Ottawa’s intentional destruction of western wealth

From Canadians for Affordable Energy

Dan McTeague

Written By Dan McTeague

Even if it fails to hit its emissions targets (which it will,) the economic consequences of enacting this plan are very serious. It would make Canada the only country in the world which willingly and purposefully stifles its single largest revenue stream.

At this point, everyone in Canada has heard about the Carbon Tax and had a chance to experience its negative effects. But less has been said about another harmful policy dreamed up by the Trudeau government — the Emissions Cap on the oil and gas sector. Just like the Carbon Tax, the Emissions Cap is part of Trudeau’s larger program to try and achieve “Net Zero” greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2050, which will have no positive impact on the environment, but which will be ruinous to Canada’s natural resource sector and to the national economy.

In their 2021 platform, the Liberals made a commitment to “cap and cut emissions from the oil and gas sector” and proclaimed that that industry must reduce emissions “at a pace and scale needed to achieve net-zero by 2050.” As promised, in December 2023 the Trudeau government proposed an Emissions Cap to reduce GHG emissions in the oil and gas sector by 42 percent by 2030. Keep in mind Canada contributes only 1.5% of global emissions, so this plan, even if accomplished, would reduce global emissions by less than one half of one percent.

Even if it fails to hit its emissions targets (which it will,) the economic consequences of enacting this plan are very serious. It would make Canada the only country in the world which willingly and purposefully stifles its single largest revenue stream. After all, the oil and gas industry generates $45 billion per year in annual economic activity, and contributes $170 billion per year to the GDP.

But don’t take my word for it. According to a Deloitte report commissioned by the Government of Alberta, an Emissions Cap would lead to a 10% decrease in Alberta’s oil production and a 16% decrease in conventional natural gas production. Fossil fuel production would decrease in B.C., Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland as well. Other industries connected to the oil and gas sector such as the mining, refinery products, and utilities are also expected to be impacted and will experience a decrease in output in Alberta and the rest of Canada.

The report goes on to state that in 2040 “Alberta’s GDP is estimated to be lower by 4.5% and Canada’s GDP by 1.0% compared to the baseline.”

It notes that because it is assumed that “the Cap is a permanent measure, the shift in the output of the oil and gas sector and associated losses are permanent and accumulate over time. Cumulatively, over the 2030 to 2040 period, we estimate that real GDP in Alberta is $191 billion lower and real GDP in the Rest of Canada is $91 billion lower, compared to the baseline scenario ($2017 dollars).”

Of course, the environmentalists will crow that the oil and gas industry is dying anyway and the demand for oil and gas around the world is slowly decreasing, but this is simply not true.

Global demand for oil and gas is only growing and will continue to do so. According to the report, “Based on current policy and before the impact of the Cap, we expect: Oil production in Canada to increase by 27% by 2030 and 32% by 2040 from 2021 levels; and Gas production in Canada to increase by 10% by 2030 and 16% by 2040 from 2021 levels.”

And this isn’t the only study which projects negative outcomes from this policy. The Montreal Economic Institute (MEI) released a study which describes how the Trudeau government’s proposed Emissions Cap for the energy sector would “cost the Canadian economy between $44.8 billion and $79.3 billion a year” and would “cause substantial losses, without achieving any net reduction in global emission.”

You can read the study here.

Plus it is worth noting that this emissions cap will result in “substantial losses without achieving any net reduction in global emissions.”

Why? Because of the increase in global demands for oil and gas, we can either produce those resources here or get them from another country that has no environmental, much less labour standards, such as Russia, Venezuela, and Iran.

To add insult to injury for the oil and gas producing provinces, and as I’ve pointed out in the past, this cap on emissions would apply only to the oil and gas sector. This emissions cap would not apply to the concrete industry, the automotive industry, or the mining industry. And — surprise surprise — it certainly won’t apply to Montreal’s lucrative jet-building industry.

But take heed: this isn’t simply an Alberta issue. This is a Canadian issue and one that everyone in Canada should be concerned about.

The umbrella of Net Zero by 2050 is large and far reaching, and an emissions cap is simply one part of a multi-layered attack on our economy and way of life. Carbon taxes, layered on top of a Clean Fuel Standard, layered on top of pipeline blockages, layered on top of Bills C-48 and C-69, preventing oil from being shipped from other parts of the world — will run counter to our national interests, and endanger the Canadian way of life for generations to come.

If Canadians are now vehemently opposed to carbon taxes, as we suggested would be the case half a dozen years ago, wait for this unnecessary burden to befall them.

In the words made famous by the Canadian rock legend BTO, “You ain’t seen nothing yet!”

Dan McTeague is President of Canadians for Affordable Energy.

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Dan McTeague

Mark Carney would be bad for Canada

Published on January 18, 2025

Dan McTeague

By Dan McTeague

Carney is a champion of ESG, and the founder and co-chair of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ,) which seeks to harness the might of global finance to bring about a Net-Zero global economy

Whether Carney will actually throw his hat in the ring is hard to predict. He did announce that he will “be considering this decision closely with my family over the coming few days.” But his years-long flirtation with electoral politics suggests that Carney is politically ambitious. And in the tradition of the politically ambitious, he’s lining up his constituents. At this very moment he’s busy making calls, and promises, to Liberal MPs looking for their support. Over the next several days we will hear an unending stream of praise for Carney, that he’s a ‘breath of fresh air,’ that he’s ‘just what Canada needs,’ and on and on.

