Liberals bury Canada's energy hopes

Dreams of Canada being an “energy superpower” have been dashed because of political leaders who place virtue signalling about climate above our national interests and the welfare of Canadians.

Canada's oil and gas industry received another in a series of devastating blows this week when, as one of his first orders of business after being sworn in as U.S. president on Wednesday, Joe Biden issued an order revoking the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have transported crude from Alberta to Nebraska, and then on to Gulf Coast refineries.

The move was not unexpected, given that Biden had campaigned on cancelling the project. But after four years of strained relations, reversing course and allowing construction to continue would have sent a strong signal that the incoming administration intended to mend the bilateral relationship between the U.S. and Canada. That is, if there was any reason to believe that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberal government would have welcomed such a gesture.

And indeed, the federal government's reaction to Biden's executive order has been meek, to say the least. Foreign Affairs Minister Marc Garneau said that “we understand” and “respect” the decision. Canada's ambassador to the U.S., Kirsten Hillman, said the government was “very disappointed,” but that it respects Biden's choice. And in a short statement on Wednesday, Trudeau said he is “disappointed,” but almost immediately went on to praise the Democrat for re-entering the Paris Agreement and halting oil and gas development in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Given the reaction, it's hard to blame Biden for believing that reversing former president Donald Trump's decision on Keystone would be an easy way to placate his base and the progressive wing of his party, without costing him too much political capital or causing permanent damage to his relationship with Canada. But it's bad news for the economies of both countries.

For years now, Canada's oil and gas sector has been struggling, plagued by a lack of pipeline capacity and a steep discount in the price of Western Canadian Select crude. The industry has pinned its hopes on the construction of new pipelines, and although there have been numerous proposals over the years, they have all been mired in setbacks, raising the question of whether this country is even up to the task of doing big things anymore.

Trudeau, especially, has tried to walk a fine line between appearing to take action on climate change and appearing to support the country's oil and gas industry. While campaigning in 2015, he said that, “We need to get our resources to market … and that means pipelines, but those pipelines have to achieve the public trust and the social licence that is necessary.”

One would be hard pressed to think of more ways that TC Energy, which owns Keystone, could have gone about trying to obtain “social licence,” a term that refers to the idea that environmental activists and stakeholders need to be appeased in order for largescale energy projects to get the go-ahead.

The company had planned to spend $1.7 billion to power pump stations along the entire line with renewable energy and pour $10 million into a “green job training fund.” The pipeline's construction would have generated upwards of 60,000 direct and indirect jobs, many of them unionized, on both sides of the border. TC also reached agreements with five First Nations, which would have taken a $785-million ownership stake in the project, and promised that $500 million would go to Indigenous suppliers and workers.

Rather than grand and expensive gestures such as these leading to much-needed pipelines being built, Liberal policies have only created more red tape for the companies that want to build them, and more avenues for their opponents to shut them down.

It's little wonder that private investors have been fleeing in droves. There have been nearly half a dozen viable pipeline proposals over the past decade or so that could have been built with private money if we had found some way to keep politics out of the equation. Instead, the federal government paid $4.5 billion to nationalize the Trans Mountain Pipeline in 2018 and the Alberta government sunk $1.5 billion into Keystone and provided TC Energy with billions more in loan guarantees.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has called on Ottawa to impose sanctions on the U.S. if a diplomatic solution cannot be reached. But a trade war with our largest trading partner is the last thing this country needs, especially in these times of economic uncertainty.

We may disagree with many of Biden's policy positions, but we understand the value of forging a good relationship with whoever occupies the White House — a concept the Trudeau Liberals failed to grasp throughout much of Trump's term.

What we, as Canadians, can do is ensure that our next government will be willing to forcefully advocate for Canada's economic interests, at home and on the world stage. Maybe then, the president will think twice before snubbing us, and we will finally be able to become the energy superpower we could be.

IT'S LITTLE WONDER THAT PRIVATE INVESTORS HAVE BEEN FLEEING IN DROVES.