Enbridge Continuing The Dialogue
Thursday, September 26, 2013 @ 4:39 AM
Prince George, B.C. – As the Joint Review Panel winds its way through mountains of material presented during hearings into the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline project, the company behind the $6.5 billion proposal is stepping up its effort to clearly explain the project to British Columbians.
Radio, television and newspaper ads are being circulated throughout the province in hopes of gathering support for the
plan to run dual pipelines 1,170 kilometres between the oil sands of Alberta and the community of Kitimat on the B.C. central coast. Bitumen would be piped to the coast and loaded aboard tankers heading to Asia while the line heading east would transport condensate, used to thin the bitumen.
plan to run dual pipelines 1,170 kilometres between the oil sands of Alberta and the community of Kitimat on the B.C. central coast. Bitumen would be piped to the coast and loaded aboard tankers heading to Asia while the line heading east would transport condensate, used to thin the bitumen.
The point person on the proposal is Janet Holder, executive vice-president of western access for Enbridge. Regarding the stepped-up advertising Holder says “What this is is really part of a complete outreach campaign which we started probably six months ago. Once we got through the regulatory application and argument, we basically changed our focus. It was definitely at that point in time on process but now that we’re over the process our focus is to engage British Columbia in a dialogue, a conversation. Talk to them where we can and where they’re willing to talk to us about the project. It gives us an opportunity to listen to what peoples’ concerns are.”
Holder says she’s been travelling the province over the last few months, holding coffee chats, a backyard bonfire, meeting with people in neighbourhoods to listen “and to explain what is a very complex project. It’s difficult to explain this project in an article in a newspaper or even in a brochure. The hearing was 180 days long for a very good reason: it’s very, very complex. This just gives us a chance, in a very relaxed atmosphere, it’s just another way to reach out to British Columbians.”
Asked about the goal of these discussions, Holder says “I think just to have people making informed decisions. The campaign is not about convincing people what is right or wrong, it is more about providing information as well as giving us an opportunity to find out what peoples’ concerns are. I mean we’ve been at this for ten years so we’ve heard a lot of concerns and we believe we’ve addressed a lot of them, and we’re still in a position to make changes where we can.”
Holder says it’s not so much that people are misinformed about the project, “I think it’s just that there are a lot of people who are not informed. I would never claim that I’m informed about everything (in society) so people choose what they want to learn and understand about, and we just want to give people an easy opportunity to find ways to get information if that’s what they’re seeking.”
We asked Holder is Enbridge is out to sway public opinion. “I would not use the word sway”, she says, “I think if people are informed, making informed decisions, then everybody makes a better decision. We believe that this is the right project for British Columbia and Canada, that it’s good for BC and Canada, and that we can do this in a way that we can protect, as we should protect, the environment that we as British Columbians all love. What we’re hoping for is that people will find ways to easily access the information so that they can make an informed decision.”
Holder says she is “seeing and hearing less opposition, hearing more support, but what’s really been surprising over the summer is the desire of people to engage in the dialogue. People are really wanting to have the conversations.” She says there is some acceptance, some strong opposition and some who don’t divulge what their final position is.
Holder says “sometimes peoples’ fears are actually issues that we’ve already dealt with. You know, there are still people who believe this pipeline is above ground and it’s not above ground it’s all below ground. There are people who don’t understand that in some cases we could be 30 to 40 metres below the bottom of a river, so some of the concerns about water crossings are alleviated as soon as they have the dialogue. So it is just providing that opportunity to understand the many aspects of this project and the lengths we are going to to protect the environment.”
But what about a break in the pipeline in the middle of the wilderness in the dead of winter under 40 feet of snow? First of all detection of the break, then getting manpower in, equipment in, being able to locate the break and repair it? Holder responds: “We actually operate pipelines that are far more remote than this one. And one of the things you’ll be hearing in the advertising is that over 90 percent of the pipeline is within one kilometre of a roadway. We patrol these pipelines very regularly and we use small planes as well as helicopters and that’s how we manage other pipelines. So it really isn’t as remote, it’s not through pristine areas. It’s following logging roads which goes through a lot of pine beetle-killed areas so it’s actually fairly easily accessible.” Holder notes that Enbridge runs pipelines to Norman Wells in the Northwest Territories, through mountains and rough terrain in Colombia, so it’s nothing new to the company.
Holder says Enbridge has been dealing with aboriginal communities on an individual basis rather than under the First Nations umbrella. She says “60m percent of the aboriginal communities along our right-of-way have signed equity agreements for the pipeline. There are some First Nations who are opposing but I would not say, by any means, that it’s all of them. And those who are opposed we continue to have dialogue and we have many ways in which we hope we can partner with aboriginal communities that will benefit us as well as benefit them.”
Asked whether aboriginal opposition could see the project locked in lengthy court battles, Holder says “I’ll leave that issue for the lawyers. It’s our hope that if the regulator, the Joint Review Panel, agrees that this is in the best interests of Canada, and it can be built in an environmentally-safe way, that we can proceed.
