Federal government’s latest villainization of oil and gas: ‘Phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.’ Isn’t it curious how Steven Guilbeault decided not to make the announcement in Calgary, say at the Calgary Petroleum Club? Wonder why?
And, across the pond, Greta just won’t stop. Now fighting fossil fuels is “self defence.”
There was a very significant think tank report issued by the Public Policy Forum think tank on July 19. I was up until 2 am reading it, because it’s that significant. It’s called Project of the Century. It’s about this whole net zero path and doubling the grid. While I do not agree with much of it, it is the most comprehensive discussion paper I’ve seen on energy transition to date. I’m seeking permission to serialize it and republish all of it, but hitting some roadblocks. Their stated policy is “The Public Policy Forum encourages interested parties to use, in whole or in part, its publications, data, images and other content to further dialogue on public policy in Canada. We require that the PPF is properly cited and acknowledged. In all instances, the PPF would like to be notified of the use of its publications and data.” But when I asked about serializing it and publishing the entire report, I was told no, they do not give permission.
We’ll see what next week brings.
However, the report got significant attention from the government of Alberta.
Also, supposed fossil fuel subsidies are in the headlines, with the feds saying they are going to get rid of them. I’m not really sure what subsidies they’re talking about, and neither are the Conservatives. Conservative energy critic Shannon Stubbs targets federal plan to end subsidies for fossil fuel
Open letter: CCS is needed and ready to address climate change. This is from the Regina-based International CCS Knowledge Centre.
In response to some of the comments yesterday – carbon capture, as practiced in Saskatchewan, actually has a substantial benefit besides whatever climate issues one might be concerned about. The Weyburn Unit, one of the largest and most prolific oil plays in this country, has been in operation for 65 years. If it had no CO2 injection, it would probably be producing around 6,000 barrels per day. It’s currently doing around 24,000 as a direct result of CO2-enhanced oil recovery. That’s a gain of around 18,000 bpd. At $75/bbl., that’s about $1.3 million per day in gross revenue. It means hundreds of jobs in Weyburn, including my daughter, who started working as a heavy duty mechanic apprentice for an oilfield service company which has been working in the Unit for 62 years. If the CO2 continues to flow, that oilfield is expected to continue on likely for her entire career, if she stays there.
This can be applied on a much broader scale, dramatically extending the life of any oilfield it is applied to. CO2 increases recovery factors from around 20% to 40%+.
Just pumping CO2 into the ground – that’s another story.
Why? Because we are the leaders, worldwide. Every second year the IEAGHG summer school returns to Regina and Estevan, because we’ve got the most significant, commercial-scale carbon capture facility on a coal plant in the world, and we’ve learned a lot from it. That’s from the general manager of the IEAGHG.
Say what you want about carbon capture and storage, but Saskatchewan’s a big deal in this field.
I also asked him about when the glaciers covered Canada, and it wasn’t my SUV or the two coal fire power plants near my house that caused them to melt.
… you can’t stop at just one.
Ontario made its second major nuclear announcement last week, and it has direct implications on SaskPower and Saskatchewan.
Why does one keep repeating “The Emperor had not clothes?” Because greater society hasn’t figured it out yet. So yet again, wind power in Alberta and Saskatchewan has cratered in recent days. But we’re building more wind turbines!
Basically, Saskatchewan large GHG emitters are forced to pay a form of carbon tax called “Output Based Pricing”. Some of the money from that is what was provided, from the feds, to Cowessess, for their investment equity into this project which cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
Also, Enbridge doesn’t build a lot of pipelines in Canada anymore. But they are building wind turbines off the coast of France.
Not so fast, we have a say in all this “just transition” stuff, says Saskatchewan.
Also, natural resources minister has faith electric tractors are coming. The local Kipling reporter asked about this, and it’s awesome. I wonder where, and when they will charge said tractors? Maybe some booster cables at the nearest power pole in the middle of a field?
One last thing: I’m live on Gormley at 10:06 a.m. Saskatchewan time today
Here are the big pieces on Jonathan Wilkinson’s time in Saskatchewan last week. The Minister of Natural Resources came to Regina to speak about “just transition.” There’s still a few more to come from it for the rest of this week, including his faith that there will soon be electric tractors for our farmers (where will you charge them???)
Shorter version (if you can call it that)
Long version:
Wilkinson’s full speech on “just transition,” verbatim.
Video of whole speech included with both.
The Clean Electricity Standard discussion paper, released a little over a year ago, says, “A Canada-wide CES will complement carbon pricing by requiring the phase-out of all conventional fossil fuel electricity generation.”
And “Regulations to limit fossil fuel generation must be decisive and swift enough to prevent locking in new fossil fuel infrastructure that will persist beyond 2035.”
Also “As natural gas currently plays a critical role in the electricity sector by providing fast-response power, exploration of the continued operation of natural gas assets in special circumstances may be needed. This includes providing flexibility to essential uses of natural gas, such as for emergency events, back-up power to complement variable renewables, and potentially supplying power during seasonal peaks of demand.”
