Premiers seeking U.S. energy investment

Gary Park

Petroleum News Calgary correspondent

Old rivals turned into allies, as Alberta and British Columbia linked up for a road show to California and Texas Oct 13-16 to promote their energy and high-tech industries.

The two premiers — Alberta’s Ralph Klein and British Columbia’s Gordon Campbell — launched the process earlier this month through a Protocol of Cooperation at a meeting of senior cabinet ministers.

The two provinces account for 20 percent of Canada’s total exports to the two states and 71 percent of Canada’s energy industry.

Klein said the trip gave him and Campbell an “opportunity to promote our two provinces as secure sources of energy for North America,” while selling other investment opportunities.

They met with key business groups in Silicon Valley and Houston, where Klein made clear that Alberta and British Columbia support both the Alaska Highway and Mackenzie Valley gas pipelines.

“We’d like both to come onstream,” he said. “We’re not concerned which one goes first, but it looks like the Mackenzie project will lead the way.”

For British Columbia one of the priorities is raising the profile of its northeastern natural gas play and coalbed methane reserves, while Alberta takes every chance it gets to pitch U.S. investors on its multi-billion dollar oil sands prospects.

Campbell said the U.S. mission is designed to draw the attention of Americans to “vast energy stores (in Alberta and British Columbia) which can meet the needs of markets south of the border.”

For British Columbia, energy is the major hope for heading off recession in the province, where Gross Domestic Product growth was flat in the second quarter and expected to shrink in the third quarter.

Following the worst forest fires on record, the British Columbia forest products industry was brought to a standstill in many regions and was faced with an overall decline of 20-30 percent in the third quarter, preventing the province from achieving its predicted 2 percent growth in GDP for 2003.

Campbell, using the 2010 Winter Olympics as a springboard, will extend his efforts to stimulate investment in British Columbia with missions to New York, Oct. 20-21; Washington, D.C., Oct 21-23; China Nov. 3-8; and India Nov. 8-12.