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Economy

Wrapping Up Canadian Energy 2023 – Prosperity, Power Struggles, Pipelines, EV Promises and “Pie in the Sky” Politics

Published

2 years ago

15 minute read

From EnergyNow Media

By Deidra Garyk

2023 was an optimistic year in the Canadian oil patch. The +15 walkway system in downtown Calgary has been buzzing with the energy of people hurrying to business meetings and networking events.

Some of those scurrying about were headed to talk multi-billion-dollar merger and acquisition (M&A) deals that the patch continued to experience throughout the year. Traditional oil companies also bought alternative energy and carbon tech companies. Carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) was the investment decision of the year.

Oil and gas prices remained relatively high. Not great, but not in the toilet like the dark years of 2015 to 2021. That meant government coffers filled, easing some of the debt burden accumulated during COVID. Oil and gas companies, producers and the many service providers who support the production, were able to continue paying down debt and providing returns to patient shareholders.

Canadian majors Suncor, Cenovus, and Enbridge went through leadership changes at the top. I wish these men success and courage. They are going to need it to embolden pragmatism at all levels of government.

The Canadian federal government continues to be all-in on climate and green energy, seemingly to the exclusion of traditional, reliable energy sources. Although, since climate change has taken a backseat to affordability and energy security for the voting public – the only people politicians really care about – the Liberals have had to rebrand some programs to get buy-in.

One example is renaming the “Just Transition” the Sustainable Jobs Plan. Other than the name, not much has changed. There is still a push for unionized, non-oil and gas jobs.

The feds “invested” (their word, not mine) billions of dollars in EV battery plants, continuing to go all-in on 100 percent EV car sales in twelve years. Senior bureaucrats at Transport Canada even touted the nearness of EV heavy-duty commercial transportation and equipment. (Someone should tell them it will not work well in remote locations with no charging infrastructure.) Energy and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson lauded the day when agricultural equipment goes all electric, fantasizing about the economic boon that will bring. (Someone else should tell him it will not be experienced by farmers who have to spend their hard-earned dollars on equipment replacements.)

Joe Biden visited Ottawa in March. I happened to be there for a conference, so I got to experience the pomp and circumstance first-hand. I have never seen so much security, and I have travelled to places under military control and lived in a country that remains perpetually under the threat of foreign invasion.

Biden’s motorcade is a long, emissions-belching row of vehicles. I did not see any EVs. It includes two “Beasts” (one used as a decoy while the other transports the President), an ambulance, and several tricked-out SUVs. It is quite a spectacle.

As expected, topping the list of topics on the visit’s agenda, President Biden and Prime Minister Trudeau talked about energy and climate, as outlined in their joint statement.

Global sustainability reporting standards were released in June and come into effect January 1, 2024. Publicly traded companies are waiting for Canada to release jurisdiction-specific regulations to understand the magnitude of what will be required. In the Fall Economic Update, released November 22, the feds said rules will be put in place to extend mandatory climate reporting to private companies. That is a big hint at what all companies should expect, at a minimum.

You can listen to my podcast on the subject with energy analyst Dr. Tammy Nemeth here.

On the topic of climate, Bill S-243, An Act to enact the Climate-Aligned Finance Act and to make related amendments to other Acts passed second reading in the Senate in June. You may think this is just some boring Senate bill, but oil and gas boards and employees need to be aware of it.

The bill aims to restrict investment in hydrocarbons, forces companies to set climate commitments, and dictates who has to be part of a company’s board of directors. Worse, section 13(1) Appointment – restriction outlines who cannot be a board member – anyone who works in or owns shares in a fossil fuel company.

It goes as far as to include: “And whereas investment in energy efficiency, clean energy and clean technologies and the incentivization of innovation and behavioural change must replace investments in greenhouse-gas-emission-intensive activities for effective action against climate change.” It targets “fossil fuel activity” in the definition of “emissions-intensive activities”.

Alignment with climate commitments requires that companies:

  • take into consideration vulnerable groups, communities and ecosystems, including the biodiversity of those ecosystems,
  • make decisions based on equity and the best available science and
  • do not promote, foster or exacerbate food insecurity or inequalities in society; and
  • do not cause significant harm to social and environmental obligations recognized by Canada.

This bill should trouble any rational person, and it is not getting enough attention. It ramps up climate hysteria and enshrines it into all financial decision making. It is ideological to its core.