The Joint Review Panel is to turn its report over to the Harper government by the end of December, after which the government will take up to six months to render its decision on the future of Northern Gateway.
Comments
Enbridge stopped work on the Kalamazoo pipeline cleanup because of winter conditions. Winter conditions here are a lot more severe than in Michigan. Furthermore, there is no technology that will allow for cleanup of oil from an ice covered river. And then there is the issue of the the tankers….
Just how much chinese money has been paid out in bribes so that these people will not stop? Despite basic commonsense, overwhelming opposition, and an all canadian pipeline option, this thing will simply not die.
We need someone with a wooden stake. I am not saying Janet Holder is a vampire, but Northern Gateway seems to be.
And Kalamazoo still isn’t cleaned up! A spill like that in the Stuart would finish Prince George. How long would they expect people to sponge bath heating up bottled water on the stove?
Go away Enbridge!
So you guys would prefer we ship this stuff by rail? Let’s hear some viable alternatives instead of rhetoric and platitudes.
This Tars Sands oil is so thick it needs to have dill-bit condensate added to it to thin it enough so that it can be pumped through a pipeline.
That dill-bit condensate will be removed from this oil at Kitimat., the the condensate returned to Alberta in a separate line. This leaves a very thick oil product being loaded and shipped at Kitimat.
All the Multi-Billiuon dollar oil companies involved in this dirty oil extraction, and Enbridge themselves proposing to pipe this oil to the coast, and none of them know whether this extra thick oil product sinks or floats should there be a spill in the ocean.
How can you have a world class oil spill response system if you don’t know the buoyancy properties of the product you are shipping? If that extra thick oil sinks, there will be no oil spill recovery what so ever!
The information I have presented in my previous comment is indisputable and irrefutable fact! Think about that when you listen to their ocean poem and whale singing radio and television ads.
Enbridge has no clue whether this oil will float or sink in the ocean should there be an oil spill. That should make all the “little and big things in the ocean” very nervous!
It is going to the coast and on tankers into the ocean regardless – if not by pipeline then by rail. CN has already been asked to quote on shipping 500,000 barrels a day by rail.
There was just another derailment with a car carrying oil the other day. Where do these rail lines run? Try right alomgside rivers, lakes and inlets – never mind straight through the center of most towns and reserves. How about that for indisputable fact.
Both Transcanada and Enbridge have proposals for pipelines to Eastern Canada.
Northern Gateway is not wanted, not needed, and is a threat to Canadas’ future.
Supporters of Northern Gateway do not have Canadian interests at heart.
So what do you want to do, People#1? Shut the whole oil sands development down? After all the years GOVERNMENTS, both Federal and Provincial have encouraged their development?
Big oil wasn’t exactly tripping over itself to take on the job, if you go back and look at the history of oil sands development.
Maybe you’d like it better if the government did all the development itself, just like some on left believe that the government of Alberta should never have let any private company ever develop any of their oil industry. Would that ensure there’d never be any oil spills, or any other environmental degradation?
Do you know that prior to the first commercial oil strike at Leduc in 1947 private oil companies had drilled over 350 MILES of ‘dusters’ all over Alberta? Can you imagine the public outcry if the Alberta government had spent taxpayer dollars doing THAT in the lean years of the ’30’s and ’40’s?
I suppose it does little good to mention that there are pipelines all over the world, many built through regions far more challenging to build and operate in than the route Enbridge’s will take, (including undersea ones, that take oil from the drilling platforms in the North Sea to shore). Tankers ply the seaways of the world, railcars move more oil, barges on rivers, trucks on highways, more of the same. As one wag once posted under an Exxon sign, “Where’s all the media when we DON’T spill anything?”
The REAL issue that should be of concern to ALL of us here in BC is NOT whether there will be a spill, but rather how this kind of development can be built, (if it makes any sense economically to build it, which it may, or may not), without causing the prices of everything we need and want in the course of living our daily lives to skyrocket. That’s going to impact ALL of us far more severely than the minute likelihood the pipeline will spring a leak, or some tanker might lose its cargo to the ocean’s bottom.
Too bad supporters of Northern Gateway always drop down to the “do use gas in your car” or “you just want to stop the oilsands” arguments.
There is no need for Northern Gateway. Canada can use all the oil destined for export through it domestically.
There are two alternative pipelines to Eastern Canada that equal or surpass the capacity of Northern Gateway.
Too bad the non-supporters of Northern Gateway drop down to having no alternatives or suggestions of ways to make this happen.
No, they’re just standing around their hands over their ears and their eyes shut. There was a time in this country when we found a way to get things done. Too bad those days are long gone.
Nice to see some are is still thinking in the best interests of Canada. You others need to read this and get a better grip on reality.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/economy/canada-competes/what-norway-did-with-its-oil-and-we-didnt/article11959362/
By supporting this proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline, you are in favour of the whole sale sell-off of our raw unprocessed oil to China. This is more in the best interests of foreign multi-national oil corporations which own 75% of the Alberta Tar Sands.
Yup we take all the risks so these foreign oil corporations can line their pockets with money from our oil… oops… correction… their “in-ground” oil reserves.
