There are bad economic ideas, spectacularly bad economic ideas, and then there is the suggestion that Canada should punish President Donald Trump by attacking Alberta’s oil industry.Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi thinks Premier Danielle Smith is being “incredibly foolish” by refusing to use Alberta oil as a weapon in the Canada-US trade war. He says nobody wants to actually turn off the taps; he merely wants the threat on the table. Earlier, he refused to rule out an export tax on Alberta oil and gas as leverage against Washington.Nenshi is not alone. Doug Ford has openly urged Alberta to use an oil export tax as a “trump card.” Jason Kenney now says oil, gas, and potash should be on the table, and Rachel Notley previously demonstrated the same willingness to weaponize energy exports during Alberta’s pipeline fight with BC.Isn’t that wonderful? Because if Alberta has learned anything over the last half-century, surely it is that politicians should manipulate the price and movement of our energy to achieve some grand national objective. What could possibly go wrong?Let's call it National Energy Program 2.0.Same theory, updated logo. More virtue, fewer jobs.The original National Energy Program (NEP) imposed controlled prices, new federal taxes and export taxes, redistributed petroleum revenues, and encouraged investment outside Western Canada. Alberta’s own historical record notes that companies and jobs left the province in droves. The NEP did not single-handedly cause the recession that followed; global recession and collapsing oil prices mattered enormously, but it magnified the damage and became synonymous with federal interference in Alberta’s economy..Apparently, we are ready for the sequel.The new theory is simple: the United States imposes tariffs hurting Canadian industries, so Canada retaliates by making Alberta’s largest export more expensive and less dependable. That’ll teach ‘em.Alberta exported about $151.5 billion worth of goods to the United States in 2025. Oil alone accounted for roughly $111 billion. We are discussing weaponizing the commercial relationship supporting the single largest stream of export income in this province.An export tax would not arrive at the White House in an invoice marked “For Donald Trump.” It would enter a continental petroleum market. American refiners would bear some of the cost because many depend heavily on Canadian crude, particularly heavy oil, but Alberta producers would not magically escape. Netbacks could fall, margins would tighten, marginal projects would become less attractive, and capital budgets would all be reviewed.Then investors will ask the obvious question: Where else can we put our money? Is there a more stable, predictable, less costly jurisdiction? The damage spreads and will spread quickly. I, like many others, lost my job as a mudman in the first NEP, and I lost my company in the 2015 downturn. Contrary to Nenshi’s and the NDP’s belief, the oil patch is not a bunch of suits sitting in Calgary towers smoking cigars over barrels of cash. It is engineers, welders, electricians, truckers, drilling crews, equipment operators, pipefitters, accountants, consultants, and thousands of small businesses across Alberta. Not many of them belong to a union, either.The provincial treasury gets hit too. Alberta expects $13.2 billion in non-renewable resource revenue in 2026-27, including about $9.7 billion from bitumen royalties. Weakened production, investment, or realized prices and taxpayers will eventually inherit the shortfall. That is a given, as this UCP government seems incapable of reining in the spending..America imposes tariffs, so we damage Alberta’s most important industry. If royalties fall, we borrow the difference. Excellent. There is yet another problem: reliability has value. Prime Minister Mark Carney himself recently warned against using energy exports this way because Canada’s reputation as a reliable supplier matters. He is right. The continental energy system was built over generations around predictable supply. Pipelines, refineries, contracts, and billions in capital exist because companies expect oil to move according to commercial agreements rather than whichever Canadian politician is angry this week.Once governments turn energy into a political weapon, customers learn to diversify away from the supplier. Think Venezuelan crude. Investors quickly learn that political risk has returned to Alberta.That is what makes Nenshi’s argument so revealing. It reflects the old centralized Canadian instinct that Alberta’s resources are not primarily an Alberta economic asset but a national policy instrument to be deployed whenever Ottawa or Central Canada runs into trouble.Autos are under pressure? Alberta oil becomes leverage. Steel and aluminum under pressure? Alberta oil becomes leverage. Ottawa’s negotiations go badly? Alberta oil becomes leverage. Somehow, somebody else’s problem repeatedly requires an Alberta drilling program, a royalty cheque, or a paycheque to become the bargaining chip.There is legitimate anger at the United States, and a recent poll found that 58% of Albertans supported an oil-and-gas export tax. That fact should not be hidden. But popular anger, much of it driven by the anti-US rhetoric which is constantly repeated by our mainstream media, does not repeal basic economics, and governments are supposed to understand consequences beyond the applause line.As the official leader of the Alberta opposition team, Nenshi’s most important job is to protect workers, preserve market access, attract investment, and keep this province a dependable energy supplier. It is not to discover creative new ways to sacrifice Alberta’s strongest industry in the name of Forever Canada.There is also some magnificent irony here. For years, Alberta oil was supposedly dirty, embarrassing, and destined for extinction. Pipelines were blocked, projects delayed, and the industry lectured about its impending irrelevance. Now everyone has suddenly discovered Alberta oil is so strategically important that they want to use it as a weapon. Funny how quickly principles evolve when somebody elsewhere needs leverage..Nenshi calls refusing to gamble Alberta’s oil industry “incredibly foolish.” Albertans have heard this logic before. The original NEP treated our resources as something Ottawa could tax, redirect, and manipulate for a supposedly greater national purpose, while Alberta absorbed the lost investment, lost jobs, and lasting economic damage. Now the same instinct is back in modern dress: use Alberta energy to solve somebody else’s trade problem and call it national unity.That is exactly why this debate goes far beyond one export tax. As long as Alberta remains within a system in which its principal industry can be turned into a federal bargaining chip, the risk never disappears. Today it is tariffs. Tomorrow it will be climate policy, industrial subsidies, regional politics, or some other national emergency requiring Alberta to “do its part.” The label changes. The centralizing instinct does not.At some point, Albertans must ask the obvious question: why should the economic future of this province remain subject to politicians whose first instinct is to sacrifice Alberta’s prosperity for someone else’s political objective?Independence would put Alberta’s resources, trade policy, and economic strategy where they belong: in the hands of Albertans. We have already lived through one National Energy Program. We should not have to keep waiting around for NEP 2, NEP 3, or whatever Laurentia decides to call the next version.
