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The Mackenzie Valley pipeline project, first proposed in the 1970s and resurrected in 2004, fell apart last December after Imperial Oil announced that high costs and other sources of cheaper North American gas meant the project was no longer viable.

We’ve already made our decision and are moving forward

All of that, McLeod said, adds up to “$22 billion worth of potential investment” that hasn’t materialized. He said he’s sympathetic to the concerns of provincial governments in Alberta and Saskatchewan, which have been pressing the federal government to support the oil and gas industry in the face of a punishing oil price differential. “I think that, finally, the rest of Canada is recognizing that the oil and gas industry is important to Canada,” he said.

The premier plugged the idea of an oil pipeline from Alberta through the Mackenzie Valley to the Arctic Ocean, given the problems facing the Trans Mountain and Keystone XL pipelines and the death of the Energy East project last year. “We feel that we should be looking at other markets and other transportation corridors,” he said. “If we can’t go east, south or west, why can’t we go north?”

For now, though, the territory is readying itself for a carbon price that will come into effect in July 2019. Unlike the Yukon and Nunavut, which have accepted the federal carbon tax backstop, the Northwest Territories has decided to create its own carbon tax, which McLeod said will be better for northerners than the federal plan. The territories have been given some exemptions, in recognition of the high cost of living in the North, including a full exemption for aviation fuel and diesel-fired electricity generation.

But McLeod said if the federal government wants to focus on clean growth, it needs to work with the Northwest Territories on a strategy. “Perhaps we could get the federal government to invest so that every community can put in solar panels, wind farms, what have you. And retrofit people’s houses and so on,” he said. “I think anything’s possible.”

• Email: mforrest@postmedia.com | Twitter: MauraForrest