By Nick Cunningham – Jun 19, 2019, 6:00 PM CDT
Canada declared a national climate emergency on Monday. The next day, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave the greenlight to a massive oil sands pipeline.
The House of Commons, with strong support declared climate change a “real and urgent crisis.” A week before, Justin Trudeau proposed a ban on single-use plastics, which, if implemented, would be the latest in a growing number of bans on plastic that could put multibillion-dollar bets on plastics and petrochemicals by the oil industry at risk.
But Trudeau has never really stood in the way of Canada’s oil industry, despite years of platitudes about addressing climate change. That was clear on June 18, when he gave the approval to the Trans Mountain Expansion (not for the first time), a $4.5 billion twin pipeline that would run along an existing line from Alberta to the Pacific Coast in British Columbia.
The Trans Mountain Expansion is one of a few high-profile pipeline projects that have run into serious trouble. Trudeau first gave the greenlight in 2016, but the project ran aground amid legal challenges from First Nations and environmental groups. Last year, Kinder Morgan, the original owner of the project, headed for the exit, threatening the cancel the project altogether.
Desperate to keep it alive – and the clearest example imaginable of how much the Canadian government depends on the oil industry – Trudeau moved to nationalize the project in mid-2018, buying it off of Kinder Morgan’s hands. A year later, here we are, with Ottawa once again trying to push it forward.
“This isn’t an either/or proposition. It is in Canada’s national interest to protect our environment and invest in tomorrow, while making sure people can feed their families today,” Trudeau said on Tuesday. Despite Trudeau’s plea, many see it precisely as an either/or proposition. Faced with a binary choice, Trudeau could either anger the oil industry, or anger First Nations and environmental groups. He chose the former, even though that was mostly expected. Related: Oil Prices Jump On Hopes Of End To U.S.-China Trade War
“The approval comes as no surprise—the federal government owns the pipeline after all,” Scotiabank’s Rebekah Young wrote in a note. The Canadian government has vowed to build the project with a Crown corporation, then turn it over to private investors or some other company.
But the next step is unclear.
The approval from Trudeau’s government is a “positive step” for the project, but “project execution risk remains elevated,” Goldman Sachs wrote in a note to clients. The investment bank said that while the government plans to begin construction this year, Goldman is not factoring the project into its base-case forecasts, “given prior uncertainty in the outlook of this project.”
HT/David B
To state that the Canadian government never really stood in the way of the oil industry is to reveal one’s total ignorance of Ottawa’s true intent. No sooner did Trudeau approve expansion of the pipeline, they passed Bills 48 and 69, the first banning oil tankers from waters servicing the approved pipeline, the latter making it virtually impossible to approve any more pipelines — or any large infrastructure—without endless regulatory impediment. All couched in the Greta Thunberg child rhetoric spewing from Catherine McKenna, the minister of “Environment and Climate Change”.
Agree with your comment, there is long list of Trudeau government actions that have stood in the way of Canada’s oil industry which commenced with the hiring of Gerald Butts.
Justin Trudeau did not hire Gerry Butts. Gerry Butts created Justin Trudeau.
And probably still pulls the strings.
This just in from the office of the Prime Minister Trudeau:
” A recent government study finds that 100% of plastic kayaks end up in Canadian waters. I’m announcing a ban on all plastic kayaks and ordering them replaced with paper kayaks. Plastic canoes are unaffected”.
And that is the level of scientific understanding possessed by Trudeau. I recently spent time on the west coast discussing massive growth in the number of cruise ships entering and exiting Vancouver and Victoria harbors. Long time local mariners laugh with disgust at Trudeau as they tell me that the cruise ships are filthy massive polluters, little more than tarted up bunker oil belching, floating cess pools.
In these experienced mariners opinions modern double hulled oil tankers are safe for coastal waters and they would see a ban on cruise ships rather than the out of control growth presently seen.
The economic benefit to Canada of a few extra oil tankers a week far, far outstrips the economic benefit of a hundred cruise ships full of tourists buying Chinese-made plastic fridge magnets from street vendors in front of the Empress hotel.
