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Standing in a stiff Alberta wind near a power plant west of Edmonton on Monday afternoon, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney appeared perplexed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s announcement only hours before to put a hard cap on greenhouse gas emissions from oil and gas.
Calling it “peculiar” that the prime minister hadn’t talked with him before his speech at the United Nation’s COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, the Alberta premier wondered why Trudeau “would make an announcement like this without consulting with the province that actually owns the overwhelming majority of Canada’s oil and gas reserve.”
“We need to know what the details are,” added Kenney
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But nothing that happened on Monday — Trudeau’s announcement or Kenney’s reactions — should surprise anyone. The prime minister fulfilled an election promise.
The Alberta premier returned to his familiar refrain of bashing Ottawa in hopes of scoring political points to revive his sinking popularity, according to political observers.
The question is whether another war with Ottawa will help boost Kenney’s flagging political fortunes — and whether his usual allies in the oilpatch will have his back this time.
Is fulfilling a campaign promise really a surprise?
With Capital Power’s Genesee Generating Station as a backdrop to announce more than a dozen emissions reducing projects on Monday, Premier Kenney seemed incredulous, wondering aloud if the federal government is “trying to fundamentally limit the development of Canadian resources.”
But the federal Liberal government’s pledge on the international stage this week to limit the growth of one of Canada’s biggest industries in order to curtail the earth’s average temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius should come as no surprise.
On Thursday, the federal government followed up by making good on its other election promise to cut subsidies to oil and natural gas companies that help them expand outside of Canada.
The oilpatch represents about 26 per cent of Canada’s total emissions.
The Liberal’s recent election campaign platform makes plain the party’s plan to “cap and cut emissions from oil and gas.” Trudeau even promised five-year targets for the oilpatch, starting in 2025, to get to net-zero by 2050.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau arrives for the COP26 summit in Glasgow on Monday. The U.N. climate summit in Glasgow gathers leaders from around the world, in Scotland’s biggest city, to lay out their vision for addressing the common challenge of global warming. (Phil Noble/The Associated Press)
“I don’t think that there’s any reason for a surprise here,” said Sara Hastings-Simon, a professor and director of the sustainable energy development program at the University of Calgary.
After all, the energy industry has already signaled its intention to cut emissions.
In June, big oil producers — including Canadian Natural Resources, Cenovus Energy, Imperial Oil, MEG Energy and Suncor Energy — formed the Pathways alliance with a goal of achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions in Alberta’s oilsands by 2050.
The plan is to use, among other things, carbon capture use and storage (CCUS) and emerging emissions-reducing technologies to cut the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for climate change.
Five years ago, the industry also agreed to the previous NDP government’s 100-megatonne emissions cap on the oilsands. Last year, the federal Liberal government asked the UCP government to make the cap enforceable.
Kenney, for his part, conceded on Monday that his government is not opposed to a cap proposed by Ottawa. “We are willing to discuss with them the proposed 100-megatonne cap,” said Kenney.
It’s not clear how the federal government’s proposed cap on the oil and gas industry will work. There are questions if it will apply to the entire oil and gas sector or be imposed on specific companies or sites.
After signalling his openness to talking about a cap on oilsands’ emissions, Kenney then turned to championing Alberta’s oil and gas industry, highlighting the jobs linked to the sector and its importance to the Canadian economy.
The UCP premier then vowed to “vigorously defend the economic interests of Alberta, including the right to develop our own natural resources,” ratcheting up his combative stance with the federal Liberal government over climate change policy.
Reviving an “old playbook”
At the onset of the pandemic, Kenney dialed down his anti-Ottawa attacks.
In recent weeks, Kenney has turned the volume up again on Alberta’s grievances with the federation, includingequalization and policing.
On Monday, before his full-throated defence of Alberta oil and gas, Kenney took aim once again at the new federal Liberal government’s environment minister Steven Guilbeault, lumping the environmental activist turned politician in with “the gross hypocrisy of the radical green left” for opposing nuclear energy, which proponents argue could help lower greenhouse gas emissions in oilsands extraction and processing.
