Top Canadian politicians have made their fifth and final forays to Washington, D.C., in a bid to woo Keystone XL decision-makers — accompanied by rearguard sniping from the domestic front.
Federal Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver emerged from meetings with U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and other U.S. officials a little more encouraged about the fate of the TransCanada’s US$7 billion pipeline, but hesitant about predicting what President Barack Obama will decide in early 2014.
Alberta Premier Alison Redford made stops at the U.S. Department of State, the White House Council on Environmental Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency, plus two pro-Keystone senators (Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana).
They left to a backdrop of shots from Alberta Opposition Leader Danielle Smith, who ridiculed Redford for her failure to gain access to Obama or Vice President Joe Biden, while the opposition New Democratic Party, introduced a motion in the federal House of Commons opposing XL because it would send oil-industry refining jobs to the U.S., meaning the project is “not in Canada’s best interests.”
Opposition from NDP
NDP energy spokesman Peter Julian said the pipeline represents yet-another example of Canada failing to extract maximum economic benefits from its oil sands resources, arguing the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper is “absolutely obsessed with the idea that it is the only way for Canadians to prosper.”
For that reason, he said the NDP opposes XL and Enbridge’s Northern Gateway project, but endorses TransCanada’s Energy East proposal to access refineries in Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick.
A study by Informetrica Ltd. has estimated that for every 400,000 barrels of oil sands bitumen shipped through XL, 18,000 processing jobs would be lost in Western Canada, but assumes that in the absence of a pipeline, companies would be willing to reverse their decisions of recent years and build high-cost, high-risk upgraders and refineries in Alberta.
Geoff Regan, a Liberal Member of Parliament, challenged Julian, saying greater processing in Canada would increase the country’s carbon emissions, while “making decisions for the private sector about where things should be done.”
Canada-US relations vs. enviros
Oliver said he again emphasized the importance of XL to Canada-U.S. relations, reflecting a growing belief in Canada that Obama is more interested in retaining the support of environmentalists in the U.S. than strengthening ties with Canada.
“I’m not making predictions about this, other than to say if the facts and science are taken into account, this project should be approved and we hope as soon as possible,” he told reporters.
“I don’t want to get into a doomsday scenario about what if it doesn’t happen. The issue has been politicized already.”
To buy some insurance, in the event that Canada loses access to the U.S. for its heavy and light crudes, Oliver is traveling to Europe later this month to meet with his European Union counterparts and sell the message that the EU’s fuel quality directive, FQD, would discriminate against oil sands-derived fuels and hurt Europe’s refining industry, without achieving environmental goals.
If adopted the FQD would attach a higher carbon footprint to oil sands crude than conventional crude, imposing financial penalties on European countries that import the bitumen, which could be made available from the Energy East pipeline to a tanker terminal in Saint John, New Brunswick.