This has little to do with Canada and more to do with the billion dollar profit margins of multi-national BIG OIL!!! As I post this Harper is playing hooky at the UN and is meeting with business leaders who invest in BIG OIL. We don’t have a Prime Minister representing our country on the International stage, we have an oil sales man pushing oil.
What an embarrassment!!!
Let us start banning oil tanker traffic on the east coast after we finish with Enbridge. Or is the east coast of my country a little less valuable or too faraway to care about? Too bad Newfies and Maritimers don’t care as much as we do about our oceans. They’d be protesting too. Tanker traffic all the way from the Middle East to us from people who hate us? Easier and trendy and acceptable to hate Alberta instead. Ca I live with that? I guess I will have to.
You will not need tankers off the east coast if Canada is self sufficient in oil.
Game, set match.
No kidding herbster, because it is Eastern Canada that still relies of foreign oil as an energy source.
How Ff’ed up is it that we should consider shipping oil to China when our own country’s oil needs are not being met.
We have some people posting on here with some pretty screwed up priorities. Again, glad to see some of us are still looking out for the best interests of our country!
If the pipeline to Eastern Canada is not built, Harper,and his henchman Joe Oliver should be arrested for treason.
People: “By supporting this proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline, you are in favour of the whole sale sell-off of our raw unprocessed oil to China.”
How is Walmart, Canadian Tire, and Costco and every other big box store supposed to stay in business? Hey People, weren’t you spouting off in another threead how you were a proud Costco member? Be careful what you wish for.
Yes, let’s ban tankers, pipelines, and all trade. Let’s hoard our resources and see how far that gets us.
socredible states; “So what do you want to do, People#1? Shut the whole oil sands development down?”
How do you expect me to debate with you if you start of with such an absurd comment as that? Of course I don’t want to shut the whole Tar Sands down. How about keeping it the same size? Or maybe growing it a little by supplying oil to eastern Canada?
Is Alberta starving, or their economy suffering, because the Tar Sands are operating at the capacity and size it currently is? If the oil is NOT sent to the Gulf Coast via Keystone XL and China to via Enbridge… will that “shut down” the Tar Sands? OF COURSE NOT it would mean the Tar Sands would have to remain the same size… only an idiot would think differently right socredible?
So what are the profit margins, operational costs?
“So what are the profit margins, operational costs?”
What are you referring to?
So what are the profit margins, operational costs?
Sorry JB, I hear you yipping around my ankles, but I will not be responding to your nebulous comments, they lack focus and are quite frankly a mess!
Look up “linear thinking” and try to apply that concept.
I might be missing something, but isn’t shipping raw (bitumen) kind of like shipping raw logs……..that is actually shipping jobs out of the country.
Perhaps we should be training more Canadians and refining that oil here, instead of shipping these jobs out of the country.
Of course these companies don’t want to train people – it would cut into profits.
hmmm!
seamut is lazy and will not look up or research that information, rather he wants us to do it for him. I call it the sad sack approach to debating.
He seem unable to learn on his own and expects us to teach him.
Peaple#1, question, how did Norway get it’s money? Answer, exporting oil.
Profit margins related to operating costs of big bad oil. Always hear complaints of billions in profits from critics but they conveniently leave out the operating costs. Exxon for example has a profit of about 10 billion. That is bad bad bad, right. What is not mentioned is the 100 billion operating costs. So what is wrong with a 10% profit?
BINGO… pansy! If we could refine our oil here, adjust our energy policies so that we as Canadians have access to our own cheaper gas and diesel… wouldn’t that be great?
More jobs for us and a cheaper gas and diesel supply!
The Canadian economy will be just fine without this project. Can’t say the same for our environment or communities.
Wow… seamut, I can see why you are afraid to comment in more detail, by doing so you really do climb out on a limb don’t you?
Umm… “profit margins” have more to do with the price of oil per barrel, which can fluctuate quite a bit on the open market.
However, if Canada adjusts it’s energy polices we can supply our own country with slightly cheaper fuel, after all the US is dong it, why can’t we with our own oil supply?
Many countries are doing this, which is why gas and diesel prices vary so much from one country to the next.
Pansy: “Perhaps we should be training more Canadians and refining that oil here, instead of shipping these jobs out of the country. “
Wrong… pansy. The problem is that Canada has priced itself out of the world labour market. It costs too much to do the work here. Keep in mind we are competing on a global scale. We do not live in a bubble.
People: “Sorry JB, I hear you yipping around my ankles, but I will not be responding to your nebulous comments, they lack focus and are quite frankly a mess!”
Yeah, I mede a good point there didn’t I? I understand why you wouldn’t want to address reality and respond. Keep on living in fantasy land.
Seamut, Norway has accumulated an oil fund of $729 billion from its petroleum reserves. Alberta has a Heritage fund of $14 billion.
What is the use of exporting oil if it is done at break even or a loss?
Alberta is exporting more and more oil, but cannot balance its books. So Alberta has a negative profit margin.