WATCH | Alberta’s premier reacts to Canada’s new federal environment minister
Alberta’s premier reacts to Canada’s new federal environment minister
8 days ago
Jason Kenney says the longtime activist’s appointment as environment minister sends a “very problematic” message. 3:01
Two days later, the UCP leader turned his fire on the Bloc Québécois leader after Yves-Francois Blanchet called out what he called Alberta’s “toxic economic model.”
The Bloc leader also highlighted his party’s campaign pledge to create so-called “green equalization” payments, whereby provinces such as Alberta, that produce more greenhouse gas emissions than other provinces, would have to pay jurisdictions that pollute less than the national average.
At a COVID-19 briefing on Wednesday, Kenney blasted the Bloc leader, accusing Blanchet of trying to divide the country and attacking Alberta’s energy industry.
“I think this is a typical provocation by Mr. Blanchet, who loves Alberta bashing. It would be nice if for once he stood up, as leader of his fringe party, and expressed some modicum of gratitude to Alberta,” Kenney said.
In the past, Kenney’s tough talk and combative posture with the ruling federal Liberals resonated with many Albertans.
After years in the nation’s capital as a Conservative member of Parliament and high profile cabinet minister in Stephen Harper’s government, with a reputation for savvy political and communication skills, Kenney returned home to Alberta in 2016 in a blue pickup truck that he crisscrossed the province in, campaigning to first unite the right and then later become Alberta’s premier.
Fast forward two years and Kenney is much less popular. The UCP’s controversial handling of the novel coronavirus pandemic and party infighting now threatens Kenney’s grip on the party he helped form.
A recent CBC News poll suggested nearly eight in 10 Albertans somewhat or strongly disapprove of the UCP’s handing of COVID-19.
Longtime political watcher Duane Bratt thinks Kenney is reverting to form in hopes of resuscitating his deflated political standing.
“It sounds like desperation to me,” said Bratt, a Mount Royal University political scientist. “He’s going back to his old playbook.”
“Kenney,” he added in an interview with CBC News, “has one playbook and this is it.”
Will the old political playbook work this time?
Bratt wonders if Kenney’s recent anti-Ottawa rhetoric will work this time.
Two years after his landslide victory — in the wake of the misery, human suffering and polarized rhetoric that COVID-19 brought — many Albertans no longer feel enamoured with Kenney.
On top of that, public concern about climate change continues to grow. And Ottawa seems intent on lowering greenhouse gas emissions. Kenney risks being seen as out of step with where the world is going on climate.
“Alberta and Premier Kenney are looking more like an outlier on the issue of climate change,” said Chris Severson-Baker, with the Pembina Institute, a clean energy think tank.
“This is the kind of thing,” added Severson-Baker in an interview with CBC News, “that doesn’t help companies who are trying to attract investment for decarbonization to the province.”
Kenney’s rhetoric may also put him offside with the province’s oil and gas industry, which also increasingly talks about cutting oilsands greenhouse gas emissions.
Industry support for cutting oilsands emissions
In a recent interview with CBC News’ West of Centrepodcast, the head of Cenovus Energy, a big player in Alberta’s oilsands, stressed the “need to reduce emissions”
Calgary-based Cenovus Energy CEO Alex Pourbaix also highlighted the “very productive relationships” he’s had with federal Liberal cabinet ministers, expecting he’ll be able to “forge the same kind of relationships” with the new federal environment minister, who once tried to install solar panels on the roof of the home of then Alberta premier Ralph Klein as part of a Greenpeace stunt.
Some in the industry seem intent on lowering the temperature on climate change.
“We have to move away from polarization,” Martha Hall Findlay, the chief sustainability officer at Suncor Energy, told CBC Radio One’s The Currenton Monday.
“We have to collaborate to move forward,” added the former Liberal. “We cannot make this work if we’re pointing fingers, if we are vilifying.”