Ironically, the plastic kayaks will be recycled and find new homes in the world’s oceans. That said, our [local] lawns and people will be greener for the effort.
Is this a case of “”Two Bob each way”” or is he just a Nut Case ?
MJE VK5ELL
No it is a charade. With all the new regulations he`s brought in and the bureaucratic nightmare he`s created for developers, no one in their right mind will buy the pipeline he had the government buy, let alkon expand it.
Enviros should be applauding efforts to clean up that stinking natural oil slick which is Alberta tars sands.
If it was an industrial spill they would be demanding billions in damages and trying to sue those responsible.
Photos I’ve seem of extraction sites that have been drained and greened over are amazing ecological miracles. Oddly the greenies love “natural ” oil slicks and want to preserve them in pristine condition.
Greg – you know NOTHING of the Oil Sands or the extraction sites – especially from photos. You want clean oil? Talk to the dirty oil people in Califormia, Suadi Arabia, Nogeria, Venezuela about their “clean oil” before even mentioning the heavily regulated Oil Sands in Alberta. Unti then STFU.
They are not TAR SANDS THEY ARE OIL SANDS. If you are looking for tar sands go to California
From the linked article:
How much of a problem are “deadly heat waves” in Canada, I’m not sure I can recall the last one.
About 100 deaths last summer in Quebec from the heat wave – about 1/12th as many deaths as the 1936 heatwave, which was preceded by 2/3 years of record setting, deadly cold across Canada.
Seems there’s more to the story than a bit of co2 being added to the atmosphere.
After a quick search, only one heat wave turned up from multiple sources. All quoting 33 deaths.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44730887
(Article dated 5th July 2018)
Thirty-three people have died in a heat wave that has baked the southern part of the Canadian province of Quebec, officials say.
The sweltering weather began last Friday with temperatures hitting 35C (95F) and high humidity.
I wonder how many extra people die in the Canadian winter? I’ll bet its more than those dying from supposed extreme heat.
“The sweltering weather began last Friday with temperatures hitting 35C (95F) and high humidity.”
Had that two days ago in Oklahoma. Nobody died. 95F is just a warm day around here. Humidity does make it a lot worse, and it’s been very humid around here for weeks, but normally we get high heat and low humidity because rain gets scarce in the summertime.
Agreed. Just about every summer, we get about a week of 100F high temperatures, and it doesn’t really cool off overnight, although technically, we are in the desert.
I worked for a couple years in another country, and everyone was allowed to go home from work if the temperature exceeded 80F. We Yanks just rolled up our sleeves, opened the windows, and kept working.
“Excessive heat” and “heat wave” are extremely relative expressions.
Upwards of 70 heat related deaths in Quebec, but attribution is less stringent relative to other provinces:
https://globalnews.ca/news/4314088/heat-wave-deaths-quebec-ontario/
“More than 40 scientists worked on the report. They said that Canadians will end up with 10 times as many deadly heat waves and twice as many extreme rainstorms if nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
And just how did they come to this conclusion? Computer models?
Hopefully October and pretty -boy will be out. If he is re-elected, it will prove that Canada is lost.
Canada has a very serious problem.
PM Stephen Harper made two huge errors while in office – he failed to ram through much-needed pipelines as national priorities – such that Canada permanently lost $120 billion in oil revenues; and he left twenty Senate vacancies that Trudeau fils filled with socialists.
Even if we throw out the sock-puppet Trudeau and all his Marxist fellow-travellers, reversing his destructive policies can be blocked by the Senate.
We are not Canada anymore – we are Canazuela.
Climate emergency?
This summer in the British isles has been pretty standard – ie awful, cool, grey, wet etc
Definitely no hottest day evah.
That helps keep the loons quiet.
A couple years of early fall freezes will help send Trudeau on his way.
Yes, weather is doing what it always has. Here in Colorado, we’ve gotten snowfalls of over a foot in some places and it has yet to reach 90F in the Denver metro area this year. Last year there were over 14 days over 90F by this time. Oh the “emergency” of it all.
