‘Smith is leading Alberta and listening to both sides': Drumheller Mayor on Bill 54
Drumheller Mayor Heather Colberg joins CTV News to weigh in on Bill 54, Alberta separation talk, and Premier Smith's timing on legal action.
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National Observer
2 hours ago
- National Observer
Canada's liquefied natural gas touted — and doubted — as a green 'transition' fuel
Canada's first liquefied natural gas cargoes will soon arrive on Asian shores, a milestone touted — and doubted — as a boon for global emissions-cutting efforts. "Cleaner energy around the world is what I think about when I think about LNG," Shell Canada country chair Stastia West said in an onstage interview at the Global Energy Show in Calgary earlier this month. Shell and four Asian companies are partners in LNG Canada in Kitimat, BC, the first facility to export Canadian gas across the Pacific in an ultra-chilled liquid state using specialized tankers. A handful of other projects are either under construction or in development on the BC coast. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith told the energy show that Canadian oil and gas exports can be an "antidote" to the current geopolitical chaos. "And it comes with an added benefit: lower global emissions. By moving more natural gas, we can also help countries transition away from higher emitting fuels, such as coal." Smith cited a recent Fraser Institute study that suggested if Canada were to double its natural gas production, export the additional supply to Asia and displace coal there, it would lead to an annual emissions cut of up to 630 million tonnes annually. "That's almost 90 per cent of Canada's total greenhouse gas emissions each year," Smith said. The authors of the Fraser Institute study, released in May, argued that Canada's ability to reduce emissions elsewhere should be factored into its climate policy. "It is important to recognize that GHG emissions are global and are not confined by borders," wrote Elmira Aliakbari and Julio Mejía. "Instead of focusing on reducing domestic GHG emissions in Canada by implementing various policies that hinder economic growth, governments must shift their focus toward global GHG reductions and help the country cut emissions worldwide by expanding its LNG exports." Some experts see a murkier picture. Most credible estimates suggest that if liquefied natural gas were to indeed displace coal abroad, there would be some emissions reductions, said Kent Fellows, assistant professor of economics with the University of Calgary's School of Public Policy. But the magnitude is debatable. "Will all of our natural gas exports be displacing coal? Absolutely not. Will a portion of them be displacing coal? Probably, and it's really hard to know exactly what that number is," he said. Fellows said there's a good chance Canadian supplies would supplant other sources of gas from Russia, Eurasia and the Middle East, perhaps making it a wash emissions-wise. He said the Canadian gas could actually be worse from an emissions standpoint, depending on how the competing supply moves. LNG is more energy intensive than pipeline shipment because the gas needs to be liquefied and moved on a ship. In China, every type of energy is in demand. So instead of displacing coal, LNG would likely just be added to the mix, Fellows added. "Anyone who's thinking about this as one or the other is thinking about it wrong," Fellows said. A senior analyst with Investors for Paris Compliance, which aims to hold Canadian publicly traded companies to their net-zero promises, said he doubts a country like India would see the economic case for replacing domestically produced coal with imported Canadian gas. "Even at the lowest price of gas, it's still multiple times the price," said Michael Sambasivam. "You'd need some massive system to provide subsidies to developing countries to be replacing their coal with a fuel that isn't even really proven to be much greener." And even in that case, "it's not as if they can just flip a switch and take it in," he added. "There's a lot of infrastructure that needs to be built to take in LNG as well as to use it. You have to build import terminals. You have to refit your power terminals." What LNG would be competing head-to-head with, Sambasivam said, is renewable energy. If there were any emissions reductions abroad as a result of the coal-to-gas switch, Sambasivam said he doesn't see why a Canadian company should get the credit. "Both parties are going to want to claim the emissions savings and you can't claim those double savings," he said. There's also a "jarring" double-standard at play, he said, as industry players have long railed against environmental reviews that factor in emissions from the production and combustion of the oil and gas a pipeline carries, saying only the negligible emissions from running the infrastructure itself should be considered. Devyani Singh, an investigative researcher at who ran for the Greens in last year's BC election, said arguments that LNG is a green fuel are undermined by the climate impacts of producing, liquefying and shipping it. A major component of natural gas is methane, a greenhouse gas about 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide over a 20-year time frame, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Methane that leaks from tanks, pipelines and wells has been a major issue that industry, government and environmental groups have been working to tackle. "Have we actually accounted for all the leakage along the whole pipeline? Have we accounted for the actual under-reporting of methane emissions happening in BC and Canada?" asked Singh. Even if LNG does have an edge over coal, thinking about it as a "transition" or "bridge" fuel at this juncture is a problem, she said. "The time for transition fuels is over," she said. "Let's just be honest — we are in a climate crisis where the time for transition fuels was over a decade ago." This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 29, 2025.
Ottawa Citizen
4 hours ago
- Ottawa Citizen
Alberta byelection called for Aug. 18, giving Poilievre path back to House of Commons
Smith said on Thursday that she's 'never seen such a high level of separatist sentiment,' and warned about the results of a provincial byelection in Olds_Didsbury_Three Hills last week, where a separatist candidate got just shy of 18 per cent of the vote. The premier also said the problem 'is really in Ottawa's hands' and challenged the Carney government to scrap the proposed emissions cap and repeal the West Coast tanker ban. The town of Trochu is within both Battle River-Crowfoot and Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills, meaning residents are now set to cast their third set of ballots in five months. Barry Kletke has been mayor of Trochu for 21 years. Speaking as a resident, not as the mayor, he said he worried that the separatist candidate might make headway in the provincial race. He said he would be happy to have Poilievre as the area's MP for one term but hopes the Conservative leader doesn't 'get caught down the rabbit hole of separation.' 'I think he's going to wear the 'proud to be Canadian' hat, and I hope that's the message,' he said. Kletke said Smith's tendency to talk about the threat of separation is 'going to come back and bite us in the butt one of these days.' Brown said the results of her most recent poll suggest a third of Albertans believe their province would be better off if it left Canada, and 29 per cent of respondents said they would vote to separate in a referendum. 'It's not a majority but it's not an insignificant fringe,' she said. As a result, she said, even if Poilievre wants to avoid talking about it, 'separatists will want to bait him into that conversation and his opponents will want to bait him in that conversation too.' Kory Teneycke, the co-founder and CEO of Rubicon Strategy and a conservative strategist, agreed Poilievre is about to be dragged into a debate that is 'entirely unhelpful for the federal Conservative party.' Poilievre has said he opposes separation. On May 13, he told reporters Albertans have 'a lot of legitimate grievances.' 'Albertans want to be part of a united Canada but they deserve to be treated with respect, and they deserve to be honoured for the immense contribution to this country, and I will be a unifier,' Poilievre said at a press conference on Parliament Hill. Teneycke said Poilievre should be openly opposing a referendum and saying that 'this is bad for Alberta and this is bad for Canada to even be having this conversation.' It's not yet clear if candidates from any separatist parties will run against Poilievre in the byelection. What is clear is that the conversation won't be limited to the campaign. If Poilievre wins, he will become an MP from Alberta _ and he will have to keep talking about the issue. 'That's a dangerous territory for a Conservative leader to be operating in,' Teneycke said.
CTV News
16 hours ago
- CTV News
CTV National News: Will PM Mark Carney follow through on July 1 free trade promise?
Watch While some progress has been made, there are still issues with Carney's interprovincial free trade legislation. CTV News' Colton Praill reports.