From the Fraser Institute
“In 1987, the value of Alberta’s Heritage Savings and Trust Fund stood at $12.7 billion. That year, the province faced a massive budget deficit and transfers to the fund from resource revenues were suspended. Such deposits did not resume again until almost two decades later and only lasted two years before being suspended again.
There is little doubt of the severity of the financial difficulties facing Alberta. In many ways, it’s the late 1980s all over again. Alberta has again squandered a period of pronounced prosperity and ended up with unsustainable deficits, the likelihood of mounting debt, and no savings. While reform and reduction of spending will have to be undertaken in the short term to achieve a balanced budget, the province should not forget or ignore the need for longer-term reform.”
A wise man once told me
“When you are in a hole, stop digging”
You guys forget one important fact. If our oil does not touch coastal waters we get 20 bucks or more less for it than world price. How much is 20 dollars on 900,000 barrels a day? Try 650 million dollars a year.
The oil is going to the coast, have no worry that it will get there with rail cars. Happy Lac Megantic reruns in the future
herbster, this is what happens when BIG OIL & GAS takes over, or unduly influences, the energy policies of a provincial, and now federal government.
All decisions seem to be made in the best interest of those large foreign oil & gas corporations and not what is in the best interests of our citizens and future generations.
There is no way I want my children and this country’s future shipped whole sale to China! Get that Enbridge!!!
You just don’t get it do you slinky, you mention “we” in your comments… it’s not us you are referring to, it is the multi-national oil corporation that are the “we” in your comment… open your eyes man!!!
Socred:”So what do you want to do, People#1? Shut the whole oil sands development down?”
No need to take the discussion to that level! The many alternatives to the Enbridge gamble have been posted here many times. To the Eastern provinces, to the North (Yukon, then on to Alaska) to the South through Alberta into the USA…..
Some of these alternatives are being already considered as making sense by those who are interested in acting upon them.
Read the paper and listen to the news.
Slinky you are wrong. Eastern Canada pays world price for the oil it imports from the Middle East.
I have yet to see that the chinese plan on paying world price for the unrefined bitumen Northern Gateway plans on exporting. So Northern Gateway will GUARANTEE less benefits to Canadians than shipping it east to be refined.
Come on people#2 answer the question? Calling names that the best you got?
Herbster it comes down to policy. Norway has a better system. The fact is Norway still exports to make money. If we do not export how do we make money? We do need a system like Norway’s.
We don’t need to export if we don’t produce as much oil as we consume, and we pay world price for the oil we import.
Give your head a shake.
The theme that only “big oil” will profit is a biased stretch. On of the reasons for Alberta’s deficits is the drop in royalties due to the large discount it receives for its oil. This applies to the feds as well. Shrinking this discount through increased markets will benefit all involved. The idea that citizens will receive no benefit is willfully naive.
Dow7500
Why not sell it to Canadians at world price? Do you hate Canada that much, that you prefer to export oil to China?
Thats not how the free markets work Herb. For starters there is not the capacity to ship to Eastern Canada. There is a proposal to do this, which I fully support, but of course, the anti pipeline/oil lobby is doing all it can to stop/delay this. The only way to get world prices is through increased markets. If we had no railroads to export grain, we would have cheap bread and broke farmers. We seem to have no problem shipping agriculture products to China, why not oil?
There is also no capacity to ship it to China. You choose what pipeline to back. Pick Harper and Northern Gateway and I would consider you a traitor.
Mulcair has come out in favour of the Eastern pipeline. Harper keeps pushing for Northern Gateway.
Which one do you think is the better Canadian?
JB wrote:
“Let’s hoard our resources and see how far that gets us.”
We are doing alright without that pipeline. We have sufficient income to be one of the most affluent countries in the world.
Remember the days when people used to have savings accounts as well as chequing accounts and charge cards. They saved for rainy days, for days when their working days and income days may be gone.
Well, I suggest we start running the country the way my parents did and my mother still does. They had a higher income in their retirement years than they had in any of their working years.
The way this country is being run, we are giving our heritage funds, which are beneath our very feet, away to the rest of the world which will be benefitting as the number of citizens who will be retiring is continuing to increase.
Stupid is as stupid does!!!!
Mulcair has come out in favour of the Eastern pipeline. Harper keeps pushing for Northern Gateway.
Which one do you think is the better Canadian?
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In this case, I’d have to pick Harper. Mulcair is just playing politics; nobody is stupid enough to believe that our country can survive if we did all our own manufacturing. Good grief, can you imagine the prices at Costco, WalMart, Canadian Tire, etc., etc., etc. if they had to buy their stock domestically?
How do you get from sending oil east to doing all our own manufacturing?
This lack of logic might however explain your support of Harper.
So Norway has a socialist government who on behalf of the country setup energy policies that guarantee maximum use and profit of the limited oil resources they have. Through extensive investment, the government has as much ownership and say in the extraction, production and sale of it’s oil reserves as the major international oil companies.
Through this approach Norway has accumulated over $700 Billion dollars in a trust fund that they use to make business and industry in other sectors more efficient and competitive.
Hmm… nice to have a “socialist government” show the rest of us capitalists countries how to manage oil and gas resources properly!
