Is the Northern Gateway pipeline dead?
Monday, October 26, 2015 @ 3:45 AM
By Bill Phillips
My apologies to Todd Doherty.
In my last column, I suggested that he did not have a job to fall back on if he didn’t win the election. In fact, Doherty is a small business owner, so he certainly would have had something to return to.
My apologies and congratulations.
• • •
As the dust continues to settle on the federal election, one of the questions facing northern B.C. is the fate of Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline.
Has it sunk like bitumen in a pristine waterway?
Prime Minister-elect Justin Trudeau stated during the campaign that he does not support the project, which started out as a $6 billion project but is now projected at close to $9 billion. Trudeau told the Vancouver Sun that such a pipeline has no place in the Great Bear Rainforest … so good luck going around it because the rainforest covers most of the B.C. coast.
During the campaign, Cariboo-Prince George Liberal candidate Tracy Calogheros demanded that Enbridge remove her image from a website associated with the pipeline. She obviously wasn’t for the pipeline either, and her photo was used in her capacity as CEO of The Exploration Place.
Trudeau has proposed a moratorium on oil tankers off B.C.’s north coast, which would effectively scuttle the project as well.
There are many who feel that the project was dead long before Monday’s federal election.
One thing is certain, it will have a tougher path now with Trudeau and the Liberals setting federal policy.
However, the Government of Canada has already approved the project, subject to the company meeting 209 conditions imposed by Ottawa.
So what happens if Enbridge rolls up next week and tells Ottawa that it has met those 209 conditions and British Columbia’s five conditions, to boot?
The Conservatives, when they were in power, were criticized for politicizing such decisions. They took the final decision for major projects out of the hands of the Joint Review Panel, which actually holds hearings and investigates projects, and gave it to the minister responsible (which under the Harper government meant the Prime Minister’s Office).
So, will Trudeau use that hammer the opposite way and kibosh the project even if it meets the conditions set out by the federal government?
Should that happen, would Enbridge then be entitled to some compensation? Enbridge would likely feel it is. After all, it has piped (sorry, poor pun) a ton of cash into the project and, should it meet the 209 conditions (granted a pretty tall order), it would have done what is required of it. To still have the rug pulled out after all that for, purely political reasons, would, no doubt, move things into the courtroom.
Trudeau might want to wait and see if the project dies on its own accord. Just saying ‘no’ might be a costly decision.
Bill Phillips is a freelance columnist living in Prince George. He was the winner of the 2009 Best Editorial award at the British Columbia/Yukon Community Newspaper Association’s Ma Murray awards, in 2007 he won the association’s Best Columnist award. In 2004, he placed third in the Canadian Community Newspaper best columnist category and, in 2003, placed second. He can be reached at billphillips1@mac.com
Comments
Some will surely hope the pipeline is dead.
Some are undecided.
And some are crying themselves to sleep at night in fear that it is.
I phoned in and spoke with an investor on the CBC radio show BC Almanac a few years ago. My question was; why can you not refine this highly toxic dil. bit. on site (creating Canadian, and oh so coveted Alberta oil and gas jobs)? The resulting fuel, in whatever state you please (as long as it doesnt sink in water should an accident occur), then be piped where ever you like. His anwser, project would be too costly. Not economicaly feasible. ??? So its better to pipe that stuff through a province and a half, load it on tankers, ship it to Asia, and refine it there. “I dont think so, Hommie don’t play that”. If its too costly to achieve an environmentaly and socialy acceptable version of this project, then I guess they can’t afford to do it. And besides, since when the f*** could the oil and gas companies and their owners not afford something. Rant over.
Doherty owns a small business??/ where… I know his wife own her business and Doherty is job hunting and going from one job to another
The fiberals have a history of canceling contracts. Remember the 500 million of taxpayer money paid out when the helicopter deal was canceled. Helicopters which where needed and later acquired anyhow.
If the pipeline is cancelled, how much will it cost us?
Hey seamutt, still pouting after last Monday’s election? Get over it.
Hey I vote for who ever will do the most damage. Me thinks in a year or so it will be hard to find anyone who voted liberal.
Your response lbear did not counter my statement, truth hurts hey.
