It would be great to see a healthier dialogue between Alberta and BC regarding Canadian energy and our future development. Sadly, the bar just gets dragged lower and lower. It’s March 2018 and despite opposition from the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, populist prairie politicians are voicing support for Alberta strangling British Columbia’s supply of domestic oil and gas.
Continue readingCategory: Blog
Threats, insults, and bullying a winning formula to gain BC support for Kinder Morgan pipeline
“Shitheads” that’s how Economic Development Minister Deron Bilous described British Columbians this week at a meeting of Albertan Municipal leaders. The same week that Alberta’s Speech from the Throne floated the idea of punishing BC by turning off the supply of oil and gas to the province, a sensible way to demonstrate just how much communities in BC need Bitumen to be shipped to China for motorists there.
Continue reading
Prime Minister Trudeau is still right, Alberta’s oil should be nationalized
The national interest, we’re hearing that term a lot right now from Rachel Notley, Prime Minister Trudeau and those others who are eager to see the Kinder Morgan pipeline twinned. So what is it? And is this controversial pipeline truly reflective of it?
Continue readingReflections on the start of SFU CED’s 2017-2018 Cohort
The SFU CED program has undergone a number of evolutions in the roughly 20 years that it has existed. It is currently undergoing another one of those evolutions as its relationship to Simon Fraser University and the Faculty of Environment in which it is situated deepens and expands. Constant throughout these evolutions have been the values at the core of the program and the hopes they bring.
Continue readingKinder Morgan Trans Mountain review delay reveals a larger problem in Canadian democracy
Just this past Friday the National Energy Board (NEB) halted the review process for the proposed Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline twinning. It wasn’t because scientists and concerned residents had been arrested on Burnaby Mountain in protest; it wasn’t because of collective statements from the Mayors of several Lower Mainland cities and First Nations condemning the project; it wasn’t even because scores of intervenors wrote public letters about the horribly flawed process that many of us subsequently walked away from altogether.
Continue readingCanada Day a time for celebration and reflection
Today I was out celebrating Canada Day with friends and neighbours, but I was also doing a lot of thinking. I was thinking about the Wampum belt. About the findings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. About the future of an increasingly multicultural and urban Canada. About Canada, the Iroquois word for “village” and “the land” and Canada the serial winner of Fossil of the Year for its lack of leadership on climate change.
Continue reading