The leftists are changing the meaning of another word. I’ve had my morning coffee already. Please excuse me while I take care of an emergency.
Nonsense. The sun appeared for 5 or 6 hours yesterday and it was warm enough to take my coat off. pretty gloomy this morning but we are promised a heat wave next week. I am keeping my coat handy
If you can take your coat off it’s already a heat-wave ! Summer in Britain does not start until the first week of September ( and finished ten days later) 😉
Guardian are hyping weather forecasts of hot weather like it is a climate news event, already. That way they can get there daily alarmist content pushed even if the forecasts are wrong. If they are right they get to have twice as much climate crap to publish for the same money.
Everybody knows a true British male is in shorts and T-shirt as soon as the temperature rises above 5C (0C if you’re a Scot).
Should that be Toni not Tony? 😉
Chilly mornings and brisk sunny days across southern Oz with the winter solstice means little wind-
https://anero.id/energy/wind-energy/2019/june
That’s some battery the climate changers are going to have to conjure up sometime with their vision splendid.
I’d still love to see Trudeau in the boxing ring with Vladimir Putin, no Queensberry Rules. They both fancy themselves a little bit tasty, but I’m pretty sure who would win.
I guess the emergency is they have to get that pipeline out of sigh PDQ otherwise the hypocrisy would be all too obvious!
The Reality is:
If Canada suddenly went “Carbon Zero”…forever… the Global Average Temperature a century from now would be unaffected…totally lost in the noise.
Reality:
Approving the new pipeline (to boost federal income) proves that the Canadian climate “crisis” isn’t about the climate. It’s a liberal Trojan horse to increase the socialist stranglehold on Canadians.
Reality:
Canada is probably the country with the most to gain if Global Average Temperatures continue to rise. There is no basis for declaring any climate emergency in Canada. Nothing is “getting worse” in Canada. There are large fields of 1000 year old tree stumps a hundred miles north of the current frost line in Canada, so they should know that they’ll survive (and prosper) in a warmer climate that is not unprecedented in (geologically) recent times.
Reality:
The climate has been getting better the last 50 years, but that won’t last much longer. The AMO index has gone past its peak and is “headed south”. Cooling can happen rapidly when the AMO goes negative. North Atlantic SST’s are cooling. Greenland Ice Mass and glaciers are on average growing again. Canada will suffer significantly in the coming cooling period…especially if they fail to maintain their petroleum infrastructure.
What is the bases for declaring a climate emergency in Canada right now? How much has the climate of Canada changed over the past 48 hours.
The basis for declaring a “climate emergency” is the same as Ireland’s. An excuse to move people into larger urban areas, banning of all personal vehicles and then importing millions of Fake-u-gees.
Ireland has just put in place a policy that will hand over the majority to Muslims in under a decade while completely bankrupting them selves.
As for becoming “carbon neutral” we would need to burn massive amounts of the stuff seeing as our great boreal forest absorbs about 2600 times what we emit. It’s all about control.
An election is coming and Trudeau needs to justify his carbon tax grab.
The author of this article had no clue the damage Trudeau has created to the oil industry, or the overwhelming support that industry gets from aboriginal groups. In fact, the new pipeline will almost certainly be owned by aboriginal investors.
France is about to embark on its first heatwave of the year. “About time,” says Mrs N, who informs me that this week just ended is the first this year when the minimum was in double figures!
The Trudeau decision(s) serve only to confirm what we have long suspected that schizophrenia, or some related condition, is epidemial in modern environmentalists.That (or rank hypocrisy) is the only conceivable explanation for their behaviour.
CANADIANS are worried about the weather getting too warm? We’re talking booby hatch-worthy hypochondria. For one thing, Canada is the coolest major country, and stands to benefit from longer growing seasons, faster forest growth, and smaller heating bills, if that’s actually in the offing. For another thing, if India, the world’s hottest major country, with 35 times more people than Canada, isn’t worried, what good will it do for Canada to worry? Most important of all, the fashionable worriers about climate assume that carbon dioxide is the control knob for future weather & climate. That is far from certain.
