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Oil and Gas Sector-Politics and Image

Supreme Court rules environmental impact legislation largely unconstitutional – by Joel Dryden (CBC News Calagary – October 13, 2023)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/

Majority of top court agreed that act’s ‘designated projects’ scheme exceeds bounds of federal jurisdiction

Canada’s top court has delivered a highly anticipated judgment, writing in a majority opinion that Ottawa’s Impact Assessment Act (IAA) is largely unconstitutional. The IAA, previously known as Bill C-69, allows federal regulators to consider the potential environmental and social impacts of various resource and infrastructure projects. It was enacted in 2019.

The IAA has long been controversial among conservative politicians in Alberta, including former premier Jason Kenney, who frequently referred to it as the “no more pipelines act.”

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Fossil Fuels Aren’t Going Anywhere – by David Gelles (New York Times – October 12, 2023)

https://www.nytimes.com/

Exxon’s $60 billion acquisition doubles down on oil and gas.

It wasn’t long ago that big fossil fuel companies were making bold claims about their plans to embrace a low-carbon future. Yet over the past year, many of those companies have walked back those commitments as they reaped outsize profits and made ambitious plans to expand their production of oil and gas.

On Wednesday, Exxon Mobil signed a $60 billion deal to buy Pioneer Natural Resources, a company that made its fortune through fracking. The acquisition — Exxon’s biggest in almost 25 years, and the biggest corporate purchase of 2023 — represents a very expensive bet that fossil fuels will remain a central part of the global economy for the foreseeable future.

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Canada could have been an energy superpower. Instead we became a bystander – by Heather Exner-Pirot (MacDonald Laurier.ca – October 3, 2023)

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Government has imposed a series of regulatory burdens on the energy industry, creating confusion, inefficiency, and expense

Oil arguably remains the most important commodity in the world today. It paved the way for the industrialization and globalization trends of the post-World War II era, a period that saw the fastest human population growth and largest reduction in extreme poverty ever. Its energy density, transportability, storability, and availability have made oil the world’s greatest source of energy, used in every corner of the globe.

There are geopolitical implications inherent in a commodity of such significance and volume. The contemporary histories of Russia, Iran, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq are intertwined with their roles as major oil producers, roles that they have used to advance their (often illiberal) interests on the world stage.

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[Alaska] Direct Payment Update: Americans in One State to Get $3,000 Check – by Jon Jackson (Newsweek.com – August 15, 2023)

https://www.newsweek.com/

Some residents of Alaska will soon receive payments of up to $3,284 as a result of oil and gas revenues from 2022. These residents will be paid from Alaska’s Permanent Fund Dividend. Revenue the state generates from its energy resources goes into the PFD. Created in 1976 to invest oil proceeds for future generations, the Permanent Fund is managed by a state-owned corporation.

Alaska began sending out 2022 payments from the state’s PFD last fall and recently disbursed a portion in July. The latest batch of residents to be paid are scheduled to receive their checks Thursday.

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Alaskans Receive Record Dividends of $3,284 – by Maryalene LaPonsie (Forbes Magazine – November 10, 2022)

https://www.forbes.com/advisor/

Alaska residents have been receiving annual dividend payments from the state’s Permanent Fund for 41 years, but the 2022 payout is one of the largest in history. Every resident received $3,284 this year, with most payments issued in September and October.

Permanent Fund Dividends (PFD), are larger than normal thanks in part to the addition of a $662 energy relief payment. Rather than send out a separate payment, as other states have done, Alaska rolled the energy relief payment into this year’s PFD payout.

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Brazil Gears Up To Become Fourth Largest Oil Producer – by Matthew Smith (Oil Price.com – June 12, 2023)

https://oilprice.com/

For nearly two decades, South America’s largest economy Brazil has been reaping a tremendous economic windfall from a massive oil boom that kicked off with the first offshore ultra deep-water pre-salt discovery in 2006.

The boom nearly collapsed as corruption, mismanagement and malfeasance saw national oil company Petrobras laden with so much debt it was almost forced to declare bankruptcy. Since then, industry reforms and rationalization coupled with higher oil prices had reinvigorated the massive fossil fuel boom underway in Brazil, although it nearly faltered for a brief moment when left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva assumed power.

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Group pulls out of Ottawa’s plan to sell Trans Mountain pipeline stakes to Indigenous owners – by Wendy Stueck (Globe and Mail – August 29, 2023)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

The federal government’s plan to sell at least part of the Trans Mountain Expansion Project to Indigenous owners has entered a new stage, with Ottawa indicating it’s prepared to provide financial backing to First Nations and Métis communities to help them acquire ownership stakes in the pipeline, and one group that had been pursuing a stake leaving the field.

In a recent letter to Indigenous groups, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said Ottawa would support Indigenous communities with access to capital, meaning communities would not need to risk or use any of their own money to participate.

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Big Oil has failed in its promise to clean up their act. Here’s why – by David Olive (Toronto Star – August 24, 2023)

https://www.thestar.com/

Oil companies’ vows to reach net-zero by transitioning to renewables are long gone, writes David Olive, and profit maximization is back in.

Once upon a time, Big Oil pledged to reduce its fossil fuel production, slash its greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), and invest more in clean renewable energy and less in oil and gas. Big Oil, including Calgary’s Suncor Energy Inc., the largest Canadian oil firm, also committed to achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.

