Foreign Affairs Committee on Oct. 25th, 2023

[Dr. Mark Winfield]

I would emphasize that I'm not an expert on energy matters in Africa. I do think it is important to keep in mind that the capacity of governments in Africa, and certainly in Latin America, to cope in the way that Europe did is much more limited. That leads to greater political fragility. The capacity to undertake the kind of structural transition in energy markets that Europe is pursuing is a huge challenge in Africa or Latin America.

That is part of the reason we have the loss and damage issues in relation to climate change and issues to provide capacity in the global south to try to manage these kinds of transitions.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you.

I have a minute and a half or so. I'm curious in terms of Canada's contribution and how we can help the world with respect to shifting to cleaner energy and renewable energy.

Do you have any insight on what we can provide as a country to the rest of the world when it comes to cleaner and renewable energy sources?

[Dr. Mark Winfield]

There are a number of areas where we have considerable expertise, although we've lost some ground not just on energy sources but also on the energy efficiency and energy productivity side.

We have some very interesting utilities in Atlantic Canada, of all places, that do very interesting energy efficiency work. We had quite a successful program in Ontario as well, until 2019.

We have developed considerable capacities in the development, operation and design of renewable energy technologies and their large-scale operation and integration into energy systems, particularly in Alberta, Ontario and Quebec, and to a certain degree in the Maritimes as well. We have quite a lot to offer in this space beyond raw commodity resources.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you.

[Joe Calnan]

If I could just jump in on that as well—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

I'm afraid we're out of time for this round.

We will go to Mr. Garon. You have two and a half minutes.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Winfield, back in March, the European Parliament reached a deal with the Council of the European Union requiring that at least 42.5% of Europe's energy consumption come from renewable sources by 2030, while targeting 45%.

Canada's carbon management strategy is to invest heavily in large-scale carbon capture projects, using public money. That's not a last resort, as was the case for steel and cement. The government is calling for large-scale investment in order to massively raise production—in other words, raise emissions—to then export that production to Europe to supposedly ensure its energy security.

In light of the deal reached in Europe, isn't Canada's strategy completely out of step with the reality in Europe? Aren't we barking up the wrong tree?

[Dr. Mark Winfield]

It's not inconceivable. The Europeans are moving very quickly on, and already have moved on, a very large-scale integration of renewables. You're seeing 40% to 50% of energy output in major European countries coming from wind and solar principally. There are other sources as well. That seems to be where the Europeans are heading strategically. They've kind of been burned, as it were, for having relied on an external energy source around their transition.

There's a kind of convergence of climate, energy security and energy transition in Europe, which is quite different from how we are thinking about things in Canada. Their perspective is very much one of a fossil fuel consumer, as opposed to a producer. That has very strongly informed their strategies, with the additional experience of geopolitical risk around this situation.

In Canada, our dynamics are different, but the need to decarbonize is just as imperative. As I've said, I do worry that we have an awful lot of eggs in the CCUS basket. For a variety of reasons, that raises some very significant risks in my mind.

[Joe Calnan]

Sir, can I jump in here?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Yes, you can, very briefly, for less than 15 seconds.

[Joe Calnan]

It's just a comment on the outlook for European energy.

Shell, Total, I believe, and Eni have all signed 27-year agreements to procure Qatari natural gas, LNG, from 2026, which will bring them beyond 2050 in terms of importing LNG. The idea that natural gas would be completely absent from Europe's energy system past 2050 is not true.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you, Mr. Calnan.

We next go to MP McPherson. You have two and half minutes.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to follow up on some of the questions of my colleague Mr. Zuberi.

Canada has a $5.3-billion international climate finance commitment that supports developing countries that are, and I quote, “hardest hit by climate change”, and it includes a thematic focus on clean energy transition and coal phase-out.

Mr. Winfield, perhaps I'll start with you. How effectively do you think Canadian international assistance is in addressing energy insecurity in developing countries, knowing that the guardrails here are clean energy transition and coal phase-out?