Virtue-signaling apparently requires the Masters of Guilt to shoot themselves in the feet because their rivals are running too fast. Please, someone explain how that makes any sense.
Germany…. will save the world, with the same success they had in trying to destroy it twice, ask the only women in the world who has no mirror in her house mrs. mukle.
9
‘Emergency’ is a word that had been spared the Left’s corruption and overuse.
Not any more.
Passing the pipeline is more an election ploy than reality.
You’re probably right. If the leftards win the election there will be a sudden “unexpected” rash of lawsuits to stop the pipeline. And the leftards will cry crocodile tears, wailing “we tried! ”
Disingenuous scumbags.
The Warmist Religion is rising and sweeping the land. Silence the cyclicalists and the fact checkers for they are evil obstructionists. Repent yee non believing skeptics!
Platitudes R Us….opening at a venue near you.
Things may be looking better soon. Greenpeace and Tides have bribed a handful of indigenous groups to protest pipelines and other infrastructure, but a much larger coalition of indigenous groups is tired of it, and wants the economic benefits from the development. It will be difficult for Trudeau to stop the momentum once they get going, as our indigenous people are #1 on the intersectionality hierarchy in Canada today. (I was going to say totem instead of hierarchy but that might be too weak a pun)
Agree 100%. U.S. eco-radicals have been using and abusing Canadian natives to further their own eco-colonial dreams for decades. And it looks like that time has passed.
https://nationalpost.com/business/local-business/david-staples-indigenous-people-level-a-crushing-blow-to-u-s-funded-anti-oil-sands-campaign/wcm/57429d48-41d1-4b1b-9acf-e718f50f5d4c
Lets hope so.
Trudeau may be stupid but he’s not stupid.
Proudly proclaiming to the the world that his family drinks water from non-existent paper water boxes tells you all you need to know about the nitwit. He is driven by an irrational need to signal his false virtue to all around him.
Scary when you stop and think about it.
The Canadians should be upset that mostly US foundations and NGOs are behind much of the opposition to the pipelines. I am surprized that no one is playing the nationalist card, and organizing resistance on that basis that the American Menace is treating Canada like a colony.
There is one error in the article. Although the TMX carries product from the oil sands it is not an oil sands pipeline. It originates in Edmonton and carries other products including refined fuels for West coast consumption. Edmonton is approximately 400 km from the oil sands hub of Fort McMurray.
Make that two errors: “Faced with a binary choice, Trudeau could either anger the oil industry, or anger First Nations and environmental groups. He chose the former, even though that was mostly expected.”
Approving a pipeline angered the oil industry? How?
We had snow the other night on our BC southern interior highways. I just love late snow during an election year.
Trudeau bought the pipeline for 4.5B, sat on it, wasted millions on interest payments, and eventually approved it… he must have had a tremendous ordeal wondering which group to please. He is screwed no matter what he decides. I think this PM is more concerned with staying in office than doing the right thing, and he can’t do either. If it has ever been possible to make everyone unhappy, it is Justin with his pipeline.
Then we hear about the “consequences” from the likes of the opposing leap parties. No specifics other than, “the consequences” and the NDP/Greens want to take the pipeline back to court. “The consequences!” Ooooooo I’m so scared, because there’s almost no one to vote for anymore.
Some of the anti-oil pipeline money comes from the US to the likes of the David Suzuki foundation and native protestors. Readers Digest called him the most trusted Canadian “barf”.
The next day, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave the greenlight to a massive oil sands pipeline.
This article doesn’t include a strong statement of support for said pipeline, made by local First Americans who feel that the income they will derive from it should trump the delicate feelings of global warmists whose virtue-signaling does nothing to feed or clothe said tribes. It’s very likely that Trudeau has decided that Indians must trump virtue-signaling.
