for now.

Since May, TMX has operated at 80 percent capacity, with no apportionment affecting customers or consumers.

Before the TMX expansion was completed, a litre of gas in Vancouver cost 45 cents more than a litre in Edmonton. By August, it was just 17 cents—a remarkable drop that underscores why it’s crucial to expand B.C.’s capacity to move energy sources like oil without the need for costly alternatives, allowing consumers to enjoy savings at the pump.

More than doubling TMX’s capacity has rapidly reshaped B.C.’s energy landscape. Despite tensions in the Middle East, per-litre gas prices in Vancouver have fallen from about $2.30 per litre to $1.54 this month. Even when there was a slight disruption in October, the price only rose to about $1.80, far below its earlier peaks.

As Kent Fellows noted, the only real change during this entire timeline has been the completion of the TMX expansion, and the benefits extend far beyond the province’s shores.

With TMX moving over 500,000 barrels more per day than it did previously, Canadian oil is now far more plentiful on the international market. Tankers routinely depart Burrard Inlet loaded with oil bound for destinations in South Korea and Japan.

In this uncertain world, where oil markets remain volatile, TMX serves as a stabilizing force for both Canada and the world. People in B.C. can rest easier with TMX acting as a barrier against sharp shifts in supply and demand.

For critics who argue that the $31 billion invested in the project is short-sighted, the benefits for everyday people are becoming increasingly evident in a province where families have endured high gas prices for years.

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