City well positioned to answer demand for renewable energy

The issue of climate change is one that is no small source of debate in Medicine Hat, the province, the country and across the planet. But there is little debate as to whether it is happening or not.

In Alberta, every party represented in the Legislature are of the consensus climate change is real and has a potentially negative effect on this province.

I believe this city has the tools and resources to continue to be an energy production leader, not just in this province but in this country.

The reason I believe this is that Medicine Hat has a 100-year history of energy production.

It now has the opportunity to extend that history into the next century.

In 1926, the patent was taken out on the technical process for separating sand from bitumen.

Over the course of 90 years, Albertans developed this process further with the financial support from government, educational institutes and industry to make this resource profitable.

With the Leduc No. 1 strike in 1947, Alberta began to cement its place on the energy production world stage.

Medicine Hat doesn’t just have the technical expertise necessary for energy resource production that comes with a century of experience but it can tap into the province’s regulatory, geo-technical, financial and legal infrastructure required to get the most of our resources.

The global marketplace is now demanding a more sustainable source of energy.

For 30 years, Alberta has been developing its renewable resources and the technologies required to make them work in this province. For the majority of those three decades, this province has been a leader in Canada in developing this technology.

The city’s economic development agency, college, and private industry are exploring ways to take advantage of the current drive towards producing sustainable energy for the benefit of southeastern Albertans.

This city — we — have all the pieces of the puzzle to meet the global demand for sustainable energy and require only the commitment to provide the leadership and foresight necessary to complete the picture.

We did it with natural gas, we did it with conventional hydrocarbon extraction and we did it in the oilsands, despite the criticisms over the decades that it would never be profitable.

And I believe we can now do it with renewable energy.

Medicine Hat is well positioned to take advantage of this demand for sustainable energy sources, being not only the sunniest city in the country but also by way of having one of the best wind resources in Canada.

We have the resources, we have the management and regulatory capability and we have the human capital.

So the questions Hatters need to ask themselves is if we don’t take advantage of this situation now, then when?

Bob Wanner is MLA (NDP) for the Medicine Hat constituency.