I don’t think it will ever be built . They missed their window of operatunity . The business model is not working . It’s failing our societies . The existing energy business model is based on scarcity , depletion and command and control monopolies . It has all the nuisances and all the inificiencies of a Rube Goldberg machine . Everyone wonders why refineries are not built at source in the tarsands ? That’s easy to figure out . Refineries are built with a hundred year shelf life . The oilly folks know the game is just about over , so all they would be doing is building a stranded asset along side of their stranded leases . By 2030 it’s game over for them .
Should have read less damage.
Ataloss the game is over for them? Are you kidding, name one thing in your life not part of a petroleum product?
Did you know the carbon trading scam is now bigger than the oil industry, all the big money houses are in. You comfortable with that?
You can’t have a conversation about business models if you don’t know what that even means . Put in the search box . Define business model . It’s really not the burning of stuff that is their problem . It’s the business model of depletion , diminishing return on investment and scarcity . Coal and nuclear is already being priced out every where that it is not being subsidized like in canada and the USA . Petcoke market is all but dead . But don’t worry your pretty little head about any of it . It doesn’t matter what canada does . Like with every thing else we’ll catch up eventually . Solar has just had its GMAC moment so expect exceleration . Did you know that the sales of the new fangled automobiles didn’t take off till GM and DuPont got together making financing for autos through GMAC . That was the turning point . The banks wouldn’t lend money for a thing that could crash and be destroyed .
Ataloss just where do you get that garble of yours?
There are over a thousand coal plants under construction all over the world, do a simple google. nuclear construction is ramping up especially in China and India. over 60 plants either proposed or under construction, do a google
Solar, wind, run of the river cannot exist with out heavy subsidies, do a simple google. Subsidies for these are drying up in some countries like the US and are these people ever crying. Solar and wind only make up a very small part of the worlds generation and that will not change being its expensive and inefficient.
You have sort of implied having a solar system but have never described it or given details when challenged, why is that? I suspect a story. Maybe you looked into it and discover just how expensive it is, never built but continue with your story.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/10/31/bankrupt-solar-panel-firm-took-stimulus-money-left-toxic-mess-says-report/
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2012/04/03/the-worlds-largest-solar-power-plant-goes-bankrupt/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckjones/2013/04/09/solar-companies-continue-to-go-bankrupt/
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Current-and-Future-Generation/Plans-For-New-Reactors-Worldwide/
Saudi Arabs are financing alot of the conservation groups fighting against
north american oil development. There is definetly an oil war going on.
I,d rather see us win it than a nation with no respect for there own citizens. But in the end I think it will never be built .
The oil line will go East. And after the election it will also go via the Keystone. At present CN Rail and CP Rails profits are up because of the huge increase in oil shipments by rail.
Some people cannot get it through their heads that there is no market for gasoline in Canada. We can supply most of our needs with the refineries that are presently here.
The big markets in the Eastern US, US Midwest, and California have refineries in those areas and refine crude to gasoline. They have no desire to buy high priced Canadian gasoline that is refined in Canada.
It is much more efficient to ship the crude and refine the gas in the areas where the market is.
That’s why we closed down over 20 refineries in Canada in the past 20/30 years, and got out of the refining business.
Same applies to exporting crude to China. Much more efficient than trying to export the finished product.
Wake up and smell the flowers.
“Saudi Arabs are financing alot of the conservation groups fighting against
north american oil development. There is definetly an oil war going on.”
Yet Stephen Harper sold them our Wheat Board that had assets in the Billions for a fraction…..Despite an offer from a group of Canadian farmers for more money?
Then he made the largest Arms deal with the Saudi’s and called them our allies while they systematically run our Petroleum Industry into the ground as they secure market share with the inevitable slowdown of the Canadian Oil Industry…. Harper selling Arms to the Saudi’s so they can protect their Oil infrastructure and continue to flood the market …as ours grinds to a halt?
Good thing we ousted Harper…it was hard to tell who Stephen was working for!
The last government did not worry about dealing with a country which still beheads and stones people to death, chops hands off and punishes offenders by lashings. Not to mention women’s rights.
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