Nice to see seamut actually coming around to a more “sane” way of thinking… who knows… he might even vote for a socialist government next election, because we know the current government operated on a BIG OIL Corporation agenda.
I got sick and tired of Harper spewing on about oil this and oil that today at a NY business convention, when he should have been at the UN representing Canada on the world stage… he’s not a Prime Minister, he’s a BIG OIL & GAS jockey!!!
Oh and by the way… GET LOST ENBRIDGE!!!
You are right herbster, seamut spewed the same Costco, Walmart, Canadian Tire, etc. mantra at me. Puts the breaks on an intelligent debate when they try to make such ambiguous and totally irrelevant comparisons.
I think when they have given all they got, and they have nothing more intelligent to say it becomes their go-to default response.
Norway is about $2.60 cdn per litre right now – just sayin :)
And gas in Venezuela is $.04 /gallon. So what? Would you rather live in Venezuela? Norwegians pay less than 1% of their income on gas, Canadians spend more than 3%
http://www.bloomberg.com/visual-data/gas-prices/20133:Cyprus:USD:g
Posted by: herbster on September 26 2013 12:11 PM
How do you get from sending oil east to doing all our own manufacturing?
This lack of logic might however explain your support of Harper.
——————
So you send the stuff east what do you plan on doing with it? Have it sitting in warehouses in Southern Ontario? Send it to the States and have them manufacture your WalMart trinkets?
It’s difficult to have a discussion with people who have to resort to ad hominen attacks as a rebuttal.
Refine it in existing refineries that now use imported oil.
Then sell it to Canadians in the Maritimes, Quebec, and Ontario who now rely on oil from the Middle East, Venezuela and Africa.
And who are paying foreigners far more for oil than the Chinese will pay for bitumen.
“Norway is about $2.60 cdn per litre right now – just sayin :)”
——————————————
Precisely. And how much is the Norwegian National Debt? Have they paid it off? And how much is the average Norwegian contributing to his or her government in the form of taxes compared to the average Canadian?
Like how I broke it down for you?
Norway ranks third in per capita income at $65,640. Canada ranks 14 at $42,553.
From the news today Statoil (Norways publicly controlled oil company) announced a major oil find off Newfoundland coast. For comparison sake, Norway has a population of 5 million, or 14% of Canadas population.
They are finding our oil for us.
If you had the norwegian average income, you could pay $10/gallon for gas, and still have $17,000 left over and above the average canadian income.
People: “You are right herbster, seamut spewed the same Costco, Walmart, Canadian Tire, etc. mantra at me. Puts the breaks on an intelligent debate when they try to make such ambiguous and totally irrelevant comparisons.”
It seems that there are lots of people who want to believe the choices they make in their daily lives has no effect on decisions like this one. What a fantasy land some live in. Come join us in the real world!
And it sounds like a lot of people should be moving to Norway, as it seems to be a socialists paradise.
Nah, they should all move to Alberta, the free enterprise paradise that can’t balance a budget, save for a rainy day, or pay their bills or pensions.
Yeah, Alberta is the #1 province in Canada in terms of population growth, while most other provinces remain stagnant or are losing population. I wonder why?
Deficit financing. That means spending money that they don’t have.
Herb, Harper is all for a pipeline East. As well as south and west, Hell even north. Whats your point again? He only supports Gateway?
Don’t even start on Mulclair, The guys a complete idiot.
Hey people#1, statoil did find a major discovery. Even a cursory knowledge of the oil business would show this was far from an anomaly. Foreign firms have been making international discoveries since the start of the oil economy. Again whats your point?
herb: “Deficit financing. That means spending money that they don’t have.”
Um,no. But feel free to guess again.
“Nice to see seamut actually coming around to a more “sane” way of thinking… who knows… he might even vote for a socialist government next election, because we know the current government operated on a BIG OIL Corporation agenda.”
People#1 just what is your problem, get a bad batch of granola.
Where did this socialist thing come from. All I did is point out that Norway has policies to look at and they make a profit selling oil with these policies. If they kept the oil internal they would not have that fund. I guess that makes them socialist capitalist.
Gee I wonder if Norway has pipelines.
You still have not commented on profit margins vs operating costs for oil companies.
As far as my politics I pick and choose at the time of voting and am actually neutral on the pipeline. I just comment on wild comments from people such as you.
Oh what colour of paint did you use to paint yourself into the corner?
Tax rate in Norway quite a bit higher than Canada so income comparison is questionable.
Harper is all hat and no cattle when it comes to pipelines east. He only supported it after Mulcair did, for PR reasons. Harper has been in power for 7 years, he has 2 more to go. I guarantee you that no pipeline east will be built during his term in office. Want to see what kind of slimeball Harper is? Just watch his support for Northern Gateway in the coming months.
Statoil shows the importance of State owned oil companies, Norway at 1/7 the size of Canada has one, Canada has none.
Jonnybelt:
from the National Post (google Alberta Budget Deficit)
“Alison Redfordâs government announced it would cut spending and borrow billions to cope with a multi-billion-dollar shortfall.
