Also: Brian Crossman: Magic Eight Ball prediction edition for 2024. “Will the current Prime Minister continue to be a dumpster fire?” “SIGNS POINT TO YES.”
The past weekend proved to be a close-run thing for the Alberta electrical grid, and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe is making statements resolving he won’t allow that to happen here.
Specifically, after having nearly completely divested itself of coal-fired power production, Alberta’s dramatic buildout of wind and solar proved impossible to keep the lights on in that province when the chips were down and temperatures hit -35 C, or worse.
Alberta’s close brush with possible rolling blackouts stiffens Moe’s resolve to keep the lights on. On Monday, he announced that SaskPower has relit a shuttered coal unit near Estevan, one the feds had supposedly forced to retire Dec. 31, 2021.
Also note: Saskatchewan has about a million cars registered. So a good bet is Alberta probably has four million. What would have happened if four million EVs were all plugged in last weekend?
If you missed them, these five stories, in order, chronicle what happened in Alberta.
Most of Alberta’s wind fleet slowly shut down Thursday night, but not for lack of wind
Grid Alert 1:
Alberta goes under grid alert for just under 5 hours on Jan. 12
Grid Alert 2:
Grid Alert 3:
Alberta goes into Round 3, with its third electrical grid alert in three days
Grid Alert 4:
Round 4: Alberta declares fourth electrical grid alert in 4 days, second in 17 hours
For the third day in a row, Alberta went into an electrical grid alert on Sunday. At one point it had no contingency reserve left at all, but imports from BC appeared to save the day. While it looked a little hairy there for a bit, there was no emergency alert declared, unlike Saturday.
Did I mention before that Alberta has more coal, oil and natural gas than God? Because guess what? It still does.
Alberta’s electrical grid stood at the brink of blackouts Jan. 13, before pulling back in the nick of time.
It was the second evening in a row Alberta saw “grid alert” issued, but this time, it was a much closer-run thing.
Alberta’s electrical grid was in such peril of falling into rotating blackouts on Saturday night, the provincial government urged people to even turn off their bathroom fans, among other things.
Also, from Western Standard:
STIRLING: When magical thinking meets a polar vortex cold, hard reality follows
Alberta went under grid alert for just under 5 hours on Jan. 12. And yes, the AESO suggested people shouldn’t run their dishwashers. Alberta has more coal, oil and gas than God, because God gave all his to Alberta, and people there shouldn’t have washed their dishes lest the lights go out. That is no word of a lie. I was up all evening monitoring it, as you’ll see in the story.
And all of this is before four million Albertans are forced to buy electric cars and pickups.
Also:
It looks like Trans Mountain might, indeed be allowed to finish the darn pipeline in weeks instead of years. That is, unless they find another hummingbird on the right of way. The Canada Energy Regulator apparently removed its head from its posterior.
Canadian Press story on record cold in BC, AB.
Did you read that in the voice of “Mortal Kombat?”
Steven Guilbeault accuses Danielle Smith of “trying to tear Canada down”
Ask Pipeline Online readers are aware, whenever this minister speaks of such issues, it is useful to provide his entire discourse, verbatim and unedited. Especially the part about the evils of methane from cows. So here it is, as posted on X the evening of Jan. 11, in all 10 parts.
And on a different note, people in the Saskatchewan oilpatch might recognize some names here: Del Mondor, Brad Wall and Myron Stadnyk to be honored at Saskatchewan Oil and Gas Show in June.
UPDATED: For seven days in a row, SaskPower saw wind generation hit zero for part of the day
The story originally said five days. SaskPower got back to me and noted the streak continued Jan. 7 and 8 as well. So that’s a whole week with wind flatlining. Total, complete flatline for part of the day, each day. How do you power the hospital my wife is an ER nurse at with zero power? Inquiring minds would like to know?
Also:
Weaker oil prices should bring some relief to consumers in 2024: Analysts
and
Quick Dick McDick: Saskatchewan Winterfront Regulation
Bonus points for Quick Dick’s instruction on how to use the box from a Pilsner 2-4 for a winterfront. Nothing says Saskatchewan like a Pil box on your pickup
Wind power flatlined in Saskatchewan on Jan. 2, after days of strong winds. Flatlined, as in zero power, at night, so no solar, either.
Zero reliability, this wind thing. And I had to start wearing my parka this week, too.
Put our trust in wind, and we’ll all freeze. In the dark.
Also, switching to third person:
Pipeline Online editor and owner Brian Zinchuk is back on the air with CJME/CKOM’s Evan Bray Show. He was on the air for a full hour on Wednesday, Jan. 3. Here’s the podcast of that appearance, including responses to several calls. One was on whether or not the Trans Mountain Expansion will ever be finished. (With the ads and news breaks removed, it’s only 35 minutes).
The problem with no one making money is that no one is making money.
Wind bottoms out across 14 states in Southwest Power Pool SPP on Dec. 22
That also meant that of any electrons coming across the border at that time, if SaskPower was buying any power from SPP, 83.4 per cent of that power would have been coming from coal and natural gas, and would not have had a carbon tax applied to it.
