Oil and Gas Sector-Politics and Image – Page 5

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

August 25, 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.

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

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.

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)

August 8, 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.

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

August 3, 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.”

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

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.

‘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)

July 20, 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.

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

July 17, 2023July 17, 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.

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

June 28, 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.

Liberals come for Alberta oil workers with mistitled sustainable jobs act – by Rex Murphy (National Post – June 21, 2023)

June 26, 2023

https://nationalpost.com/

The title of the act is a lie. It is not about sustaining jobs. It is about killing jobs

Is it that they don’t know better? Or they simply do not care? It has to be both. The most arrogant, blundering government in modern times is fixated on devastating the most essential industry Canada has; on stopping the production of the most essential resource of the modern world. The resource that makes the world work: energy.

Everyday Albertans must be asking themselves, without hope of any reply, “What is it we have done to earn the enmity of this green cabal in Ottawa, so hypnotized by their delusional calling to save the world from global warming that they have now officially given us notice that they want to kill our most productive and central industry?

Canada’s Mediocracy – by Diane Francis (Diane Francis Substack – June 5, 2023)

June 6, 2023

https://dianefrancis.substack.com/

In January, most Canadians were embarrassed after their federal government announced that four Leopard tanks would be given to Ukraine as it fights for its very existence, as well as Europe’s. Four more came a month later, but these were measly gifts, considering that Canada is wealthy, home to the second largest Ukrainian diaspora in the world, and America has given disproportionately more to Kyiv.

It’s also fair to assume that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has not phoned President Joe Biden or NATO or Ukraine offering help along the way, or suggesting that Canada will ship substantially more energy to help reduce energy inflation and replace Russian fossil fuels. Trudeau has been in power since 2015 and yet to meet NATO military spending commitments.

Mining Lithium in Abandoned Oil Fields for Tomorrow’s EVs – by Jacob Lorinc and Robert Tuttle (Bloomberg News – April 20, 2023)

April 20, 2023

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

(Bloomberg) — Chris Doornbos pulled up to Alberta’s foundational oil field in a baby-blue Tesla Model Y, a not-so-subtle nod to a new world order. It was a crisp January afternoon in Canada’s top-polluting province and a biting -5C (23F), and the 40-year-old mining executive squinted at a patch of dirt that midcentury prospectors had once scoured for oil. It doesn’t look like much now, he admitted, but what counts is the lithium beneath the soil.

The Leduc oil field was discovered in the 1940s, when a group of Imperial Oil Ltd. workers stumbled upon a well so profuse with petroleum that, on first drill, it burped a gaseous fireball almost 15 meters (49 feet) into the air.

Enough is enough of energy absurdity – by Derek H. Burney (National Post – April 18, 2023)

April 18, 2023

https://nationalpost.com/

A line must be drawn between obtuse environmental orthodoxy and the rational need for responsible energy development

Led by Saudi Arabia and Russia, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) recently announced a million-barrel-per-day reduction in oil production, action only cartels can take to limit supply in order to raise prices — the cost to the global economy be damned.

It will inevitably lead to higher North American gasoline prices as refineries gear up for peak-driving summer months. Even more damning is that it exposes the inherent fallacy of the anti-energy policies of Canada and the United States, which have two of the largest oil and gas reserves on the planet.

Analysis: Earning First Nations’ trust on resource projects – by Donna Kennedy-Glans (National Post/Wiarton Echo – April 16, 2023)

April 18, 2023

https://www.wiartonecho.com/

The Ring of Fire region in northern Ontario is one lynchpin in America’s green energy moonshot. Unearthing mineral deposits more than 500 kilometres north of Thunder Bay is essential to Ontario’s future as an electric vehicle manufacturing hub. But what happens if some local First Nations want nothing to do with mining critical minerals?

In western Canada, we’ve struggled at times to develop resources, build energy infrastructure, and export oil and liquified natural gas (LNG) — with the support of Indigenous communities. There’s no straight-forward path. When a successful project emerges, it’s worthwhile taking a closer look.

Western premiers blast Lametti for suggesting Ottawa might ‘look at’ provinces’ power over natural resources – by Elizabeth Thompson (CBC News Political – April 11, 2023)

April 12, 2023

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

Lametti told an AFN meeting he would examine calls to rescind Natural Resources Transfer Act

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and three western premiers are calling on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to disassociate his government from comments made by his justice minister — who promised last week to “look at” a decades-old law that gives control over natural resources to the four western provinces.

“The federal government cannot unilaterally change the Constitution,” the premiers of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba said in a joint statement Tuesday. “It should not even be considering stripping resource rights away from the three Prairie provinces.

Trudeau Liberals propose ripping up Constitution on oil, mining – by Brian Lilley (Winnipeg Sun – April 12, 2023)

April 12, 2023

https://winnipegsun.com/

Two different chiefs asked Lametti to take away provincial responsibility for natural resources.

Is the Trudeau government looking to rip up the Constitution of Canada on the issue of natural resources like Alberta oil, Quebec timber or Ontario mining deposits? Based on a few brief words, made by Justin Trudeau’s Justice Minister David Lametti, the answer is yes.

“I obviously can’t pronounce on that right now, but I do commit to looking at that,” Lametti said. “It won’t be uncontroversial, I would say with a bit of a smile.” Controversial would be an understatement. Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe was first out the gate with a statement.