Natural Resources Committee on Nov. 23rd, 2006

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you, Mr. Tonks. As usual, that was direct and precise.

I have one question that's more on a technical point, and I'll ask for your advice.

The committee has heard a number of witnesses and is now going to look at the remaining witnesses for this session. It seems to be that one of the recurring matters that comes up is the responsibility of the Alberta government. It's not, of course, our jurisdiction to tell them what to do, but it might be useful for this committee to hear from somebody from the Alberta government. Without putting you on the spot--but you know the area better than we do--is there a particular department you think might be helpful for us to hear from more than others, if we were only able to hear from one or two? I understand that Minister Boutilier is your provincial MLA, the Minister of Environment, and he may be one we would be interested in hearing from if he's available. Are there others that would occur to you, such as Municipal Affairs?

[Melissa Blake]

Absolutely, and there are two recommendations I would make. Municipal Affairs has been a key contact for us in trying to advance some of the things we've talked about, from changes to the Municipal Government Act right down to comparisons between the infrastructure in our community and in other communities of our size. We are actually working quite actively with Municipal Affairs. The challenge we run into is that it's difficult to treat us differently than other municipalities in Alberta, so we run into that as a constant deterrent from progress.

The other recommendation I would make is.... As recently as the end of August, Minister of Justice Ron Stevens was appointed chair of the Oil Sands Ministerial Strategy Committee. He is currently going through a process to create a report due out in December that will be a foundation for the new premier. Then hopefully, individual budgets will reflect whatever recommendations they have. Based on the nature of the work he's completing, that would be another excellent contact for you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you very much.

I should mention as well that we're inviting former deputy minister--we're in conversation right now--Vance MacNichol, head of the stakeholder committee, to come down, and we're hoping he'll be able to see us within a couple of weeks. I think he would be able to provide a broad picture as well.

With that, I want to thank you.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

It being 5:10 p.m., may I make a brief comment?

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

I was hoping you wouldn't ask, but go ahead.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Thank you. It is not a question, just a comment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

We know how long your questions take.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

In fact, the Bloc québécois does not think it is realistic to believe that one day, someone could limit your production or the capacity of companies to produce more than a certain number of barrels per day. As you say, the market will dictate this, that is what we believe. So, we do not believe in imposing a moratorium nor a quota. However, we need to realize that we have just one planet and we have to take care of it.

As I was telling you earlier, in economic terms, you would both win, both the Chamber of commerce and the municipality, by forcing companies to make an effort that would not cost them a lot per barrel so that greenhouse gases can be eliminated. This would create jobs in your region but it would not cut the volume of production. On the contrary, this would allow production to increase. This would mean more business. At the same time, you would have a clear conscience and the satisfaction of having helped save the planet. The companies would be the ones taking action, but you have an important role to play on the ground to help us make them understand this. Business would improve. Perhaps you could also help out the local community.

The seat of the federal government is far from your region. As Mr. Russell said earlier, clearly the federal government made mistakes in how it has dealt with the First nations. But you live next to them. I don't want to hear that you are too poor to identify their needs and give them a hand. It is not just about giving them money, but also about giving them a way of life or adopting regulations. When the First Nations complain that their property rights having been violated, you could intervene. In my opinion this would be the least you could do. As has been said earlier, they will still be there after you leave.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you, Mr. Ouellet.

And again, I want to thank the committee, and for the record, our witnesses, and also Brian Jean, our member of Parliament for Fort McMurray. He was unable to be here today. He is Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport, and his committee is meeting at the same time.

I'm sorry he couldn't be here. It was his suggestion that you come, and I think it was a very good suggestion.

The committee has very much appreciated your testimony today. Again, thank you very much for appearing.

We will take a minute. As they're packing up and carrying on, I just want to get the attention of the committee, to talk very briefly about where we go from here. I'll just run down the list of witnesses we have scheduled until the end of the session and then ask your advice on where we proceed from here.