Amidst this plea for less finger pointing, climate change activists remain skeptical of government and industry’s commitments and efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Oil and gas hedges?
The oil and gas industry has done a lot over the last decade to reduce its emissions intensity, but actual total greenhouse gasses from the oilpatch have increased because of higher production.
Pourbaix foresees oil and gas remaining a “huge part” of Canada’s energy mix “for decades to come.”
“I think there is going to be a transition, but it’s not going to be a transition off oil and gas. It’s going to be a transition to oil and gas that has much lower emissions because I just think the role they play in our modern world right now is very difficult to replicate or replace,” he told West of Centre.
Chris Severson-Baker, with the Pembina Institute, hopes the Cenovus CEO is wrong.
“He, and his company, are betting against the world being able to tackle climate change,” said Severon-Baker. “Hopefully he’s not, right,” about a future demand for oil and gas well into the future, he added.
“If that’s the case, we simply are not going to be able to prevent dangerous climate change.”
A report by the International Energy Agency (IAE), an autonomous intergovernmental organization, warned earlier this year against investing in new coal and oil and gas projects in order to meet climate mitigation goals.
Questions about carbon capture
Pourbaix — and others in the oil and gas industry — are also betting big on carbon capture, the process of capturing C02 emissions from fossil fuel-powered energy generation and storing it deep beneath the earth or for reuse.
UCP Premier Jason Kenney is also a big fan of CCUS, calling on Ottawa on Monday to invest $32 billion in the technology.
The oil and gas industry’s Pathways alliance also trumpets the benefits of carbon capture and storage technology.
Severson-Baker remains skeptical about CCUS playing a big role in cutting oilsands emissions, as Kenney suggests.
The Alberta regional director of the Pembina Institute says the Canadian oilsands producer alliance to achieve net-zero “looks good on paper,” but “it’s overstating the opportunity for carbon capture utilization and storage.”
Experts believe meeting the climate change goals agreed to this week at COP26 will mean leaving a lot of oil in the ground.
They envision a time not too far down the road when oil and gas companies won’t be able to make a profit extracting it from the earth, highlighting, they say, the pressing need for Alberta to transition to a low-carbon economy.
Updated climate pan for Alberta
In the coming weeks, Alberta plans to unveil its updated climate change strategy.
Climate change activists and experts hope the UCP government seizes the opportunity to remake the oil-rich province’s economy.
Climate change expert Sara Hastings-Simon predicts demand for Alberta oil will eventually wane.
“What we see,” says Hastings-Simon, “is that in a world that is increasingly ratcheting up ambition towards addressing climate and to reaching net-zero, that means that that demand [for oil] is going to fall.”
The IAE’s most recent annual report, in fact, predicts a future energy economy that “promises to be quite different from the one we have today.”
Many Albertans rely on the oil and gas industry for their livelihood. Transitioning away from oil and gas could trigger, by one estimate, 312,000 to 450,000 job losses.
The federal Liberal government pledged $2 billion to help workers in oil-producing provinces transition to a greener economy.
The federal government’s “People-Centred Just Transition” discussion paper also highlights the importance of creating “decent, fair and high-value work” to replace the jobs lost in oil and gas.
Hastings-Simon also believes Alberta has an opportunity to seize the “huge economic opportunity” that comes from transitioning to renewable energy.
The climate change expert stresses it’s crucial to start planning now to support oil and gas workers who will eventually lose work because of the expected declining global demand for Alberta’s oil and gas.
Whether that planning begins in earnest soon remains a question. Moments after Premier Kenney signalled his openness to discussing an emissions cap on Alberta’s oil and gas industry with the federal government, he vowed to “vigorously defend the economic interests of Alberta.”
Kenney, it appears, has reverted to his “old playbook” of waging war with the federal Liberals.
Political watchers, however, are not so sure it will win the deeply unpopular politician many political points this time — and climate activists and scientists worry that it’s just stalling the hard work needed to make Alberta’s energy transition happen.
