Month: April 2019

Bill C-48, An Act respecting the regulation of vessels that transport crude oil or persistent oil to or from ports or marine installations located along British Columbia’s north coast, has passed third reading in the House of Commons and is now at the Senate committee stage.  I’ve been invited to appear before Senate Committee on Transport and Communications on Tuesday, April 30th.  I’ve slightly adapted my opening statement from an appearance before the House Transport committee last year. My opening statement to the committee is as follows:

Thank you for inviting me to appear today. In my remarks which follow, I will focus on those areas most relevant to my expertise – the impact of the proposed tanker ban on Canada’s ability to realize maximum value for its resources and for products derived from Canadian processing of those resources.

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Jason Kenney formalized the United Conservative Party’s climate change and energy plans on the weekend. There’s more to Kenney’s platform than the headlines about scrapping the carbon tax – the platform is a systematic walk-back of some of the most important climate change initiatives in Alberta, an effort to perpetuate myths about other initiatives and, I believe, a gift to those opposed to Alberta’s energy sector.

In case you’re not aware, I have a personal tie to many of these policies: in 2015, I chaired Premier Notley’s Climate Leadership Panel that recommended many of them. I’ve also worked on policies federally under Prime Ministers Harper and Trudeau and provincially under Premiers Stelmach, Redford, Hancock, Prentice and Notley. I’ve written on these topics since before Alberta had its first carbon price introduced in 2007. So, if you want to take this as sour grapes about an opposition party proposing to unwind a policy I recommended, go ahead. But, before you do that, I hope you’ll take time to consider the arguments below.

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