Next week, we will begin on Tuesday with a session on land reclamation and the boreal forest. It was one issue that was particularly evident to those of us who had the opportunity to visit Fort McMurray, and it's one we want to pursue. Obviously it came up again today. We're going to have a representative of the industry, the manager of land reclamation from Syncrude, and we're going to have Mary Granskou of the Canadian Boreal Initiative, which is an NGO that looks at this initiative across the north.

We'll be away on Thursday, because of the convention in Montreal. We won't have a meeting.

We'll return on Tuesday, December 5. Again, we will be discussing the environmental impact of the oil sands and the community. We will have the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency appearing with the Cumulative Environmental Management Association, CEMA. That will take up the first hour.

In the second hour, we are hoping to have Vance MacNichol, who is the chairman of the Oil Sands Multi-stakeholder Committee. This is a committee that is very similar to what we're trying to do here. It was established in Alberta, and I understand they've done some very good work. Rather than us recreating the wheel, we'd like to hear from them.

It may be as well that from that testimony we will find other areas we wish to pursue, to delineate information we have heard. That will be a busy day on December 5.

On Thursday, December 7, we're going to hear about prospects for nuclear power to recover oil sands. We did hear from some people in Fort McMurray about this prospect. It has come up a few times. That is about perhaps replacing the use of natural gas with nuclear power.

We'll hear from the Energy Alberta Corporation, which is making a proposal in that regard. Also, we think we will hear from a leading expert in it, Dr. Keith, from the University of Calgary, who has a different point of view from our first witness. That should be an interesting discussion of the possibility of using nuclear power in the oil sands. Also, we'll hear from Dr. Angus Bruneau, who is the chair of the R and D working group on the oil sands.

That, to this point, concludes the witnesses.

Then we will have two more days before the Christmas break. That's what I wanted to talk to you about. My sense is that we may want to use one more day for some wrap-up witnesses--not in terms of blue-skying or going out looking for new witnesses--to focus on areas on which you want more information. They may derive from some of the witnesses we've heard to date, or from those we will hear subsequent to this. I thought maybe on the last day before we have the Christmas break we might look at our direction, maybe just to have a blue-sky meeting, where we could talk about the direction our committee wants to go.

I'm going to ask our researcher to outline a draft to see if that captures where we think we'd like to go with the report, with the thought of giving direction to your input. When we adjourn for the Christmas break, we would leave the researcher with all this data and hearings, plus your input, and ask for a draft report to be made in the break. We'll give you five weeks to prepare a report from the information the committee has given you and in February we will begin a point by point analysis of that draft to come up with a report within a couple of weeks, I hope.

That's the sense I've been getting from speaking with you. I welcome your comments.

Madame DeBellefeuille.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I apologize for my absence, but I had to give a speech in the House on the Bloc motion. I did not want this to be taken as a sign that I was not interested in what the witnesses had to say. I have read the documents and they are extremely interesting. They have given me a different perspective.

Since we have the time to meet with other witnesses, I would say that, out of everything I have heard, once subject was addressed at the end and that we have not explored enough. I am talking about CO2 sequestration technology. When we visited Fort McMurray, we learned that this technology existed and that it is not being used because it is too expensive. I was surprised to hear this, since witnesses had previously told us that the technology was not ready and still at the embryonic stage. Yet, suddenly, the industry itself is saying that this technology is available.

I would like to know more about this technology.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you for that.

Madame DeBellefeuille has raised this point before. We had scheduled the entire meeting next Thursday to talk about sequestration and we had some very good witnesses lined up. Subsequent to that, the House agreed to adjourn on Thursday, so we've asked those witnesses to stand down.

Could I have your leave to ask them to come back on December 12, which would be our last meeting for consideration of witnesses? My understanding from the clerk is that we had three excellent witnesses prepared to speak at that meeting. And if you could bring them back on the agenda for the 12th, if that's possible, and if not, perhaps alternatives, so we could have a full discussion of the possibilities of CO₂ sequestration....