Within the next three years, Canadaâs wealthiest province will borrow $12.7-billion for capital projects â a major reversal from Albertaâs financial position under former premier Ralph Klein, who paid off the provinceâs $23-billion debt in full in 2004, after several years of severe spending cuts.
âThis is a complete repudiation of Ralph Kleinâs legacy,â said Derek Fildebrandt, Alberta director of the Canadian Taxypayers Federation. He said the budget was unclear; he predicted debt over the next three years to soar to $20-billion.
In 2010 the oil and gas industry represented only 6.8% of Canada’s total GPD, yet we have Harper acting like Canada’s Minister of Oil & Gas abroad, and then acting like the Prime MInister of Alberta when he is at home.
We can do better than this people!
oops, that would be GDP* (Gross Domestic Product)
Norway has established a heritage fund for future generations amounting to 800 billion dollars, all from the royalties from the companies which extract the crude.
Alberta has a huge debt and a deficit, the healthcare system is struggling to meet ends.
Norway also has the greatest number of electric vehicles per capita and the most public free recharging stations per capita. The idea is to reduce pollution in the cities, like healthier air for people.
Perhaps something we should start paying attention to?
———————————-
herb: “Deficit financing. That means spending money that they don’t have.”
JB: “Um,no. But feel free to guess again.”
———————————-
Herb is correct. Not taking in sufficient taxes and borrowing money from future generations to pay today’s bills is spending money that they don’t presently have. If they had the money they would have a balanced budget, hence no deficit.
Just another really wild guess, of course.
Any advanced manufacturing country would be nuts to manufacture goods which can be manufactured by cheap labour. European countries buy manufactured goods in other countries, and they manufacture goods and sell them in the high end product range …. BMW, Mercedes, as well as Italian designed furniture, household fixtures, ceramics, window coverings … any high priced, quality designed and manufactured items.
Here is where the market for high priced goods is …. number of millionaires per country
1 United States 5,231,000
2 Japan 2,105,000
3 Germany 1,326,000
4 China 1,280,000
5 United Kingdom 675,000
6 France 555,000
7 Canada 422,000
8 Switzerland 298,000
9 Australia 275,000
10 Italy 259,000
11 India 251,000
by city
1 Japan Tokyo 460,700
2 United States New York City 389,100
3 United Kingdom London 281,000
4 France Paris 219,300
5 Germany Frankfurt 217,500
6 China Beijing 213,400
7 Japan Osaka 189,500
8 Hong Kong Hong Kong 187,400
9 China Shanghai 166,400
10 Singapore Singapore 157,000
11 South Korea Seoul 130,600
12 Germany Munich 129,600
13 Italy Rome 126,800
14 United States Los Angeles 126,200
15 Canada Toronto 117,600
16 United States Chicago 106,800
17 Australia Sydney 103,700
18 United States Houston 103,200
19 Mexico Mexico City 102,300
20 Russia Moscow 101,200
Lol and Enbridge thinks the pipeline is gaining support, just look at these posts, almost as active as the Costco gas pump story.
“Holder says Enbridge has been dealing with aboriginal communities on an individual basis rather than under the First Nations umbrella. “
Divide and conquer so that is their strategy. Offer them the moon but give them tar.
Axeman just because people don’t want the pipeline doesn’t mean they support rail. The alternative is for them to figure out. The tar pipeline through BC should be avoided at all costs.
No pipeline, no rail line period! BC and the rest of Canada will do just fine without it!
Herb, the only way that a eastward pipeline doesn’t get built is if Quebec and the econazi’s’s win the day. I know its in your DNA to crap on everything Harper, but your losing what little credibility you have with blind bias and selected facts.
If the eastward pipeline gets built, then there is no need for Northern Gateway. Why then is the Harper Government pushing it?
The trouble with you Harper sycophants is that you don’t think.
BCRacer, CN isn’t the problem, crude by rail is the problem. There are spills right across the industry. The Quebec catastrophe was not CN. CP has its share. It all ponts to pipelines to get crude to markets as the safest and efficient way. I’m sure people will bring up Kalamazoo, but lets be clear here. There are pipelines built 50 years ago that where built no where near today’s standards. They are not perfect but they dwarf all other means of transport for safety. Gateway would be the most scrutinized and monitored pipeline on the planet.
Further more, the idea that Enbridge would cut corners to maximize profit is a urban environmentalist myth.
There’s zero money in a pipeline spill, only billions of lost profit. So Enbridge, being of the capitalist pig variety, would go out off its way to ensure no spills.
The stock market won’t pay up for polluters, its just not good for business.
Herb…..news flash…Harper is pushing every pipeline. He is not fixated on NG like you. He was in NYC today saying “NO” to keystone is not an option. Guess he likes that pipeline too.
Every pipeline but an all-canadian one. Which is one that could be built quickly and safely.
dow7500 states; “There’s zero money in a pipeline spill, only billions of lost profit. So Enbridge, being of the capitalist pig variety, would go out off its way to ensure no spills.”
