Natural Resources Committee on Oct. 16th, 2023

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

Botox helps. Botox is helping.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Shannon Stubbs, Conservative, Lakeland, AB]

I might ask, Chair, if we could keep the questions on the topic of the motion, which is the purpose we're all here today for this meeting. It was moved by our colleague Charlie Angus, so perhaps he can stay on the topic of the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, George Chahal]

Mr. Angus, the floor is yours. Please continue with your questioning in line with the topic at hand today.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I am certainly very close to the topic at hand.

I guess, if you're saying I should talk to Exxon, right now the lawsuits against your industry are in the hundreds, and there's a pretty damning one against Suncor in Colorado.

You're saying that I have documents you haven't been able to read—I'll give you the documents—these are all documents from your company.

Part of it is about liability, and this is what I'm really interested in here. When you were vice-president, Exxon released a statement saying, “Taking drastic action immediately is unnecessary” because “the indications are that a warmer world would be far more benign” and “warming would reduce mortality rates in the U.S.” That's a false statement.

Today, we have a letter from Canadian medical doctors to the government stating, “1 in 7 premature deaths in Canada are related to fossil fuel air pollution”. Would you say that your industry is at a high risk of these kinds of lawsuits, which are proliferating for your having known the damages, refusing to do something about it and refusing to tell the public they were at risk?

[Rich Kruger]

I'd reiterate that the last time I worked for Exxon was about 10 years ago, so your Exxon comments... If you want to talk about Exxon, I'm no longer the one to talk to about it.

In terms of our industry—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Can we talk about Suncor being sued by Colorado?

[Rich Kruger]

That's why I thought I came here today.

I won't talk about active lawsuits.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

That's fair play.

[Rich Kruger]

If I go to what I said earlier and what I think is important here, the importance of these issues—energy for people, for our quality of life, and doing it in such a way that's compatible with the long-term health and well-being of our climate—that's why we're here. That's why you're in your position, and it's why I'm in my position: to work together to address these critical issues.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Absolutely. My concern, Mr. Kruger, is that the evidence coming forward is that your industry knew that increasing production and increasing the burning of fossil fuels was destabilizing the planet. I've had people evacuated, people who cannot go home. We've had people lose their properties because of this, and we have the evidence that your industry knew. I'm amazed that this is all new to you, because it's a question of liability.

I noticed, for example—I'm going to change subjects here, if you don't mind—that there's a complaint at the Alberta Securities Commission that you dropped the issue of liability to investors. Right now, this is a very concerning question, because the International Energy Agency has put out a report telling us as legislators not to put more investments in because of stranded assets, yet, since you've taken over Suncor, you've dropped the issue of liabilities.

Do you not have an obligation to make sure that the public is aware of the risks and liabilities of further investments and of the damage that's being done to the planet, which your industry has known about since the beginning?

[Rich Kruger]

First of all, for others, you're referencing a Greenpeace complaint put in front of the Alberta Securities Commission—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Does that make it irrelevant?

[Rich Kruger]

—that is inaccurate.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Have you dropped your liabilities?

[Rich Kruger]

No.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

You haven't.

[Rich Kruger]

They're still contained within the report, and all of the obligatory liabilities and risks are reported. This is a voluntary report, and they're in there. It happens to be in a different area that apparently wasn't read, but it hasn't changed.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Do you believe you are at higher risk for liability?

[The Chair, Liberal, George Chahal]

Thank you, Mr. Angus.

Thank you, Mr. Kruger.

The time is up. We'll move to our next round.

We have Mr. Patzer for five minutes.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Thank you very much for coming today, Mr. Kruger.

Off the top, I'd like to apologize to you on behalf of Canadians for wasting some of your time here. We look at the motion that we have before us today, and we have these people over here bringing up issues that aren't even relevant to the motion at hand or what you were called for here today.

On that fact, I would like to start, Mr. Kruger.

You were asked a question, and you were starting to answer on the higher costs associated with producing oil and fuels in Canada, and you were cut off before you could finish that answer. I was wondering if you could lay out on the table for this committee what some of those higher costs are and maybe some costs we have here in Canada that other jurisdictions around the world you compete with don't have, so that we can get a good grasp and an understanding of what's happening so a company like yours, which is trying to be competitive today, can also be relevant in the future.

[Rich Kruger]

I go back to some of the comments I made earlier. Oil and gas are fundamentally global commodities. They are produced around the world. They are consumed around the world. When you compete in a commodity market, it's about your ability to supply cost. In Canada, some of the areas where it's higher cost relate to where we are. The types of climates and environments that we operate in are part of it. The resource that we develop is part of it, but it also then becomes taxes, royalties and other charges that are applied.

I would say that in a relative sense we're on the higher side of that curve, whether it's income taxes, carbon taxes or whatever. As an industry, what we need to do to be competitive and relevant in Canada is to find ways to improve our operations and offset those costs, because our goal is that we're predominantly a Canadian company and we want to thrive and grow here for the long term. Therefore, we have to bring new technology in. We have to do things that make us better to allow us to compete.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

We heard earlier some of the numbers that you talked about for investments in new technologies. I think, at least on this side of the table, we all agree that it is the absolute appropriate approach to take: technology not taxes. That's a common tag line that you've probably heard us say over and over again on our side.

I'm wondering if you wanted to tell us what some of these technologies are that you're operating and what you'd like to see going forward in order to make the investments in that technology actually work and be sustainable.

[Rich Kruger]

We're spending right now $1.5 billion converting, in our oil sands mining sites, from using coke as a fuel source to provide heat and steam for our operations to natural gas. That's fuel switching, and it has a significant reduction in carbon emissions.

In our in situ operations, the operations that drill wells and produce from reservoirs, we're spending several hundred million dollars right now on pilot work to look at introducing solvents as opposed to steam, again to dramatically reduce the carbon content. I commented on it.

In St. Clair, we have a renewable-fuels ethanol plant, the country's largest. We're looking at what we can do to further expand or improve that operation.

I think it's across the board. To make the base business better and to grow new renewables businesses are where we're focused.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

It would be fair to say, then, that you've done a lot of this before the government mandates take effect. I'll preface that by saying Suncor built one of the first wind farms in Saskatchewan 20 years ago. You guys have been making these investments without the government mandating things or putting arbitrary targets in front of you. Is that correct?