https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Mac Van Wielingen is the Calgary-based founding partner of ARC Financial, the largest energy-focused private-equity firm in Canada, and the founder and chair of Viewpoint Group.
I am a committed, first-generation Canadian. I care deeply for this country that gave my parents a new start after Canada liberated the Netherlands in the Second World War. And, I should say, I accept the science of climate change; I believe we need solution-focused change on both the production and consumption of fossil fuels.
But I am deeply concerned about the future of the country, amid the alarming polarization in the discourse on energy development.
This debate – more specifically, the one around recent legislative initiatives such as Bill C-48 and Bill C-69 – is clear evidence that we’ve moved away from certain basic facts and this country’s energy policy needs a rethink.
Contrary to what many believe, oil demand has not peaked; in fact, within the context of a global shift to a low-carbon future, it will continue to grow over the next 10 to 20 years, according to the International Energy Agency, largely driven by an increasing standard of living in developing countries.
Canada – as the fourth-largest oil exporter in the world – is positioned to play an important role in supplying the developing world. That’s certainly to our benefit: Within Canada, our oil-and-gas-extraction and pipeline industry is the second largest subsector of the economy (based on GDP), employing 500,000 people across the country. It is also Canada’s largest employer of Indigenous peoples.
For the rest of this article: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-canadas-energy-policy-and-its-increasingly-fact-free-discourse/