REGINA – Saskatchewan‘s provincial election is on Oct. 28. Here’s a look at some of the campaign promises made by the two major parties:
Saskatchewan Party
— Continue withholding federal carbon levy payments to Ottawa on natural gas until the end of 2025.
— Reduce personal income tax rates over four years; a family of four would save $3,400.
— Double the Active Families Benefit to $300 per child per year and the benefit for children with disabilities to $400 a year.
— Direct all school divisions to ban “biological boys” from girls’ change rooms in schools.
— Increase the First-Time Homebuyers Tax Credit to $15,000 from $10,000.
— Reintroduce the Home Renovation Tax Credit, allowing homeowners to claim up to $4,000 in renovation costs on their income taxes; seniors could claim up to $5,000.
— Extend coverage for insulin pumps and diabetes supplies to seniors and young adults
— Provide a 50 per cent refundable tax credit — up to $10,000 — to help cover the cost of a first fertility treatment.
— Hire 100 new municipal officers and 70 more officers with the Saskatchewan Marshals Service.
— Amend legislation to provide police with more authority to address intoxication, vandalism and disturbances on public property.
— Platform cost of $1.2 billion, with deficits in the first three years and a small surplus in 2027.
—
NDP
— Pause the 15-cent-a-litre gas tax for six months, saving an average family about $350.
— Remove the provincial sales tax from children’s clothes and ready-to-eat grocery items like rotisserie chickens and granola bars.
— Pass legislation to limit how often and how much landlords can raise rent.
— Repeal the law that requires parental consent when children under 16 want to change their names or pronouns at school.
— Launch a provincewide school nutrition program.
— Build more schools and reduce classroom sizes.
— Hire 800 front-line health-care workers in areas most in need.
— Launch an accountability commission to investigate cost overruns for government projects.
— Scrap the marshals service.
— Hire 100 Mounties and expand detox services.
— Platform cost of $3.5 billion, with small deficits in the first three years and a small surplus in the fourth year.
—
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct .17, 2024.
VANCOUVER – More than a million British Columbians have already cast their provincial election ballots, smashing the advance voting record ahead of what weather forecasters say will be a rain-drenched election day in much of B.C., with snow also predicted for the north.
Elections BC said Thursday that 1,001,331 people had cast ballots in six days of advance voting, easily breaking a record set during the pandemic election four years ago.
More than 28 per cent of all registered electors have voted, potentially putting the province on track for a big final turnout on Saturday.
“It reflects what I believe, which is this election is critically important for the future of our province,” New Democrat Leader David Eby said Thursday at a news conference in Vancouver. “I understand why British Columbians are out in numbers. We haven’t seen questions like this on the ballot in a generation.”
He said voters are faced with the choice of supporting his party’s plans to improve affordability, public health care and education, while the B.C. Conservatives, led by John Rustad, are proposing to cut services and are fielding candidates who support conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic and espouse racist views.
Rustad held no public availabilities on Thursday.
Elections BC said the record advance vote tally includes about 223,000 people who voted on the final day of advance voting Wednesday, the last day of advance polls, shattering the one-day record set on Tuesday by more than 40,000 votes.
The previous record for advance voting in a B.C. election was set in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic, when about 670,000 people voted early, representing about 19 per cent of registered voters.
Some ridings have now seen turnout of more than 35 per cent, including in NDP Leader David Eby’s Vancouver-Point Grey riding where 36.5 per cent of all electors have voted.
There has also been big turnout in some Vancouver Island ridings, including Oak Bay-Gordon Head, where 39 per cent of electors have voted, and Victoria-Beacon Hill, where Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau is running, with 37.2 per cent.
Advance voter turnout in Rustad’s riding of Nechako Lakes was 30.5 per cent.
Total turnout in 2020 was 54 per cent, down from about 61 per cent in 2017.
Stewart Prest, a political science lecturer at the University of British Columbia, said many factors are at play in the advance voter turnout.
“If you have an early option, if you have an option where there are fewer crowds, fewer lineups that you have to deal with, then that’s going to be a much more desirable option,” said Prest.