“We reached a historic consensus to move away from fossil fuels in energy systems,” Guilbeault’s statement on the conclusion of COP28, verbatim.
And the Canadian Press version:
Guilbeault hails ‘monumental’ COP28 deal, others warn of ‘dangerous distractions’
Also:
COP28 Agreement Signals “Beginning of the End” of the Fossil Fuel Era: the verbatim press release
And the conclusion from yesterday’s op-ed:
Op-Ed: Deidra Garyk: The Impact of ESG on the Energy Sector, Part 2
And since it’s the Christmas season, and Die Hard IS a Christmas movie, here’s a little Hans Gruber. Notice any resemblance to anyone? And if you don’t think Die Hard is a Christmas movie, fight me! Yippee Kai Yay, …
My thoughts on the current situation at #COP28, and why we must deliver on a solid agreement. pic.twitter.com/Uq0U4mfabA
— Steven Guilbeault (@s_guilbeault) December 12, 2023
Pipeline Online columnist Brian Crossman hits it out of the park again:
Brian Crossman: Climate hysteria, teachers, kids and the end of the world
Also, you think anyone noticed prices going up? Wonder why? From Canadian Press:
Tories have ‘successfully’ scapegoated carbon price in affordability crisis: Trudeau
Federal and Nova Scotia governments kill offshore petroleum project in name of “clean energy”. No more gas development. Don’t even try. But wind? You betcha.
And here’s an analysis of why. It has a lot to do with the fact Nova Scotia can still pay for its hospitals with natural gas money, just natural gas produced in Alberta and Saskatchewan. And it has more to do with Guilbeault announcing a defacto production cap by banning venting and flaring.
And along the topic of the undead, the federal regulator still isn’t done with stretching out the Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline. What’s another $200 million per month delay?
As a side note, two years ago I ran into the consultant whose job it was to shut down, abandon and clean up this project. He was the company man looking after the drilling of the first lithium well in Canada, near Torquay, Saskatchewan. I never got around to writing a story about it, dammit. Not enough hours in the day.
And if anyone feels like asking CJME/CKOM why Zinchuk isn’t scheduled to do his regular energy spot the first Wednesday of the month, as he did with Gormley:
Text
COP28: Saskatchewan, and over 50 companies and organizations, will be in the room where it happens
No carbon tax on electrical home heat from SaskPower, says Moe
Wind drops to 0.9% output in Alberta on Thursday. Again.
Shipper costs to rise as regulator approves preliminary interim Trans Mountain tolls
Alberta now has 44 wind farms, and Wednesday night they collectively produced next to no power (posted yesterday, but leads into the next two for context)
On Thursday, Alberta wind power had a hangover and the sun didn’t come out to play
What the Globe and Mail left out in its story on grid-scale batteries in Alberta
Key points:
The last day saw not only wind utterly collapse in Alberta, but solar AT THE SAME TIME, even at noon. And the narrative that we’ll simply build a lot of batteries for when that happens is disproven, as Alberta’s seven batteries only produced a 62 minutes of a wee bit of power all day on Thursday. And over the last 30 days, those seven batteries only produced 265 minutes out of over 300,000 minutes available to them. Yes, you read that right. And SaskPower is spending $26 million to buy one of these batteries. Seriously. It should be online any day.
So why, again, are we throwing away what we know works, natural gas and coal, for wind, solar and batteries? And it’s not even all that cold yet!
Bonus reading:
Unions? What unions? The “Just Transition” legislation talks about unions in the oilpatch.
The problem is, except for refining, oil sands and big inch pipeline construction, unions are all but non-existent in the oilpatch. But hey, the legislation also includes five year plans, with the exact implications of what that means. Total transformation of the economy.
Can solar power essentially flatline for a whole day? It did in Alberta on Monday
How is it some people are arguing a pipeline treaty is “dormant?” Would that make other treaties, say those with First Nations, also dormant?
I’ve been writing about the phenomenal growth of the North Dakota Bakken for the better part of 15 years. In 2008, the state produced around 90,000 barrels per day. By 2014, it was something like 1.2 million. Currently it’s around a million or so. A major player was Hess Corporation, which currently produces about 175,000 barrels of oil equivalent in North Dakota. But curiously, none of the supermajor oil companies were involved in North Dakota. Well, that changed, as Hess is being bought by Chevron.
On Friday, Alberta Energy Minister Brian Jean praised the Travers Solar Project in a LinkedIn post. At noon on Sunday, when the sun was highest in the sky, it was producing 10.9 per cent of nameplate capacity.
And at the very same time, wind was producing less than 2 per cent capacity, and was around that level all afternoon long.
The Canadian Energy Regulator provided reasons for its TMX pipeline route change ruling.
In an unrelated note, if you’ve worked in the southeast Saskatchewan oilpatch, you probably know, or know of, Larry Day, who was awarded dispatcher of the year.
And while we’re tooting horns, Pipeline Online received an Estevan Business Excellence award for New Business Venture.