I beg to differ…
http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/article/20130227/PRINCEGEORGE0101/302279982/-1/princegeorge/oil-spills-can-benefit-economy-panel-told
This Enbridge representative proudly touted there would be lots of money that could be made off a pipeline spill… imagine that!!?? What a disgusting concept and way iof thinking!!!
Are you of the mindset that Enbridge makes money from spills?
Umm.. no dow7500, I am of the mindset that Enbridge thinks there is lots of money to be made off of an oil spill.
It’s ff’ed up thinking but that’s what they are inferring, read the article and then reads the comments to that article, also note how many times that story was shared on facebook and twitter. It was a big hit to Enbridge’s reputation when that story came out. It showed us all where their mindset was, so to speak.
Dow ….Enbridge ignored the fact that the Kalamazoo pipeline needed maintenance for 5 years……5 years Dow. Until it finally burst and the morons at the controls kept pushing the go button until someone at the site said STOP. Unacceptable Dow plain and simple. They are still cleaning it up!!!
Suzuki called himself a 10 th level maggot being a 1 percenter.
“It is production, not destruction which creates prosperity”
Some products and some services provided by some companies are simply better than those provided by other companies.
The test, in this case, is not only which transportation method has the least risk, but also which company presents the least risk.
And with that, we are not done yet. We have not yet looked at the entire process from extraction to end use of the product which provides the least risk. That means it includes such things as to which level the transported product should be refined to.
Finally, it goes beyond the land based transportation, and includes the sea based transportation system.
The above is the environmental risk as well as associated economic risks associated with any failures.
We have not yet touched the notion of economics and the leakage of money to those who own the resource, the people in whose jurisdiction the resource is found.
What is best for the province and what is best for Canada.
Remember, Texas has had to switch from an oil economy to a goods and services producing economy. Oklahoma the same.
Result? Texas is #25 in the USA when it comes to median household income and Oklahoma #45.
No oil in Maryland, New Jersey and Connecticut … #1 though 3 …
Alaska is #4 and still running an oil based economy.
Noway,Im sure that they don’t want a repeat. Flush a billion and counting…..not a great business model.
They are cleaning it up. There were mistakes made. Like all accidents, people learn. Don’t rule out all pipelines based on Kalamazoo. It’s just not practical.
Gus. ask North Dakota if they like the resource sector.
I’m getting your diversification theme. But you need to play the resource hand your dealt.
No government navel bases in North Dakota. But its a government world in Maryland. Throwing out, out of context facts and stats
baffles most, but not all.
What does Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline and Harper have in common ? Both will simply not take no for an answer.
The Oil spill
Thick. Crude.
A lifeless pool of black tar.
A suffocation blanket capable of choking all life above and below it.
And provides a vast dark gateway to destruction of all living things.
I think any export of oil outside of North America with Canadians paying the world market prices is treason. Those people are all traitors as far as I am concerned. UnCanadian and no respect for the well being of the country, just the bank accounts of traitors and the foreign multinationals.
British Columbia takes all the risks and the pipeline shareholders get all the rewards. The billions in Canadian fisheries, clean water for our towns, the birds and the salmon, the integrity of our rivers… the budget deficits of our province for the clean up… all non factors to the proponents of the Northern Gateway. Divide and conquer is their plan.
The oil companies have proven they can not be trusted. They will up the price because Assad in Syria farts, they will jack the prices up for any reasons they can find… its not based on return on investment but rather getting the most in a market as they possibly can through any means necessary. Energy sustainability and affordability is one of the top priorities of nation and society. So this world market price thing is treasonous to the dignity of this country we call Canada. They should at minimum be paying an export tariff with x being the Canadian price and world exports being at least 20% more (the cost of being an importer).
People forget in the times of donkeys and carts we were all equal in our manual labor based standard of living and it is only since the age of energy and the way we put it to work for us that we have been able to advance our standard of living above that of a peasant Chinese laborer. Its the multiplication factor on output of human input that creates wealth. If we race to the bottom we all loose.
Foreign multinationals can sell to anyone to create wealth for themselves. Its our governments that needs to ensure our national wealth in energy resources are used to generate a higher standard of living for Canadians, and I don’t see that happening with our give away and subsidized risk for the foreign multinationals.
For me I rank the the issues of importance on the following scale:
#1 Selling to Canadians at world market prices as set by say the Asian exports which undermines the standard of living values for Canadians.
#2 Provincial government assuming the risk and the cut out subsidiary corporation revenue centers having limited liability. A half a billion in liability insurance for the Gateway project is laughable and is a subsidy by all the other hard working people in BC for the other $19.5 Billion in liability insurance.
#3 The risk to other Canadian industries in the trade off.
#4 The cost to our ocean and rivers from a spill of unknown effects from a system that is not fool proof.
#5 The huge inflation this project will cause to our local region.
If Alberta wants to send it to the East coast to be refined and be Canadian then I say great lets do it.
If Alberta wants to sent it to Texas to be refined then I say its bad policy and a sell out to Canada, but not quiet treasonous considering our close bond economically to America.
