WIECHNIK: Guilbeault is choosing 'climate commitments' over Canada’s economic future

CALGARY — Stephen Guilbeault has stated Canada is now at a crossroads and must choose between compromising its “climate commitments” or embracing the path to a “more sustainable” future.The former Environment Minister recently authored a column in the Toronto Star discussing the impacts the memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed last November between Prime Minister Mark Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith could have on Canada’s future, and unsurprisingly, it reads like a script most Canadians have heard many times before. Don’t compromise on a “green” future. Raise the carbon tax. No more pipelines. Save the planet.According to Reuters, Ottawa and Alberta are now close to a deal that would raise the effective carbon tax for Alberta’s industrial emitters to $130 per tonne..KAPLAN: Alberta's hidden carbon tax bombshell — $550 per tonne by 2050 .At the same time, the broader points in the MOU — a new BC coast pipeline, industry support for the $16.5 billion Pathways carbon capture project, and a workable emissions plan for the oil sands — remain unresolved.Guilbeault is adamant that carbon taxes need to be “reinforced, not weakened.”“Carbon pricing is a pillar of Canada’s climate change strategy. Its predictable pricing provides the economic underpinning that drives more than $57 billion in clean energy projects,” he said.He is right about one thing: Canada is at a crossroads..Do we want to be a serious country again, or are we going to be trapped in a Leftist fantasy land where empty slogans and regulations rule and we continue down a dark hole to net zero while other countries — in particular European Union members — are taking a step back to review their current economic and energy policies?For years, environmentalists have insisted that implementing a carbon tax was the ethical thing to do.Industry will adapt, and investment will flow.Well, things haven’t been going to plan..Guilbeault warns Carney-Smith energy accord won’t decarbonize oil, pipeline 'won't get built' .Canadian oil and gas producers have anticipated higher profits this year as prices have surged due to the Iran conflict, but major industry players are still holding off on investing in new major capital projects amid ongoing concern about perceived regulatory and policy barriers in this country.Recently, at a conference in Toronto, Lisa Baiton, CEO of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), said Ottawa is still “talking about a carbon tax when no other producing and exporting nation does that to their producers.”She went on to say that instead of Canada seizing the moment given the current global energy crisis, “we are focusing on things that add cost and make us less competitive.”.Guilbeault also brought up federal methane regulations, saying that while Ottawa and Alberta agreed “in principle” to a plan that could see Alberta delay taking action by five years, it was just more “foot-dragging” from Smith.Yet, Alberta is already a world leader in reducing methane emissions from oil and gas operations, having made a 52% reduction in emissions from the oil and gas sector from 2014 to 2023, which was achieved two years before the strategy’s original 2025 deadline.The Liberal MP then turned his attention to water use, saying that on average, 2.3 barrels of water are required for each barrel of oil produced in the oil sands sector and that if “a pipeline increases oil production by one million barrels of oil per day, more than two million barrels of water per day would be required to meet this goal.”While it is true that oil sands production can require significant volumes of water per barrel, what Guilbeault fails to mention is that roughly 78% of the water used in oil sands mining is recycled, with the broader oil and gas industry recycling about 81% of its total water use, according to Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) data..UPDATED: Steven Guilbeault resigns from cabinet because of pipeline deal.He also invokes national unity, warning that a new pipeline to the BC coast could fracture already fragile relations with coastal First Nations.While that is a concern, Alberta’s resources being permanently held hostage by another province’s politics breeds nothing but resentment.National unity does not mean that Alberta’s product — which the rest of the world is begging for — gets perpetually blocked so Eastern politicians like Guilbeault and climate warriors like David Suzuki can feel morally superior.“This MOU represents a defining moment for the country’s energy and climate future,” Guilbeault says..“Getting this agreement right is an economic, social, and moral imperative. The decisions made in the coming weeks will echo for decades to come.”He’s right, but this isn’t about abandoning environmental goals; it’s about recognizing that policies have consequences, and right now, the policies this Liberal government has implemented in multiple sectors in this country have led to an affordability and unemployment crisis as well as economic instability, which Liberals like Guilbeault have exacerbated by doubling down on them.An economic approach that’s built on ever-increasing costs for both producers and consumers, while undermining growth and ignoring reality, is a sure-fire recipe for disaster.A serious country doesn’t sacrifice its core industries and the well-being and prosperity of its people in pursuit of virtue signalling.It adapts as needed.The choice Canada faces isn’t one that's moral versus immoral.It's practical versus impractical. Guilbeault and his ilk have chosen their path.It doesn’t mean the rest of us have to follow it.

WIECHNIK: Guilbeault is choosing 'climate commitments' over Canada’s economic future

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