Andrew – Page 2 – Rescuing the frog

The evolution of Alberta gas prices

December 20, 2018 by Andrew

Today was mostly a course prep day for me and, as part of that, I was updating a graph package for my students. I decided to pull down some longer history on Alberta natural gas prices and overlay them with settlement prices for futures contracts. These are US-dollars-denominated contracts but for gas at the Nova … Read more

All credible agencies?

December 19, 2018 by Andrew

My fellow economist Jack Mintz has a piece out this morning in the Financial Post on Alberta Separatism. By Jack’s standards, this piece leaves a lot to be desired – it makes a claim that an Alberta exit from Canada would be easier (implied) and more beneficial (explicit) to Alberta than Brexit has been for England. Now, to be fair to Jack, given that we are mere months from an official Brexit and no one seems to have any idea how it’s going to work, it would be hard to come up with a major change in policy which would be less beneficial to the region involved than Brexit is likely to be for Britain, but let’s put that aside. The piece struck me as being glaring in its many omissions. What of currencies? Trade deals? Border security? International relations? Family connections? Perhaps amid all of these, you’ll think that the omission which struck me the most is relatively minor, but I don’t believe it is.

My FINA remarks

May 7, 2018 by Andrew

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. It’s a pleasure to speak to you today to express my overall support and to provide context for the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act, Section 5 of Bill C-74. This legislation is the backbone of the federal government’s approach to climate change and will complement the measures already taken by … Read more

Bill 12 – Problematic Legislation That Should Never Be Proclaimed

April 18, 2018 by Andrew

Alberta’s Energy Minister Marg McCuaig-Boyd introduced Bill 12, The Preserving Canada’s Economic Prosperity Act, on Monday and stated that the province, “absolutely intends to use it if we need to,” on Tuesday. The government should never be given that chance. Bill 12 is potentially in direct violation of the limits of provincial powers which are … Read more

Western Canadian oil pricing

February 5, 2018 by Andrew

A lot of discussion happening about pipelines, market access and crude differentials these days. I’ve started using this map as a means of illustrating the various levels to this debate. First, it’s important to always note that all oil is not equal – if you’re looking at a WTI-WCS differential and getting really upset about … Read more

Back to the FrogBlog

February 4, 2018 by Andrew

It’s been two and a half years (wow) since I’ve written anything on this blog site, and more than three years since I’ve updated in on any kind of a regular basis. Over the next while, I’m going to get back to more writing so hopefully that will change. I hope that a few of … Read more

The Mill Creek and the Valley Line – An opportunity we shouldn’t pass up

March 24, 2015March 22, 2015 by Andrew

Up until 1970, the Mill Creek flowed through the ravine as we know it today, under what is now Connors Road, between 98th Avenue and the current site of the Muttart Conservatory, and finally under 98th Avenue to empty into the North Saskatchewan River. You can still see the delta today – just walk east … Read more

Updates

November 15, 2014 by Andrew

I don’t update this blog much now, as most of my writing goes to Maclean’s – please check here for the latest – as well as occasional posts at the Globe and Mail here. I hope to post move back to posting more technical analysis here in the near future. Thanks for checking-in.

Do Oil Spills Boost the Economy?

May 5, 2014 by Andrew

This week, Press Progress and the Vancouver Sun’s Peter O’Neil reported that Kinder Morgan had quantified the economic benefits of oil spills in its application to expand the Trans-Mountain Pipeline from Edmonton, Alta. to Burnaby, B.C. Yes, the benefits of oil spills—they create jobs in the communities where the spills occur. Beyond being a public relations disaster for the … Read more

How Canada’s incoherence on climate is killing Keystone

April 24, 2014 by Andrew

There’s no shortage of blame being passed around in the wake of another delay in the U.S. regulatory approval process with respect to TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline which, it was announced last Friday, will now drag on for at least another six months. Among other reasons cited for the decision, the Calgary Herald’s Deborah Yedlin and others have cited a lack of greenhouse gas policies applied to Canada’s oil sands. Yedlin is direct, saying that, “the evidence to date suggests (that the Harper government hasn’t listened to what is being said in Washington) because the Harper government has not moved on anything resembling a policy on greenhouse gas emissions.” I think she’s right, to a point, but I think the problem is not that we haven’t been listening, but that our governments, both in Edmonton and in Ottawa, have yet to establish a coherent vision on anything which includes the words climate change and oil sands.

This post previously appeared at Maclean’s magazine.