Some of us saw this coming. The government will stall the pipeline until the private entity gives up and sells it to government. Then the government will ok the development and sell the pipeline to “private” interests. First Nations can make or break these big projects, and will, unless there is more money in ownership than in protesting. Either way the Canadian tax payer will cover the costs and assume the risk, while others claim the profits. This is not at all like a private company putting up private capital, assuming risk and taking profit. This omelet was cooked before the eggs were laid.
Imagine there’s no emergency
It’s easy if you try
No climate hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today
Imagine there’s no socialists
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill us or die for
And no climate religion too
Correction:
Trudeau shut down a pipeline expansion, the original pipeline had been in operation for decades. The expansion was to lay a second pipe alongside the first.
He shut it down by two methods: Overturning a decision to allow the expansion (theoretically because one of his liberal appointed judges told him to) and by banning tanker traffic from the West coast.
The pipeline owner had spent years and millions jumping through bureaucratic hoops and finally threw their hand in forcing the federal government to buy the thing. Now no one will want to build the expansion so his allowing it (and since when is he the King of Canada) is meaningless.
Why oh why did the Canadian people allow a dangererous child to be their president. They are and will rue the day.
This may seem strange to non-Canadians but it is the political climate in Canada nowadays. Common sense is, if not illegal, not socially acceptable. Everything is the fault of climate, hot, cold, wet, dry, high, low, sun, rain, you name it. According to our national news even substandard screw piles are being caused by climate change…
http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/safety-put-in-jeopardy-by-some-companies-shoring-up-shaky-homes-industry-complaint-alleges-1.5184859
I added the url because you would never believe it without proof.
Catastrophic Anthropogenic Political Climate Change, perhaps.
Next week is Climate Five Alarm Fire followed the next week by Climate Fire in Your Pants. Signing ceremonies will follow.
This would be a great time for Albertans to education Canada and the world in place of being used and whip sawed by agenda science.
Don’t be afraid or sold down the river over a little topping out of a curve…..learn some math about cycles too.
long term
short term
The Kinder Morgan pipeline is okay, and won’t affect Canada’s GHG emissions?
—————————————————————–
TMX approval was already factored in to Paris emissions target, fisheries minister says
The Liberal cabinet’s approval of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion will not make it harder for Canada to meet the emission reduction targets it agreed to in Paris, says Fisheries Minister Jonathan Wilkinson.
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thehouse/tmx-approval-was-already-factored-in-to-paris-emissions-target-fisheries-minister-says-1.5185723
Make that two errors: “Faced with a binary choice, Trudeau could either anger the oil industry, or anger First Nations and environmental groups. He chose the former, even though that was mostly expected.”
Approving a pipeline angered the oil industry? How?
If a real climate emergency appears, then it would be good to have acces to oil and gas.
Trudeau has absolutely screwed the country with delay after delay .
What happens when the thing comes in at $16 billion instead of $ 5 billion ?
Are the shippers going to eat that ? Nope …. tax payers .
Why have the shippers been so silent ? Because they essentially agreed to a fixed price over 5 years ago .
Trudeau can agree to it now , will get destroyed in the October election , and the pipeline will be massively in the red …if built at all .
Trudeau believes budgets magically balance themselves , has opened Canada to a flood of his communist
idols , and delivered a devastating blown to one of the few provinces that play above their weight .
Good riddance .. But isn’t he cute .
Trudeau has absolutely screwed the country with delay after delay .
What happens when the thing comes in at $16 billion instead of $ 5 billion ?
Are the shippers going to eat that ? Nope …. tax payers .
Why have the shippers been so silent ? Because they essentially agreed to a fixed price over 5 years ago .
Trudeau can agree to it now , will get destroyed in the October election , and the pipeline will be massively in the red …if built at all .
Trudeau believes budgets magically balance themselves , has opened Canada to a flood of his communist
idols , and delivered a devastating blown to one of the few provinces that play above their weight .
Good riddance .. But isn’t he cute ?
Let’s see now who exactly is going to pay for a pipeline now 3 times it’s original cost ?
The shippers have been silent . Why would they not be saying boo ?
Maybe just maybe they don’t care because they have a dated low ball fixed price .