“So, having the possibility of voting across multiple advanced voting days is something that more people are looking to as a way to avoid last-minute lineups or heavy weather.”
Voters along the south coast of British Columbia who have not cast their ballots yet will have to contend with heavy rain and high winds from an incoming atmospheric river weather system on election day.
Environment Canada said the weather system will bring prolonged heavy rain to Metro Vancouver, the Sunshine Coast, Fraser Valley, Howe Sound, Whistler and Vancouver Island starting Friday.
Eby said the forecast of an atmospheric weather storm on election day will become a “ballot question” for some voters who are concerned about the approaches the parties have towards addressing climate change.
But he said he is confident people will not let the storm deter them from voting.
“I know British Columbians are tough and they’re not going to let even an atmospheric river stop them from voting,” said Eby.
In northern B.C., heavy snow is in the forecast starting Friday and through to Saturday for areas along the Yukon boundary.
Elections BC said it will focus on ensuring it is prepared for bad weather, said Andrew Watson, senior director of communications.
“We’ve also been working with BC Hydro to make sure that they’re aware of all of our voting place locations so that they can respond quickly if there are any power outages,” he said.
Elections BC also has paper backups for all of its systems in case there is a power outage, forcing them to go through manual procedures, Watson said.
Prest said the dramatic downfall of the Official Opposition BC United Party just before the start of the campaign and voter frustration could also be contributing to the record size of the advance vote.
It’s too early to say if the province is experiencing a “renewed enthusiasm for voting,” he said.
“As a political scientist, I think it would be a good thing to see, but I’m not ready to conclude that’s what we are seeing just yet,” he said, adding, “this is one of the storylines to watch come Saturday.”
Overall turnout in B.C. elections has generally been dwindling compared with the 71.5 per cent turnout for the 1996 vote.
Adam Olsen, Green Party campaign chair, said the advance voting turnout indicates people are much more engaged in the campaign than they were in the weeks leading up to the start of the campaign in September.
“All we know so far is that people are excited to go out and vote early,” he said. “The real question will be does that voter turnout stay up throughout election night?”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version said more than 180,000 voters cast their votes on Wednesday.
CHICAGO (AP) — Donald Trump has had a tough time finding a consistent message to questions about abortion and reproductive rights.
The former president has constantly shifted his stances or offered vague, contradictory and at times nonsensical answers to questions on an issue that has become a major vulnerability for Republicans in this year’s election. Trump has been trying to win over voters, especially women, skeptical about his views, especially after he nominated three Supreme Court justices who helped overturn the nationwide right to abortion two years ago.
The latest example came this week when the Republican presidential nominee said some abortion laws are “too tough” and would be “redone.”
“It’s going to be redone,” he said during a Fox News town hall that aired Wednesday. “They’re going to, you’re going to, you end up with a vote of the people. They’re too tough, too tough. And those are going to be redone because already there’s a movement in those states.”
Trump did not specify if he meant he would take some kind of action if he wins in November, and he did not say which states or laws he was talking about. He did not elaborate on what he meant by “redone.”
He also seemed to be contradicting his own stand when referencing the strict abortion bans passed in Republican-controlled states since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Trump recently said he would vote against a constitutional amendment on the Florida ballot that is aimed at overturning the state’s six-week abortion ban. That decision came after he had criticized the law as too harsh.
Trump has shifted between boasting about nominating the justices who helped strike down federal protections for abortion and trying to appear more neutral. It’s been an attempt to thread the divide between his base of anti-abortion supporters and the majority of Americans who support abortion rights.
About 6 in 10 Americans think their state should generally allow a person to obtain a legal abortion if they don’t want to be pregnant for any reason, according to a July poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Voters in seven states, including some conservative ones, have either protected abortion rights or defeated attempts to restrict them in statewide votes over the past two years.