That was in the late 2010s, when slumping oil prices prompted Big Oil to invest in what it expected to be lucrative clean-energy alternatives like wind and solar power, biofuels, and batteries.

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Ecuador Will Keep Some Oil in the Ground – by Manuela Andreoni and David Gelles (New York Times – August 22, 2023)

https://www.nytimes.com/

59 percent of voters sided with young activists in a referendum.

Ecuador voted overwhelmingly on Sunday to halt oil drilling in one of the most biodiverse places on earth. With almost all ballots counted, 59 percent of voters sided with the young activists who spent a decade fighting for the referendum, as we wrote last week.

It is widely considered to be the first time a country’s citizens voted decisively to leave oil in the ground. In a separate referendum, Ecuadoreans also voted to block mining in a biosphere reserve. “The answer from the Ecuadorean people suggests to us that the people are proposing a different way to live,” Monserrat Vásquez, an anti-mining activist, told reporters after the victory was announced.

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Our never-ending oil addiction. Why a net zero world is unlikely anytime soon as global consumption hits a new high – by David Olive (Toronto Star – August 5, 2023)

https://www.thestar.com/

The hydrocarbons war between economic prosperity and our climate, writes David Olive, is the struggle of our times. The betting is on prosperity.

Remarkably enough, the world is consuming a record amount of oil today, five decades after it began trying to end its addiction to oil. That means we remain hostage to sudden increases in oil production by OPEC and other producers, who periodically glut the market and drive oil-production regions like Alberta into economic slumps.

It means we’re still vulnerable to abrupt spikes in oil prices when those producers cut their production to drive up prices. And it means that with expected further increases in oil demand through the end of the decade, we stand little chance of meeting greenhouse gas reduction targets in the fight against climate change.

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Big Oil Ventures into Lithium Production Amid Loomining Shortages – by Christopher Bonasia (The Energy Mix – August 1, 2023)

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As lithium producers warn of shortages amid a global push for electrification, oil and gas companies are making forays into extracting the in-demand metal—and banking on nascent technologies to “become big in lithium.”

Delays in mine permitting, staffing shortages, and inflation are making lithium producers anxious about their ability to meet skyrocketing demand for the battery metal, reports Reuters. “At stake is the pace with which electric vehicles could displace internal combustion engines, a key goal of the green energy transition.”

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‘Neo-colonial’ environmental activists are tearing First Nations apart – by Chris Sankey (National Post – July 21, 2023)

https://nationalpost.com/

Chris Sankey is a prominent Indigenous business leader, a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and a former elected councillor for the Lax Kw’alaams Band.

Canadians need to be made aware of the ways in which non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are interfering in Indigenous participation in Canada’s natural resource sector.

These organizations — which are almost all foreign entities with Canadian branches — hire activists and promote misleading commentary about Canada’s oil and gas sector and First Nations’ interest in development.

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‘The best untold story in Canada’: JP Gladu on how First Nations communities and the energy industry are partnering for responsible prosperity – by Staff (The Hub – July 19, 2023)

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This episode of Hub Dialogues features host Rudyard Griffiths in discussion with JP Gladu, former President and CEO of the Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business, founder and President of Mokwateh, and current member of the board at Suncor. The two discuss the increasing partnerships between industry and Indigenous communities, the pathway to responsible development in the energy industry, and how Canada can become a model for other global jurisdictions.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: JP, welcome to the Hub Dialogues.

JEAN PAUL GLADU: Rudyard, it’s fantastic to be here. Thanks for having me.

RUDYARD GRIFFITHS: Likewise, looking forward to this conversation with you, exploring the Indigenous dimension of a lot of the issues and ideas that Pathways Alliance is grappling with. It’s a critical perspective to get on this conversation. So a privilege to talk with you today. Let’s start big picture, JP, for the benefit of our listeners.

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Western premiers push back as Guilbeault calls for ‘phase-out of unabated fossil fuels’ – by David Thurton (CBC News Politics – July 15, 2023)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/

Other countries are going further, calling for end of fossil fuel era

Canada’s environment minister hopes the next international climate summit will commit to phasing out unabated fossil fuels — oil and gas projects that don’t rely on technology to capture their emissions. Steven Guilbeault outlined his expectations for the next COP28 while meeting with fellow international ministers from Europe, Mexico, India, Japan, China and other countries.

One of those expectations is the eventual elimination of fossil fuel projects that lack a mechanism to prevent carbon emissions from escaping into the atmosphere. Carbon capture, yet to be proven at scale, has been proposed as a way for the oil and gas industry to continue production without changing the planet’s climate.

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Should Big Oil Get Into The Lithium Business? – by Irina Slav (Oil Price – June 26, 2023)

https://oilprice.com/

In March 2021, Schlumberger announced a pilot project led by its subsidiary Schlumberger New Energy. The project was supposed to test a new method of extracting lithium much more quickly and efficiently.

Also in 2021, a joint venture between All-American Lithium and an Occidental Petroleum subsidiary received a package of patents for new lithium extraction technologies and processes.

Fast-forward three years and Exxon has also joined the lithium show. The supermajor last month said it had acquired drilling rights for an area in Arkansas with the potential for substantial lithium reserves. Big Oil is quietly going into lithium.

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