Industry Committee on May 29th, 2008

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Okay, maybe I'll go back to Mr. Fissel. One of the comments you made was about the demise of IRAP in 2005. In fact, as I understand it, the program is still there. What do you mean by demise?

[David Fissel]

It's a good question.

I was talking about a specific IRAP program. The National Research Council's IRAP program continues to exist, though it's changed. I was specifically referring to the IRAP pre-commercialization assistance program, which was cancelled, as I understand it, in September of 2005. That program, in my view and that of the industries I'm a representative of, was at the key pre-commercialization stage of development. That's the final stage in R and D.

Research is well funded in Canada, but for getting into development and then into pre-commercialization and commercialization, where the economic benefits are, that program was the only one in IRAP and the only federal government program that had really supported that, other than a bunch of bigger programs called TPC, Technology Partnerships Canada.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

That's moved over now to—

[David Fissel]

Aerospace, yes. But that program was removed from the IRAP portfolio, unfortunately.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

And what's the distinction between the two? In terms of pre-commercialization, as I understand it, IRAP is really about getting money to the SMEs, and so on. Could you distinguish between those two again?

[David Fissel]

Most IRAP funding is more around the research end of things or the initial part of research and development, as viewed by SMEs. Often the gap comes when you have the proof of concept in place but then have to take it to the market, which is often much more expensive work.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Well, is this applied research now, the kind that the community colleges are doing in advancing and developing the technology to the point where it could be picked up by a venture capital company, and that type of thing?

[David Fissel]

Yes, it's after the research and more on the development side of things, building the scale of something that's really commercial.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

It's the second part of the second stage.

[David Fissel]

That's right. It's a good point.

In attracting outside investment, this IRAP program plays a key part, because you can then leverage money. It's about partnerships again, and it really opens up getting outside investment too.

[Bruce Stanton, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

I think Mr. Tak had something he wanted to add.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Mr. Tak.

[John Tak]

I did want to add something that's not directly related to IRAP, but it is related again to the need to look at these sectors and to provide national strategies, and within those to take a purchase incentive. I think it's ironic that all of our wind technology is imported, mainly from Denmark, where they had a national strategy for wind power, but there's no incentive for fuel-cell products. Nobody gets an incentive to purchase the buses that are built in Winnipeg, but we are selling in the U.S., where they do have a fuel-cell purchase incentive. Korea has a fuel-cell purchase incentive. We don't count fuel-cell energy as renewable in Canada; there's no feed-in tariff for fuel-cell energy. In Korea there is a fuel cell....

So why is it that we're a leader in this sector but we have to go elsewhere to get the incentives to help us to commercialize it? That's a question for the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Okay.

Thank you, Mr. Stanton.

I'm going to go to Mr. McTeague for a 30-second question, and then Mr. Van Kesteren.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

I appreciate that.

It dawned on me today and in the past couple of days that we've found ourselves in a situation—or at least one member has—where we are monitoring gas prices since coming out west. But the interesting part of that is I just came to the conclusion that Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan are in a very, very acute or critical situation.

Putting together all of what you've said, Mr. Tak, and Mr. Schubak, on your highway proposal working here, how likely is it that you'll find the kinds of wealth or investment opportunities you need, so that you can start to take the pressure off those three provinces, which are in a very critical or acute stage?

I just want to let the chair know that it's going to get a lot worse this summer, more so than for the rest of the country, including B.C.

How do you see yourselves working in those three provinces? Because in the next two months, they are going to be at a real loss.

[John Tak]

They have a challenge with greenhouse gas reduction and creating clean energy. A lot of fuel cells operate directly on natural gas, but because of their efficiency, they help reduce the greenhouse gases and the emissions that come out of using natural gas.

We're not talking about replacing fossil fuels. We're talking about working with fossil fuels to make them cleaner and last longer, and then gradually transitioning to using fuel cells that run directly on totally renewable hydrogen. So we're totally complementary to working in those sectors.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

I want you there now, is really what I'm saying. It's becoming a serious problem.

[John Tak]

Okay, I'm happy to follow up.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you, Mr. McTeague.

We'll go to Mr. Van Kesteren.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. MacDonald, I'm curious, is Day4 in reference to the biblical story--

[Dr. John MacDonald]

You're number six in six years.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

--of the creation of the sun, the moon, and the stars?

[Dr. John MacDonald]

Yes, we have a little thing going. Until about ten seconds ago there were only five people who've known that since 2002. Now there are six.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

For the benefit of those who don't know, that was the creation of the sun, the moon, and the stars, and day and night.

I want to ask Mr. Fissel a question.

We've talked a lot about universities and how they can interact with industry. What about the reverse of that? How are you interacting with universities? Are you utilizing them?

[David Fissel]

Yes. Speaking for my own company, I can tell you that ASL Environmental Sciences has worked very actively with the University of Victoria, as we're in Victoria, and the University of Victoria's NEPTUNE and VENUS projects--the underwater observatories. There's a lot of back and forth. We sell products and technology with discounts to that major Canadian research effort, and our scientists work with their scientists.

This is a work in progress. I can't point to any great results so far, because the funding is just under way now, but ultimately, in the end we see the benefits being that we can take the technology that arises from the research there in this groundbreaking or deep-ocean water-breaking effort, and by working with them we can look for opportunities where we can commercialize it through companies like ours.

Also, the people who are there are a tremendous resource. Universities provide great people. I think somebody else here mentioned that Canadian scientists and engineers are second to none in the world in terms of their capabilities when they graduate and come out of those universities. Sometimes the issue is what will they do then, because universities can't employ them all. Again, that's where you need a very strong private sector. We need to do better in Canada in that area.

I don't know if that answers your question.