TC Energy cuts 1,000 jobs on KXL demise

Workers in u.s. and Canada affected

TC Energy Corp. has let go 1,000 workers in both the U.S. and Canada after President Joe Biden cancelled the Keystone XL oil pipeline project.

“A majority of the 1,000 are unioned workers who have been constructing on both sides of the border,” Terry Cunha, a spokesman for the Calgary-based company, said Thursday by email.

Biden withdrew a permit to build the pipeline within hours of assuming office Wednesday. Construction of the pipeline, which would have transported more than 800,000 barrels a day of oilsands crude from Alberta to Nebraska, started last year after the government of Alberta invested $1.5 billion in to jump-start work.

Building of the controversial, cross-border conduit that was first proposed more than a decade ago was authorized by president donald Trump in 2017, just over a year after president Barack Obama rejected the project on environmental grounds.

Alberta, home to the world’s third-largest oil reserves, viewed the line as essential for delivering its heavy crude to u.s. refineries at a time when alternate supplies from Latin America were dwindling. Environmentalists argued that the pipeline would stimulate expansion of carbon-intensive oilsands production, worsening global warming.

On Wednesday, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney lashed out at the decision by the new u.s. administration.

“This is a gut punch to the Alberta and Canadian economies,” Kenney said in a press conference Wednesday. “It’s an insult.”

Kenney said Trudeau should demand the new u.s. administration sit down and discuss the project in the context of environmental, climate and security policy. If that fails, Canada should be willing to impose “meaningful” punitive measures against its biggest trading partner.

Biden’s decision Wednesday will cost more than 2,000 people their jobs working to build the project, Kenney said.

The Keystone XL pipeline is one of three pipeline projects that Alberta’s oilsands producers were counting on to get their crude to foreign markets after struggling for years with a lack of export pipelines.

TC Energy (formerly Transcanada Pipelines) shares jumped on the news, closing 2.34-per-cent higher to $57.23 in Toronto.

Biden’s decision to revoke the pipeline’s permit was part of a sweeping order to review all of former president donald Trump’s actions weakening environmental protections, including America’s return to the international Paris Agreement to fight climate change.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Biden are scheduled to have a phone call Friday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said. Trudeau said Wednesday Ottawa is disappointed “but acknowledge the President’s decision to fulfil his election campaign promise on Keystone XL.”

Trudeau praised Biden’s other first-day orders, including the move to rejoin the Paris climate agreement.

In a statememt Thursday, Jim Hoffa, general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which represents pipeline workers, criticized Biden’s issuance of an executive order cancelling the completion of construction of the project, adding it will affect 8,000 union jobs and members’ retirement and health benefits.

“The Teamsters strongly oppose yesterday’s decision, and we would urge the administration to reconsider it. This executive order doesn’t just affect u.s. Teamsters; it hurts our Canadian brothers and sisters as well who work on this project. It will reduce good-paying union jobs that allow workers to provide a middle-class standard of living to their families. America needs access to various forms of energy that can keep its economy running in the years ahead. This decision will hurt that effort.

“Going forward, we expect the President to boost u.s. workers by allowing them to come together and negotiate for better wages, benefits and retirement security as his administration pushes forward with policies that grow good-paying jobs that support American families.”