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During the campaign that swept his United Conservative Party into government, Kenney vowed to “turn off the taps” to B.C. with provincial legislation that would enable Alberta to squeeze petroleum shipments to the province to pressure Horgan over his government’s opposition to the Trans Mountain expansion project.

On Friday, Myatt said that Kenney’s job as premier will be “to defend Alberta’s vital economic interests.”

As of Friday, Metro Vancouver drivers faced average prices of $1.71 a litre for regular gasoline across the city, with prices as low as $1.56 per litre and as high as $1.73, according to the crowdsourced price tracking website GasBuddy.com.

Horgan has been under pressure from critics looking for him to offer temporary relief from some of the provincial taxes on gas, which are the highest in Canada.

While the government is on a legislative path to require all new vehicles sold in the province be zero-emission by 2040, on Friday the premier said he looked forward to Victoria businessman David Black submitting his proposal for a new B.C. refinery for review by regulators.

“I encourage him to bring forward that plan, to go through the regulatory process, the environmental assessment process, and test if that’s a viable alternative,” Horgan said.

Horgan said the purpose of “carbon-pricing” is to set a marker for consumers to gauge the impact of choices they’re making.

However, “when you see a 30-cent spike (in gas prices) over a three-month period, that appears, to me, to be gouging,” Horgan said, according to a transcript from the media availability. “It doesn’t appear to me to be sustainable environmental policy.”

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