Trump also has been repeating the narrative that he returned the question of abortion rights to states, even though voters do not have a direct say on that or any other issue in about half the states. This is particularly true for those living in the South, where Republican-controlled legislatures, many of which have been gerrymandered to give the GOP disproportionate power, have enacted some of the strictest abortion bans since Roe v. Wade was overturned.
Currently, 13 states have banned abortion at all stages of pregnancy, while four more ban it after six weeks — before many women know they’re pregnant.
Here’s a breakdown of Trump’s fluctuating stances on reproductive rights.
Flip-flopping on Florida
On Tuesday, Trump claimed some abortion laws are “too tough” and would be “redone.”
But in August, Trump said he would vote against a state ballot measure that is attempting to repeal the six-week abortion ban passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature and signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis.
That came a day after he seemed to indicate he would vote in favor of the measure. Trump previously called Florida’s six-week ban a “terrible mistake” and too extreme. In an April Time magazine interview, Trump repeated that he “thought six weeks is too severe.”
During the Oct. 1 vice presidential debate, Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social that he would veto a national abortion ban: “Everyone knows I would not support a federal abortion ban, under any circumstances, and would, in fact, veto it.”
This came just weeks after Trump repeatedly declined to say during the presidential debate with Democrat Kamala Harris whether he would veto a national abortion ban if he were elected.
Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, said in an interview with NBC News before the presidential debate that Trump would veto a ban. In response to debate moderators prompting him about Vance’s statement, Trump said: “I didn’t discuss it with JD, in all fairness. And I don’t mind if he has a certain view, but I don’t think he was speaking for me.”
‘Pro-choice’ to 15-week ban
Trump’s shifting abortion policy stances began when the former reality TV star and developer started flirting with running for office.
He once called himself “very pro-choice.” But before becoming president, Trump said he “would indeed support a ban,” according to his book “The America We Deserve,” which was published in 2000.
In his first year as president, he said he was “pro-life with exceptions” but also said “there has to be some form of punishment” for women seeking abortions — a position he quickly reversed.
At the 2018 annual March for Life, Trump voiced support for a federal ban on abortion on or after 20 weeks of pregnancy.
More recently, Trump suggested in March that he might support a national ban on abortions around 15 weeks before announcing that he instead would leave the matter to the states.
Views on abortion pills, prosecuting women
In the Time interview, Trump said it should be left up to the states to decide whether to prosecute women for abortions or to monitor women’s pregnancies.
“The states are going to make that decision,” Trump said. “The states are going to have to be comfortable or uncomfortable, not me.”
Democrats have seized on the comments he made in 2016, saying “there has to be some form of punishment” for women who have abortions.
Trump also declined to comment on access to the abortion pill mifepristone, claiming that he has “pretty strong views” on the matter. He said he would make a statement on the issue, but it never came.
Trump responded similarly when asked about his views on the Comstock Act, a 19th century law that has been revived by anti-abortion groups seeking to block the mailing of mifepristone.
IVF and contraception
In May, Trump said during an interview with a Pittsburgh television station that he was open to supporting regulations on contraception and that his campaign would release a policy on the issue “very shortly.” He later said his comments were misinterpreted.
In the KDKA interview, Trump was asked, “Do you support any restrictions on a person’s right to contraception?”
“We’re looking at that and I’m going to have a policy on that very shortly,” Trump responded.
Trump has not since released a policy statement on contraception.
During the Fox News town hall, which was taped Tuesday, Trump declared that he is “the father of IVF,” despite acknowledging during his answer that he needed an explanation of IVF in February after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos can be considered children under state law.
Trump said he instructed Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., to “explain IVF very quickly” to him in the aftermath of the ruling.
As concerns over access to fertility treatments rose, Trump pledged to promote IVF by requiring health insurance companies or the federal government to pay for it. Such a move would be at odds with the actions of much of his own party.
Even as the Republican Party has tried to create a national narrative that it is receptive to IVF, these messaging efforts have been undercut by GOP state lawmakers, Republican-dominated courts and anti-abortion leaders within the party’s ranks, as well as opposition to legislative attempts to protect IVF access.
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