[Dr. Mark Winfield]

I would have to admit that this is somewhat beyond my immediate area of expertise in terms of where the international assistance has been going.

In general, one would expect the investments to emphasize relatively distributed resources, because they're appropriate in scale and capital intensity in responding to the energy needs in those sorts of locations. It makes sense to be doing household community-level things as opposed to large centralized infrastructures, I think, in many contexts.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you.

You also spoke a bit about this massive transition in Europe as a result of, I guess, being weaned off Russian energy.

This question is actually for you, Mr. Calnan. Do you find it strange that there's a massive transition to renewables in Europe and a massive transition to renewables in our development dollars, and yet in Alberta we have put a pause on renewables? Do you find that incongruent in any way?

[Joe Calnan]

I don't tend to comment on more political matters, but I'd say that there's nothing that by nature goes.... There's no logical incoherence in having a country that has a significant amount of renewables in its energy system as well as being a major energy exporter in the form of hydrocarbons. Norway, for example, is one of the most advanced countries in the world in terms of decarbonization, and yet it is a major and very strong exporter of both natural gas and oil.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Of course, they also haven't paused renewables, though, have they?

Thank you.

[Joe Calnan]

No, they have not.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you.

For our next round, members are provided four minutes.

We start off with MP Chong.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for appearing.

In March of 2022, Minister Wilkinson, in response to the energy crisis resulting from Russia's invasion of Ukraine a month earlier, agreed to incrementally increase oil and gas exports in 2022 by a 300,000 barrels-a-day equivalent, 200,000 of which were oil and 100,000 of which were natural gas, in order to displace gas from authoritarian states like the Russian Federation. At the time, industry experts—industry executives in Alberta—indicated that they could easily double that number if required. The pipeline capacity and the production capacity were there to do that to 600,000 barrels.

I note that at the same time in 2022, President Biden authorized the release of 217 million barrels of oil from the strategic petroleum reserve, which works out to about 600,000 barrels a day.

This year, in effect, the administration turned a blind eye. It was deliberate policy. It has been widely reported in the New York Times and in the Washington Post. The administration turned a blind eye to the sanctions on Iran, beginning in late December of last year and throughout this year, that allowed Iran to increase its oil production by some 700,000 barrels of oil a day. Now that it's coming to an end because of what's happening in the Middle East, the Biden administration announced last week, on Wednesday, that it had lifted sanctions and issued a permit through the treasury department lifting sanctions on Venezuela to produce what is expected to be about 200,000 barrels of oil a day going forward.

Do you not think that Canada should be supplying these barrels of oil to our closest trading partner and ally in lieu of the strategic petroleum reserve releases, after the lifting of sanctions on a pretty brutal regime in Venezuela and a blind eye being turned to increased output from the Islamic Republic of Iran?

That's my question.

[Joe Calnan]

Yes, I'll comment on that.

Certainly the relations between Canada and the United States on energy are a major issue for Canada. That is part of why the Trans Mountain pipeline is very important for Canadian national interests going forward. That's not to say that the United States isn't our best friend, but you shouldn't rely on your best friend for everything.

To take the example of the Keystone XL pipeline, which was—how do I put this?—stopped by the Biden administration on his first day in office, I'd say that at this point—

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Industry executives said at the time, in March of 2022, that they could easily double up exports of oil and gas under existing pipeline and production capacity, from 300,000 to more than 600,000 incremental barrels of oil equivalent a day.

I guess my question is this: Should we have not, as a country, worked with our closest trading partner and ally to supply them with those incremental barrels, instead of their having to drain the SPR or go to Iran and Venezuela for these incremental barrels?

That's my question.

[Joe Calnan]

I'm sorry. I'm not sure if I have the information on why we did not increase production by that much.

[Dr. Mark Winfield]

We don't control production in that way. I mean, if there's a market there, and a capacity to export, then the commodity is exported—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you—