But I asked federal Minister of Natural Resources about this twice between Wednesday and Thursday, and got a different response. He appeared to be open to the continued usage of natural gas power generation, as long as it was coupled with carbon capture. This is a huge deal for Saskatchewan and Alberta, but means expensive CCUS schemes. It could also have national unity implications. Steven Guilbeault even threatened Scott Moe with jail time.
He even said coal with CCUS would be allowed.
Did the feds just blink?
And note: the morning of Wednesday, Alberta’s 3618 megawatts of wind power was producing 3, less than one-tenth of one per cent.
There’s no pleasing the Bloc, except to break up the country. But they had some interesting things to say about the Natural Resources Committee’s “just transition” report.
Also, on the longest day of the year, Saskatchewan’s grid scale solar averaged just 26.7 per cent capacity. But that’s okay. Texas knows what they’re doing. They built all sorts of solar and wind power. How’s that working out for them with a heat wave?
And with NATO arming Ukraine to fight a war with Russia before Russia crosses Ukraine and takes on NATO, the top dogs at NATO still have time to fight climate change. Shouldn’t they be more concerned about the Ruskies?
One more thing, folks. Facebook will start blocking media, including Pipeline Online, on Sunday. Say what you want about Facebook, but this is a huge issue. Social media is crucial to the business plans of all news media, mine included. Thanks for all the support from SDA, because it means a lot. This is going to be a tough row to hoe. And glib comments about Facebook not mattering simply aren’t true. It matters to people like me. Where else can you find 3 billion people to tick off?
As promised, here is the federal Conservative response to the Natural Resources Committee just transition report. They want to expand oil and gas, not make it go away.
Entitled “Creating a Fair and Equitable Energy Transformation,” The 56 page report outlines nothing short of the utter transformation of Canada, its economy and workforce, by way of transitioning away from fossil fuels to a largely electric economy, with the possibility of hydrogen usage as well. In doing so it means to largely do away with the fossil fuel industry which is one of Canada’s largest industries and contributors to GDP, exports and wealth. The report provides recommendations as to what to do with the people involved in that industry, but not so much the companies who employ them, create those jobs or that wealth.
On Thursday, I’ll have the detailed Conservative response from MP Shannon Stubbs.
Believe it or not, there are successful oil companies growing substantially in Saskatchewan.
Also, Quick Dick McDick goes branding. This video has way too much about prairie oysters. Way too much.
Only sheer and utter incompetence at the top could result in Alberta again issuing electrical grid alerts. It did so again Wednesday afternoon. In November-December, it issued five alerts in three weeks.
And Saskatchewan is continuing down this path.
Wind power collapses across the central US, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba at the same time Wednesday morning. That’s 1100 miles north south, and 700 miles east west in the Canadian prairies.
Flooding shuts down major coal power station at Coronach, leaving SaskPower scrambling to backfill its nearly 600 megawatt output and shed load internally. This was the story promised yesterday.
Without it, nothing else matters.
I wrote this column nearly two weeks ago, and only shared it this morning. But it turns out this is playing out in real time, as I’m working on a big story about how SaskPower’s Poplar River Power Station is down, thus putting us out nearly 600 megawatts. This happened just as demand is spiking for air conditioning due to +30 temps this week. As a result, SaskPower is scrambling to reduce its internal demand, doing something called “load shedding.” Watch for that story once I’ve got it together.
A few years ago the Weyburn Oil Show Board created a new honour called Southeast Saskatchewan Legends. There are a number of people who, over several decades, were key players in building the Saskatchewan oil industry. Many of them started and operated not one, but several oilfield service companies, and coincidentally, almost every single one of them farmed on the side. You could call them “serial entrepreneurs.”
Ron Wanner of Estevan was one of the first to be honored as a “Legend,” back in 2017. He started wheeling and dealing surplus oilfield equipment, and ended up having a trucking company, an oil company, a drilling rig and a service rig company. He passed away a few days ago. He also had a policy of buying long-term employees their own vehicle after a certain number of years. I remember around 2010 he bought a Hemi Challenger SRT/8 for the engineer who successfully built his oil company from nothing. This is his obituary, as published in Pipeline Online. They don’t make many like Ron Wanner anymore.
Geez, wonder who the federal government likes best? Federal government gives $86 million to convert Newfoundland oil refinery to biofuel.
And you know it likes Newfoundland because when they wanted to open up a major new oilfield, the federal Liberal government bit their tongue and said, “Sure!”
But now Newfoundland will also got a taste of what Alberta usually chews on – delays on energy projects. The Bay du Nord sailed through federal approvals (sailed – see what I did there?) , only to find out that Norwegian proponent Equinor is going to delay it three years. Didn’t they know the federal government is supposed to delay oil projects three years, not the oil company?