I encourage you to read the bill here.

Fortunately, two major, necessary egress projects – Coastal GasLink and Trans Mountain – are well underway before Bill S-243 can stop them. Coastal GasLink reached major milestones of 100 percent pipeline installation and mechanical completion, ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, the federally owned Trans Mountain pipeline has continued to experience delays and a cost increase to $30.9 billion. Although, it was about 80 percent complete in March and expected to be in service in the first quarter of 2024, the project has been delayed due to issues over the route and may not be completed until the end of 2024.

Canada’s summer wildfire season had environmental activists hot and bothered, blaming one thing, and one thing only – climate change!

Calgary hosted the 24th World Petroleum Congress and world energy leaders in September. The torch was passed on to Saudi Arabia to host next. Based on their booth, it will be an extravaganza that will undoubtedly proudly display their oil and gas development. Energy and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson dutifully kept to the Liberal’s script and was challenged to mention the words “oil” and “gas” during his speech at the World Petroleum Congress. This caused the ire of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, who has had it with the feds’ attitude towards oil and gas.

She has now invoked the Alberta Sovereignty Act in an attempt to prevent the federal government from being able to enact the Clean Electricity Standard by 2035. She has taken a lot of heat for it, but Saskatchewan’s Premier Scott Moe did it first with the colloquially named Saskatchewan First Act. When adversarial Environment and Climate Change Canada Minister Steven Guilbeault threatened to criminalize the use of coal-fired power generation past 2030, Moe puffed out his chest and said, “come get me!”

For all the partisan naysayers attacking the Premiers, I recommend reading Electricity Canada’s response to the Clean Electricity Regulations. It is emotionless and objective, and it sides with the Premiers.

Good thing there is serious discussion about the electricity grid and reliability happening in the Edmonton Legislature because Alberta’s grid operator AESO has issued several warnings in the last year, on both hot and cold days. This has me impatiently waiting for the 2,700 megawatts of new natural gas-powered generation to come on in 2024.

November was all about the carbon tax fight. The feds doubled down on the importance of carbon taxes in the fight against global warming, but not in regions where their sitting MPs risk losing their seats (i.e. their jobs) in the next election. If you think it was not political, you are fooling yourself. They are still fighting over the applicability of a tax on farmers. As someone who eats, I would like it removed to keep the cost of food down.

Premier Moe will not charge Saskatchewan residents carbon tax on natural gas and electricity used to heat homes. This seems reasonable considering that it gets really, really, really cold in Saskatchewan for many days in the winter and reliable energy is a must.

In a hotter region of the world, Dubai, United Arab Emirates hosted COP28 in December. It is the twenty eighth UN climate conference, and yet we appear no closer to solving the thing they say is a crisis – rising emissions. The globe reached the height of emissions in 2023, even though coal use is down and renewable energy capacity and investment is up, up, up, according to the International Energy Agency.

As expected, Canada made various expensive pledges. Minister Guilbeault bounces to the podium for a photo op, drops a climate pledge or two, and the rest of us are left trying to figure out how to meet the commitment. The most contentious for Alberta and Saskatchewan was the oil and gas emissions cap that has been called a de facto production cap.

GEOPOLITICS

With energy security remaining a priority for citizens, nuclear is no longer a bad word. Countries and regions are expanding existing nuclear infrastructure and there is increasing public acceptance for small modular reactors. The false fear tactics used by the anti-nuclear activists have finally been shown for what they are – exaggerated and untrue.

The BRICS alliance expanded with the addition of six new members: Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina, and the United Arab Emirates.

Not only are the BRICS nations population and economic power players, they hold the keys to unlocking vast reserves of reliable energy. Total oil production from BRICS nations will be between 40-45 percent of global oil production, more than OPEC’s 35-40 percent. In addition, the members hold vast reserves of the minerals needed for any future energy transformation.

Forty other countries applied to join, demonstrating an interest in the group. Western leaders and NGOs would be wise to pay attention to the growing influence of the BRICS, even if they dislike some of the members.

BRICS is my geopolitical story of the year as it continues to disrupt global energy markets. In 2022, India increased purchases of discounted Russian oil by forty percent. This year, India purchased oil from the United Arab Emirates in rupees, their local currency. These are two examples of the shifts that are happening but are seemingly ignored by the West.

Overall, it appears that pragmatism and realism are influencing political energy decisions, and 2024 is expected to be another positive year for the Canadian oil patch.