Well don’t you believe it. Because one thing is for certain — Canada does not need another uber-elite, WEF hobnobbing, Green Agenda-pushing leader at the helm of any political party.

Let’s not forget who Carney is.

The former Governor of the Banks of Canada and England, Carney currently runs the megafirm Brookfield, whose offices he recently moved from Canada to the U.S., and serves as the UN Special Envoy for Climate Leadership and Finance.

Rich, established, and part of the green elite: that is Mark Carney.

I warned about Carney during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 when he — along with climate activist and Trudeau-whisperer Gerald Butts — was pushing hard for what he called a ‘green recovery.’ At the time Carney was framing the economic and health crisis as an opportunity to ‘leapfrog’ into a new economy. Four years later and we have all experienced first hand the real meaning of this utopian green vision — soaring energy costs which have made it harder to heat our homes, gas up our cars and buy groceries.

Conservatives call him “Carbon Tax Carney,” a nickname which his apologists have started to say is unfair, since after years of championing the Carbon Tax, he has recently distanced himself from it.

Well, of course he has! Support for the Carbon Tax has cratered across the country, and Carney is just one of many long-time supporters jumping ship in the hope that their reputation — and their wider agenda — doesn’t get sucked down with it.

Carney has been, and continues to be, a carnival barker for interventionist policies and regulation to control carbon emissions. When it comes to action on the environment and the economy Carney is of the “just do what we smart people say” school. He constantly talks of an impending climate crisis, and supports his alarmist fellow travellers like climate doomster Greta Thunberg, whom he has praised for her “many positive contributions.”

Carney has persistently advocated for strict controls on corporate governance to direct support — that is, money — towards his favored fuels and technologies. In fact, his apparent “about face” on the Carbon Tax (he said it “served a purpose up until now”) came about in the context of his Senate testimony in favor of Bill S-243, the “Climate-Aligned Finance Act,” which seeks to make it nearly impossible for banks to invest in, or loan money to, oil and gas projects in Canada, and tries to force financial institutions to appoint board members ideologically opposed to hydrocarbon energy.

Carney is a champion of ESG, and the founder and co-chair of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ,) which seeks to harness the might of global finance to bring about a Net-Zero global economy. After a lot of initial excitement and acclaim (at least from the Davos-brigade), GFANZ has had trouble coping with the difficult economic times which Carney’s preferred policies have contributed to bringing about, not to mention the potential for antitrust litigation from the U.S. Department of Justice, which seems increasingly likely. Some of the group’s biggest members — Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, CitiGroup, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo — have dropped out of the alliance just in the past month.

That might mean that GFANZ is not long for this world, but even so it should remain as a black mark on Carney’s résumé. It demonstrates that his economic instincts, whichsome are praising, are always towards more control, by the likes of him, over how the rest of us live our lives. And its downfall likely foreshadows what a Prime Minister Carney would do to Canada’s economy.

On energy and the environment, Carney is Trudeau with Wall Street and central bank experience: a green ideologue, but a more sophisticated one.

Canadians are fed up with green ideologues, polished or otherwise. Their ideas undermine our economic well-being, by making energy a lot more expensive. Ultimately, a Liberal Party under Mark Carney’s leadership would represent more of the same green grifting policies we saw under Justin Trudeau.

Dan McTeague is President of Canadians for Affordable Energy.

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Liberals Have Cut Canada’s Electric Vehicle Subsidies, Now It’s Time to Kill the 2035 Mandate

Published on January 18, 2025

Dan McTeague

By Dan McTeague

Former Liberal MP Dan McTeague calls on Mark Carney and all other leadership candidates to kill Trudeau’s electric car mandate.

President of Canadians for Affordable Energy (CAE) and former Liberal MP Dan McTeague says, “It’s good that the Trudeau government are ending their taxpayer funded electric vehicle subsidy, but it’s time to take the most important step of all and kill the government’s mandate that all vehicles bought in Canada be battery powered by 2035.”

As of January 10^th, Transport Canada announced that it “paused” its financial incentive to purchase electric vehicles which had provided up to $5,000 of taxpayers money to anyone who purchases an electric vehicle. Quebec ended its $7,000 subsidy last February. However, the government policy requiring that every car sold in Canada after 2035 be electric remains in force.

“Even with these giveaways in place, it was a stretch for hard working Canadians to afford an EV,” said McTeague. “We at CAE are happy for Canadian taxpayers that the program is coming to an end. But this move must be followed up by abolishing the mandates on unaffordable electric vehicles once and for all.”

“My hope is that each and every Liberal Leadership candidate stands up and acknowledges that mandating that all new cars in Canada be electric by 2035 is wrong and that that policy needs to be scrapped,” added McTeague.

Dan McTeague served in Parliament as a Liberal MP for 18 years, and is now Executive Director of Canadians for Affordable Energy. CAE counts on it’s 60,000 supporters nationwide, you can find more information here: https://www.affordableenergy.ca/

For more information contact:

Dan McTeague
647-220-0114
[email protected]