D'accord?

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Chair, it seems to me that we are spending a lot of time trying to figure out what we are going to do in the second week of December. I have heard that your government intends to adjourn before that date. So, we're maybe wasting our time talking about what we would be doing that week. Supply voting has been moved to November 28 because the House is going to quickly conclude its business. So we won't be here at that date.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

That's news to me.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

I'd also like to say that the need to improve the state of the planet and the environment are questions which fall under provincial rather than federal jurisdiction.

I personally would not want us spending too much time on these issues, because that will not enable us, at the federal level, to develop a national energy policy, far from it. I would like us to cut back on these discussions. I think nuclear energy however would be interesting to discuss, because that is an area we could potentially make recommendations in. Also, I think it would be interesting to meet with some people, specifically Canadian manufacturers and exporters. These people hold very specific opinions on climate change and sustainable development. We've had one example from the mines and oil sands industry representatives. Between 1990 and 2003 there was a 103 per cent increase in greenhouse gas emissions. These people may be in a position to inform us a great deal about the actual potential of technology and innovation.

Moreover, we could also consider hearing from the international Institute for sustainable development, because our committee will not be here to meet with Ms. Gendron, as planned, on November 30th. So, perhaps we could invite somebody else, I wouldn't really count on the committee sitting until December 12, 13 or 14.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Yes, I heard that.

Mr. Bevington, just briefly.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

I agree that the sequestration issue could be moved forward on the agenda over the reforestation. It's a solution issue that links back to the Clean Air Act and to a number of other things that are going on in this Parliament. It's a good plan, I think, to bring that forward and make sure we get it in before Christmas.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

I agree with that.

I think we have consensus on that, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

The difficulty is that it seemed like a good idea at the time. It was on the list, or on more than one of the lists we received, because initially people thought it would be a good thing to see what could be done as part of the environmental concerns up there, whether it's within our jurisdiction or not. Frankly, not very much of this stuff is the jurisdiction of the federal government, let alone of this committee. Many of these things are of particular concern to the environment committee; this is the natural resources committee, after all.

I say that only because it is just four days away, and the clerk has made arrangements to have these people come. If it were a little further down the road, I think it would have been easier to change them around. We've had these people prepare for this meeting. Even at our last meeting we discussed that they were coming, and there wasn't any objection at that time. I just think this could be a little difficult.

I don't mean to suggest that by allowing the reclamation and boreal forest people to come next Tuesday it would preclude further discussion in other areas. I think we can still get that in by Christmas. We do have a date available.

This is news to me about breaking. I mean, we're pretty clear that we're going to be here until December 15, but there may be something.... If in fact there is an earlier break, we're going to have to reschedule these people to the new year in any event. I was just hoping we could get it all done before Christmas. But I will take that into consideration.

To the clerk, in terms of seeing to the requests of the committee, do the best you can to do that, because I think there is clear interest in the sequestration particularly. We'll ask you to give us an updated report on Tuesday at the start of the meeting so that we know where we go from here.

Tuesday is not going to be a long meeting in any event. Maybe then we could even try to get somebody to start discussion on other areas for consideration. We only have about an hour and a half on land reclamation and boreal forest, so we could probably put in half an hour on a different topic. Perhaps the clerk could get some thoughts from Mr. Ouellet as to who might come. We could put them in on Tuesday, if they could come on short notice.

Yes, sir.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

On behalf of the committee, Mr. Chair, I would think it appropriate to thank the clerk, on the record, for the arrangements that were made with respect to our trip to Fort McMurray. The arrangements were excellent. It was very quick, but we appreciated the tremendous effort that was made to accommodate us and to keep the program going.

Thank you to the clerk and to you, Mr. Chairman, for the hospitality we received. We appreciated that. You did a good job.

On behalf of the committee, I'll put this on the record.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear!

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you.

With that, ladies and gentlemen, we are adjourned.