All the best for the new year. May you enjoy peace and prosperity.

About Deidra Garyk

Deidra Garyk has been working in the Canadian energy industry for almost 20 years. She is currently the Manager, ESG & Sustainability at an oilfield service company. Prior to that, she worked in roles of varying seniority at exploration and production companies in joint venture contracts where she was responsible for working collaboratively with stakeholders to negotiate access to pipelines, compressors, plants, and batteries.

Outside of her professional commitments, Deidra is an energy advocate and thought leader who researches, writes, and speaks about energy policy and advocacy to promote balanced, honest, fact-based conversations. 

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Business

Canada’s climate agenda hit business hard but barely cut emissions

Published on December 3, 2025

By

This article supplied by Troy Media.

Troy Media By Gwyn Morgan

Canada is paying a steep economic price for climate policies that have delivered little real environmental progress

In 2015, the newly elected Trudeau government signed the Paris Agreement. The following year saw the imposition of the Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change, which included more than 50 measures aimed at “reducing carbon emissions and fostering clean technology solutions.” Key among them was economy-wide carbon “pricing,” Liberal-speak for taxes.

Other measures followed, culminating last December in the 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan, targeting emissions of 40 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 and net-zero emissions by 2050. It included $9.1 billion for retrofitting structures, subsidizing zero-emission vehicles, building charging stations and subsidizing solar panels and windmills. It also mandated the phaseout of coal-fired power generation and proposed stringent emission standards for vehicles and buildings.

Other “green initiatives” included the “on-farm climate action fund,” a nationwide reforestation initiative to plant two billion trees, the “Green and Inclusive Community Buildings Program” to promote net-zero standards in new construction, and a “Green Municipal Fund” to support municipal decarbonization. That’s a staggering list of nation-impoverishing subsidies, taxes and restrictions.

Those climate measures come at a real cost to the industry that drives the nation’s economy.

The Trudeau government cancelled the Northern Gateway oil pipeline to the northwest coast, which had been approved by the Harper government, costing sponsors hundreds of millions of dollars in preconstruction expenditures. The political and regulatory morass the Liberals created eventually led to the cancellation of all but one of the 12 LNG export proposals.

Have all those taxes and regulatory measures reduced Canada’s fossil-fuel consumption? No. As Bjorn Lomborg has reported, between the election of the Trudeau government in 2015 through 2023, fossil fuels’ share of Canada’s energy supply increased from 75 to 77 per cent.

That dismal result wasn’t for lack of trying. The Fraser Institute has found that Ottawa and the four biggest provinces have either spent or forgone a mind-numbing $158 billion to create just 68,000 “clean” jobs, increasing the “green economy” by a minuscule 0.3 percentage points to 3.6 per cent of GDP at an eye-watering cost of more than $2.3 million per job.

That’s Canada’s emissions reduction debacle. What’s the global picture? A decade after Paris, 80 per cent of the world’s energy still comes from fossil fuels. World energy demand is up 150 per cent. Canada, which produces roughly 1.5 per cent of global emissions, cannot influence that trajectory. And, as Lomborg writes: “achieving net zero emissions by 2050 would require the removal of the equivalent of the combined emissions of China and the United States in each of the next five years. This puts us in the realm of science fiction.”

Does this mean our planet will become unlivable? A U.S. Department of Energy report issued in July is grounds for optimism. It finds that “claims of increased frequency or intensity of hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and droughts are not supported by U.S. historical data.” And it goes on: “CO2-induced warming appears to be less damaging economically than commonly believed and aggressive mitigation policies could be more detrimental than beneficial.”

U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright responded to the report by saying: “Climate change is real … but it is not the greatest threat facing humanity … (I)mproving the human condition depends on access to reliable, affordable energy.”

That leaves no doubt as to where our largest trading partner stands on carbon emissions. But don’t expect Prime Minister Mark Carney, who helped launch the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ) at COP 26 in that city in 2021 and co-chaired it until this January, to soften his stand on carbon taxes. His just-released budget imposes carbon tax increases of $80 to $170 per ton by 2030 on our already struggling industries.

Doing so increases Canadian businesses’ competitive disadvantage with our most important trading partner while doing essentially nothing to help the environment.

Gwyn Morgan is a retired business leader who has been a director of five global corporations.

