Article content continued

Norway green policies have not prevented it from exploiting its vast offshore resources

When I was minister of natural resources, our Conservative government legislated “one project, one review” in a defined time period, a significant regulatory improvement. Later, we provided an accelerated capital allowance for the project’s facilities and extended export licenses. In contrast, the Liberal government denigrated the National Energy Board (NEB), politicized, duplicated and lengthened the consultation and review processes and broadened their scope. It is now considering the addition of social and cultural impacts, which would exacerbate uncertainty and delay.

Former premier Christy Clark imposed a provincial carbon tax and took her time in pressuring Petronas to commit up to $1 billion in investment over 20 years. For its part, the CEAA’s numerous and onerous requests for information stopped the clock and added a one-and-a-half-year delay. Meanwhile, the B.C. NDP, later to form government, officially rejected the project. In September 2016, the federal cabinet finally gave its approval, subject to 190 conditions including a cap on carbon emissions. So, a lot of people contributed to killing the deal.

Let’s put the project in perspective. Canada has enormous natural gas reserves (1,100 trillion cubic feet), enough for 350 years of domestic use at current consumption. It is just common sense that we export as much as we responsibly can, as soon as we can. However, according to the NEB, Canada will be a late entrant in the highly competitive global LNG market and “the next several years will be critical to the development of the Canadian LNG industry.” Unfortunately, only the $1.6-billion Woodfibre LNG project has any chance of being built in the next five years.