Featured
Knowledge for an Ecologically Sustainable Future?
Innovation Policy and Alberta Universities As scientists and Indigenous elders have been telling us for decades, life on this planet as it has evolved over millions of years is on the brink of a precipice. Planetary ecosystems are threatened with collapse by the pressures of humans’ appropriation of nature and their production of wastes, pollutants, …
State of Play: COVID-19, carbon and energy
2020 has been a year like no other in the political economy of energy and climate change. As the new year broke, wildfires spiked by higher temperatures scorched Australia. In Canada, a different fire took hold as a BC gas pipeline sparked a cross-country Indigenous-led uprising. By mid-March, economies around the world were shutting down …
Alberta’s Keystone XL investment benefits oil companies more than Albertans
Earlier this week, Premier Jason Kenney announced that the Government of Alberta will borrow money to debt finance the construction of TC Energy’s Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline. More specifically, the Alberta government is making an equity investment in TC Energy of $1.5 billion CAD in 2020, and the government will provide a backstop for the pipeline through a $6 …
Bailout for people and communities, not oil and gas industry
Canada is in an economic tailspin due to the COVID-19 pandemic, echoing the worst months of the Great Depression. Yet while millions of Canadians need support to pay for basic necessities, a powerful group of oil company CEOs and lobbyists has insisted on a multi-billion dollar handout from the federal government, to be released any …
Governments should support oil sands workers, not companies
About two weeks ago, my new Corporate Mapping Project report on the future of Alberta’s oil sands industry was published. The report analyzes how the oil sands industry, in the early years of the mature phase of its business life cycle, is producing more bitumen with less capital and fewer jobs. The figure below, produced by earth …
The Future of Alberta’s Oil Sands Industry: More production, less capital, fewer jobs
As debate continues to rage over pipelines for Alberta’s oil, this report analyzes how the oil sands industry, in the early years of the mature phase of its business lifecycle, is producing more bitumen with less capital and fewer jobs. “Since the 2014 oil price crash, advancements in extractive technologies and modular facility design have …
Managed wind-down of BC’s fossil fuel industries: a just transition to a green economy
Imagine it’s 2025 and because of the escalating climate crisis, governments in Asia have declared ambitious new climate action plans and an aggressive transition off natural gas. BC’s fossil fuel exports would soon dry up, workers would be laid off and local communities would lose public- and private-sector jobs. This type of scenario needs to …
Winding Down BC’s Fossil Fuel Industries: Planning for climate justice in a zero-carbon economy
For British Columbia to meet its emissions targets and not perpetuate the climate crisis, it must phase out its fossil fuel industries by mid-century. This means strategically and thoughtfully planning for the coming energy transition, including full decarbonization of the economy by 2050 and a fair transition for workers and resource-dependent communities. The report outlines …
Coastal GasLink connects bad economics with terrible climate policy while trampling on Indigenous rights
Protests around BC and the rest of the country have put Indigenous issues front and centre in discussions of Canadian politics and energy policy. Approved by the BC government, TransCanada’s Coastal GasLink pipeline would run through Wet’suwet’en territory and the company argues it is in the broader “public interest” because of “substantial benefits to First …
Peace River Frack-Up
Part 1 of a report on how fracking poses risks to BC Hydro’s Peace River dams Read Part 2 of the report View timeline BC Hydro has known for well over a decade that its Peace Canyon dam is built on weak, unstable rock and that an earthquake triggered by a nearby natural gas industry …
Oil Together Now: Who’s really playing politics in the classroom?
Alberta Education Minister Adriana LaGrange is very concerned that teachers in classrooms across the province are turning students into anti-oil zealots. Her evidence? Two multiple-choice questions from a grade 10 Social Studies test, reportedly sent by a parent, that appear to cast aspersions on oilsands development (the offending options have been helpfully highlighted). In the first, …
An electrifying announcement leads to more questions than answers
In late August, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau traveled to Vancouver to announce that the federal government had agreed to financially support a new hydroelectric transmission line project in British Columbia’s remote northeast region. In a memorandum of understanding signed with the provincial government, the federal government committed $83.6 million to the project, which will cover …