Troy Media empowers Canadian community news outlets by providing independent, insightful analysis and commentary. Our mission is to support local media in helping Canadians stay informed and engaged by delivering reliable content that strengthens community connections and deepens understanding across the country.

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Business

Is Carney Falling Into The Same Fiscal Traps As Trudeau?

Published on December 3, 2025

By

From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy

By Jay Goldberg

Rosy projections, chronic deficits, and opaque budgeting. If nothing changes, Carney’s credibility could collapse under the same weight.

Carney promised a fresh start. His budget makes it look like we’re still stuck with the same old Trudeau playbook

It turns out the Trudeau government really did look at Canada’s economy through rose-coloured glasses. Is the Carney government falling into the same pattern?

New research from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy shows that federal budgets during the Trudeau years “consistently overestimated [Canada’s] fiscal health” when it came to forecasting the state of the nation’s economy and finances over the long term.

In his research, policy analyst Conrad Eder finds that, when looking specifically at projections of where the economy would be four years out, Trudeau-era budgets tended to have forecast errors of four per cent of nominal GDP, or an average of $94.4 billion.

Because budgets were so much more optimistic about long-term growth, they consistently projected that government revenue would grow at a much faster pace. The Trudeau government then made spending commitments, assuming the money would be there. And when the forecasts did not keep up, deficits simply grew.

As Eder writes, “these dramatic discrepancies illustrate how the Trudeau government’s longer-term projections consistently underestimated the persistence of fiscal challenges and overestimated its ability to improve the budgetary balance.”

Eder concludes that politics came into play and influenced how the Trudeau government framed its forecasts. Rather than focusing on the long-term health of Canada’s finances, the Trudeau government was focused on politics. But presenting overly optimistic forecasts has long-term consequences.

“When official projections consistently deviate from actual outcomes, they obscure the scope of deficits, inhibit effective fiscal planning, and mislead policymakers and the public,” Eder writes.

“This disconnect between projected and actual fiscal outcomes undermines the reliability of long-term planning tools and erodes public confidence in the government’s fiscal management.”

The public’s confidence in the Trudeau government’s fiscal management was so low, in fact, that by the end of 2024 the Liberals were polling in the high teens, behind the NDP.

The key to the Liberal Party’s electoral survival became twofold: the “elbows up” rhetoric in response to the Trump administration’s tariffs, and the choice of a new leader who seemed to have significant credibility and was disconnected from the fiscal blunders of the Trudeau years.

Mark Carney was recruited to run for the Liberal leadership as the antidote to Trudeau. His résumé as governor of the Bank of Canada during the Great Recession and his subsequent years leading the Bank of England seemed to offer Canadians the opposite of the fiscal inexperience of the Trudeau years.

These two factors together helped turn around the Liberals’ fortunes and secured the party a fourth straight mandate in April’s elections.

But now Carney has presented a budget of his own, and it too spills a lot of red ink.

This year’s deficit is projected to be a stunning $78.3 billion, and the federal deficit is expected to stay over $50 billion for at least the next four years.

The fiscal picture presented by Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne was a bleak one.

What remains to be seen is whether the chronic politicking over long-term forecasts that plagued the Trudeau government will continue to be a feature of the Carney regime.

As bad as the deficit figures look now, one has to wonder, given Eder’s research, whether the state of Canada’s finances is even worse than Champagne’s budget lets on.

As Eder says, years of rose-coloured budgeting undermined public trust and misled both policymakers and voters. The question now is whether this approach to the federal budget continues under Carney at the helm.

Budget 2025 significantly revises the economic growth projections found in the 2024 fall economic statement for both 2025 and 2026. However, the forecasts for 2027, 2028 and 2029 were left largely unchanged.

If Eder is right, and the Liberals are overly optimistic when it comes to four-year forecasts, then the 2025 budget should worry Canadians. Why? Because the Carney government did not change the Trudeau government’s 2029 economic projections by even a fraction of a per cent.

In other words, despite the gloomy fiscal numbers found in Budget 2025, the Carney government may still be wearing the same rose-coloured budgeting glasses as the Trudeau government did, at least when it comes to long-range fiscal planning.

If the Carney government wants to have more credibility than the Trudeau government over the long term, it needs to be more transparent about how long-term economic projections are made and be clear about whether the Finance Department’s approach to forecasting has changed with the government. Otherwise, Carney’s fiscal credibility, despite his résumé, may meet the same fate as Trudeau’s.

Jay Goldberg is a fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.

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