Don't much care what people call the PM, I didn't vote for him either. Can't say I like the tone that whole thing has taken, but it's people like Smith who crossed the Rubicon to bring us there many moons ago.
In the end: We need to be done with hydrocarbons, like yesterday. And the people who've staked their political livelihood to it realize this, and they're distorting the entire political culture out of desperation to hold onto what they have.
> In the end: We need to be done with hydrocarbons, like yesterday. And the people who've staked their political livelihood to it realize this, and they're distorting the entire political culture out of desperation to hold onto what they have.
We can set the vitriol aside and discuss this point, as this is where we disagree. Our way of life is almost entirely dependent on hydrocarbons. Forget gasoline cars and diesel trucks, we can't even build roads or medical devices without them. Just take a look at a saline IV. We have no substitute for the flexibility and durability of plastic. Pick any item in your house, it's everywhere. Same with lubricants, they are in everything. Electric motors require brushes and lubricants too. Switching wholesale will cause will be very costly, and without acceptable substitutes, cause a huge reduction in the quality of life. It's essentially economic and lifestyle suicide. And for what? Canada contributes ~2 percent of global emissions. Reducing that to zero still won't make a dent in global emissions. China and India just need to build a few more coal plants to make up the difference. Meanwhile we will have destroyed our way of life irrevocably.
It's far more pragmatic to have a slow, phased rollout of eco-friendly technologies. Alternatives have to be built and tested to show that their total ecological footprint is lower. In many cases, the alternatives don't even exist yet. They need to be designed first. Look at paper straws, turns out they're impossible to make without plastic, and the plastic used is completely under-studied. It leaches into the drink and is more likely than not toxic. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, feel-good thinking is not a substitute for science.
Climate change is a global problem. Whether we like it or not, our part to play in it is quite small. We should do what's best for the country and its people.
Here we're going to have to strongly disagree, for sure.
Absolutely Alberta and others will continue to supply the world with hydrocarbons for generations to come. But that is not the same argument as demanding that the entire nation chip in to ensure that the sector be aggressively expanded.
Saying the world needs plastics and lubricants is hardly an argument for expanding -- significantly -- production. This is an argument I hear often from folks in Alberta like it's some sort of "oooh gotcha" moment, but it's frankly insulting. Yes, we all know how stuff is made. They're not telling us anything we don't know. They're not smarter about fossil fuels because of their proximity to it. Just insanely and heavily biased.
What Suncor and others and the Alberta taxpayer and energy sector wants is not a trickle of oil used for those purposes -- it's what any corporation wants: year over year growth, large profits for stock holders, revenues for governments, and jobs -- lots of jobs -- for Albertans.
Unfortunately that growth is not compatible with the ecological scenario of the planet. And the rest of the country is under no obligation to shift policy and economic planning for it.
And this 2% number is an absolute distortion of the facts and simply a product of cherry picking how things are measured. North Americans impact on the climate isn't just from their direction product & emissions, but also from the imports they bring in from abroad. Emissions from Chinese factories producing products for western consumers is not "China's fault" that somehow absolves us such that we can aggressively turn around and increase emissions.
What we're seeing demonstrated here is just classic deflection of responsibility. The bias within the western energy sector will always be to find "facts" to back up a world in which they can continue to grow and, in fact, destroy the climate. Intelligent people should be able to see past this.
In the end, Alberta provides oil and gas for domestic consumption, and that's not a bad role. Contrary to what Kenney was saying when he was premier, the large majority of domestic consumption does in fact come from Canadian (primarily Albertan) production, and has since the mid-2010s when the direction on Line 9 was reversed. Only the Atlantic provinces are substantially importers.
Alberta must diversify. Amazingly it actually was, at the level of renewable energy production, and ... you can see what a threat that was to established energy sector interests, because one of the first things Smith did was to put an end to that.
Finally, there seems to be a misperception in Alberta that the energy sector and Alberta are somehow underwriting the whole Canadian economy such that Ontario and Quebec "owe" it something. This is a falsehood. As a % of GDP, even for exports, oil & gas is still behind manufacturing, despite the multi decade decline in that sector. Share prices on the TSX are one thing, dollars and cents in paycheques and gov't coffers on the whole are driven by manufacturing, real estate, agriculture, etc., too.
Check out Canada's rating from 2017. It's 1.66%. The source: A 2022 report commissioned by the EU. Must be a terrible blow to your "absolute distortion of facts." Are you going to try a No True Scotsman fallacy?
Got any data from credible sources to support any of your assertions? Or is it all just dogma? Is it even possible to have a rational discussion on this topic which so much zealotry? Where's the science?
> Alberta must diversify. Amazingly it actually was, at the level of renewable energy production, and ... you can see what a threat that was to established energy sector interests, because one of the first things Smith did was to put an end to that.
If it ended, it was unprofitable, a failed business model. It didn't make money. It's that simple. Businesses chase profit. Oil is pursued because it is profitable. What you are saying is that Alberta should pursue less profitable directions to benefit the world. Why should it do that?
I'm not even going to touch NEP or equalization given how messy it has become over decades of political interference. It's not possible to have such a discussion in the forums.
> Unfortunately that growth is not compatible with the ecological scenario of the planet. And the rest of the country is under no obligation to shift policy and economic planning for it.
You don't know the first part of that. No one does. And the second part, it's more about bringing policy and economic planning to the status quo, rather than destroying the economy of the country which the current climate-driven agenda is achieving. When Alberta sells more oil, our country's tax base benefits as well.
> Absolutely Alberta and others will continue to supply the world with hydrocarbons for generations to come. But that is not the same argument as demanding that the entire nation chip in to ensure that the sector be aggressively expanded.
Forget aggressively expand, it's currently being strangled. If Alberta was a coastal province, this would be a moot point. Right now, the rest of the country is holding Alberta hostage. I can see it and I'm not even Albertan.
No point in arguing with you, you're a True Believer, and I'll let you drive around with whatever "F*ck Trudeau" stickers you want to put on your car, but I have to interject on this one point, as this is just pure lies: If it ended, it was unprofitable, a failed business model. It didn't make money. It's that simple"
In the real world, the Alberta gov't literally just banned renewal energy projects because they were too* successful.
Funnily enough, that book is on my nightstand at this point. Thank you for putting words in my mouth, I'm not the one insulting politicians here. I'm neither a rabid conservative nor a woke progressive. I'm a moderate, a centrist. I represent the silent majority that's looking for a balanced perspective and finds itself increasingly frustrated with the extremism on both sides of the spectrum. As far as I and others like me are concerned, the progressives and the reformers can cast off somewhere and fight each other to the death. Leave the country to those who know how to run it.
In the end: We need to be done with hydrocarbons, like yesterday. And the people who've staked their political livelihood to it realize this, and they're distorting the entire political culture out of desperation to hold onto what they have.