Last week Michael Law, CEO of the Alberta Electricity System Operator (AESO,) conducted his first press conference. He said that any potential solutions to replace natural gas as the generating source of electricity — wind power, battery storage, importing electrons from BC — were useless. Worse, any attempt to do so would put large parts of Alberta at risk of blackouts and brownouts. Alberta might end up entirely without power in the middle of a windless January night..Law then explained the obvious: Canada’s proposed electricity regulations created a huge public health and safety problem for Alberta..Shortly after Law’s presser Premier Danielle Smith explained Alberta’s response to this initiative by Canada and provided some context. Most significantly, she said Alberta would use the Sovereignty Act to resist Canada’s proposals..She explained: “we continue to see aggressive and hostile announcements that seem to indicate they’re not respecting [Alberta’s constitutional jurisdiction] and coming to the table in good faith.” Her “seem” is generous to a fault. When has Canada ever acted in good faith towards Alberta in the past 118 years?.The three areas of Canada’s bad faith towards Alberta concern first, Michael Law’s chief concern, a refusal to compromise or seriously negotiate on proposed electrical regulations that would increase the fragility of the Alberta power grid and likely induce its failure. Smith said she would not permit Albertans to freeze in the dark..Second, Canada refused to compromise, discuss, or seriously negotiate on a carbon emissions cap, preferring instead to limit production of hydrocarbons. The eventual goal, as the Prime Minister blurted out years ago, is to shut down the oil sands..Earlier this month Smith said Alberta will not transition away from oil and gas but from CO2 emissions. How? By developing new carbon capture and storage, CCS, technologies. Alberta will produce more hydrocarbons but emit less carbon..Made-in-Alberta technological improvements are not good enough for Canada because Canada is not really interested in limiting CO2 emissions and the alleged effect CO2 has on climate change, except as a rhetorical club to attack Alberta..Apparently, Canada, under the tutelage of environment minister Steven Guilbeault, has forgotten that national borders do not inhibit the movement of gasses in the atmosphere..Readers may recall that Monsieur Guilbeault was in Beijing at the end of August. Not long ago Gwynn Morgan pointed out that, if all gasoline-and diesel-powered vehicles were off Canadian roads for a year, that would equal an emission reduction that China would make up in 56 hours. If Guilbeault (and Canada) were so concerned with CO2, why did he not mention this while visiting the largest (by far) emitter in the world?.Smith pointed out the obvious significance of his silence in China and his grandstanding elsewhere. “I am concerned,” she said, “why the Minister wants to force Alberta to 2035 but is okay with China getting there by 2050.”.And that is the third real issue between Alberta and Canada: a refusal to compromise, discuss, or seriously negotiate on Alberta’s net-zero target year of 2050 in favour of Canada’s target year for Alberta, 2035..Alberta has said, “2035 is impossible.” Canada replied: “We don’t care.”.And why should Canada care? Alberta is the problem, Canada thinks, not them. So there is nothing to care about. Moreover, personal pride as well as divergent interest are involved. In a word, Canada doesn’t like Alberta all that much, which is why they want to destroy Alberta’s livelihood..Most recently, for example, this attitude, personified in the environment minister, explains why Guilbeault did not promote the export to China of much “cleaner” natural gas to replace “dirty” coal. Such exports, unfortunately, would benefit Alberta. End of story..On Alberta’s side, Smith has said she was going to show up at COP28, the enviro gabfest, in Dubai later this fall to showcase CCS technologies developed in Alberta. An ulterior intent involves Smith’s pride, which personifies the pride of all Albertans. She intends, just by being there, to rebuke Guilbeault, whom she has called a “maverick” and a “renegade” who is “quite offensive to those of us who are trying to be reasonable,” on his favourite show-off stage..The use of the Sovereignty Act will prove more important than the admittedly amusing task of making a fool of Canada’s fanatical environment minister..It was not initially clear whether the Sovereignty Act was a sword or a shield. Smith said, by way of explanation: “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction,” a neat paraphrase of Newton’s third law of motion. The implication is that the Sovereignty Act is a shield against the illegal incursions by Canada into legislative responsibilities assigned by the Constitution to Alberta..By this reading, Alberta will defend its jurisdiction in order to ensure the orderly development of oil and gas and to ensure a reliable and affordable system of electricity generation. Electricity generation, in other words, will continue for the foreseeable future to rely on natural gas both for baseload and for peak demand..The Sovereignty Act, however, can also be a sword. If the Act is unconstitutional, as so many lawyers say it is, that’s fine. Change the constitution..If the lawyers on the Supreme Court of Canada rule against Alberta, as most observers of this institutional agent of Canada expect, then we move from the territory covered by the Sovereignty Act to that of the Clarity Act, initially drafted to provide Quebec with a legal exit strategy, but one they have not (yet) successfully used..It seems obvious that a clear majority of Albertans do not wish to be extinguished by Canada. And if the Supreme Court of Canada rejects any successful use of the Clarity Act by Alberta, which is entirely possible, then we have reached the impasse of the English colonies of British North America in 1776..A lot is riding on the refusal of Canada to compromise, discuss, or seriously negotiate.