If Alberta wants to send it anywhere in Canada to be refined and then selling the refined product abroad, then we are building Canadian industry and deepening the resilience of the Canadian economy and lowering the shipping risks… we should still have export tariffs, but at least we are moving in the right direction.
If Alberta wants to stick BC with all the risk for raw bituman exports to Asia because they have an addiction problem and can’t manage their budget, then I suggest they go to George street and chew some gum from the sidewalk while they try to get off their addiction problems.
North Dakota is doing well because they have the only state owned bank in America. They wouldn’t even have an oil industry today if it wasn’t for the seed money from their state owned bank that created the opportunity as well as lends to state business when national private banks won’t. They are American patriots using their state power to empower America while the parasites on Wall street try to tear it all down through bankster globalization.
Don’t see all the bitchers rushing out for their horses and buggies.
BS eagle, North Dakota isn’t booming due to a state bank. Financing isn’t a problem for ND now. Wait for the next depression and you could have a point.
“Gus. ask North Dakota if they like the resource sector.”
Why bother? …… all the usual problems that happen with single industry, quick growing small communities….
You think it is all fun and games? You never see all sides ….. I remember the program TV ran on the problem with Mackenzie when it was first built as a one industry town some 40 years ago. And, we have seen the recent up and downs.
If you think North Dakota is any different, you are delusional and do not understand the growth and death of resource towns.
Nothin’ for nothin’
North Dakota’s oil boom has put pressure on women
http://www.startribune.com/209723591.html
“Once quiet farm roads now straining with traffic. Crime. Rents on par with Manhattan.”
“The average annual wage in the county is $77,000. (The average wage in the state is pretty close to half that.) No college degree needed.”
“In 2000, the census put the townâs population at about 12,000. Some estimates put it at 30,000 today. The police force has more work to do. Overall, calls for police service have tripled.”
Welcome to oil country ….. nothing new there, but you seem to be oblivious to that part of a boom town, DOW7500.
Haven’t had too many worldly experiences from the sounds of it, or maybe you love that kind of macho, yahoo, big spender, nouveau riche environment.
“Financing isn’t a problem for ND now.”
Thanks for the honesty of putting in the operative word “NOW”.
Who bankrolled the original explorations and installation of technology to access oil that is not “conventional” oil and thus more risky? Eagleone likely has a point.
Give me a few minutes.
http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/eij/article/bombing_north_dakota
The pains of landowners who do not own the below surface mineral rights.
“ask North Dakota if they like the resource sector”
Who exactly is North Dakota if it is not the people who have lived there for decades? Aliens, as they are called in the USA, do not represent North Dakota. They are leeches!!
“Pat Hedstrup, a second-generation rancher in her forties who lives west of Dickinson, says the air pollution has gotten so bad that sometimes the cattle reject the dust-laden feed. âItâs so full of dirt you have to wash it or nothing will eat it,â she says. âSometimes the hay has so much dirt the cattle wonât even lay on it.â Open range cattle in North Dakota have begun to die from dust pneumonia, a disease usually limited to feedlots”
Starting to get the point DOW7500?
That’s a rhetorical question. We all know you are incapable of rational thought.
“Flaring of natural gas is one of the many reasons that there are air pollution issues with oil and gas drilling. It is a major issue that contributes to climate disruption, puts public health at risk and is economically wasteful.”
“The absolute volume of flared gas in North Dakota has increased 2.5 times between May 2011 and May 2013. Sadly, this has propelled the United States to join Russia, Nigeria, and Iraq among the worldâs top-10 flaring countries.”
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/compass/2013/08/flaring-up-in-north-dakota-natural-gas-emissions-from-oil-production.html
Ya ,boomtowns stress the system. Nothing new here. Like most landowners in Canada, very few own mineral rights, but are compensated for surface rights. Ask any farmer with oil leases and pipelines if they like the oil patch. In hard times these payments keep the farm going. I know, I receive them.
As far as local banks financing the Baken oil play? not bloody likely. That risk is out of there league.
Not much worldly experience gus? Mine is from real life experience not computer spam and cut and paste, which seems to be your foundation.
Good thing you weren’t in Barkerville 125 years ago or the Kootenay’s in the Silver rush. Your head would of exploded.
If your trying to make a rational argument, don’t cut and paste Sierra club crap as fact.
Wow over 100 comments, how often does that happen on this comment board?
Back to the topic… GET LOST ENBRIDGE… LOL
Dow7500,
“The Bank of North Dakota is the only state-owned bank in Americaâwhat Republicans might call an idiosyncratic bastion of socialism.”
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2009/03/how-nation%E2%80%99s-only-state-owned-bank-became-envy-wall-street
So they specifically targeted the energy industry with participatory lending in conjunction with other private banks to share the risk of incubating the new energy industry in their state. The funds of the state and its taxes run through the bank giving it liquidity, and it is the bank of choice for residents who want a safe place to put their money.
The North Dakota State Bank acts as a sort of mini fed that provides liquidity to over a hundred other private banks when it comes to financing economic development in North Dakota.
Key to their success is they do no sub prime lending and stay away from the derivative markets. Half of all profits are paid to the state as a dividend.
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