Natural Resources Committee on June 8th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Mr. Ouellet, were you going to take the final two minutes?

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

No. May I carry on with my questions? It's the Bloc's round.

In the green plan, there was a very specific 33 Mt target. Will large industrial emitters have the same target in your greenhouse gas emissions reduction plan? I know that Mr. Brown is with you and that he knows the file well because he negotiated with the large industrial groups. I admit that was no easy task. Can we say today that large industrial emitters will continue to bear the burden they had in the green plan?

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

All I can tell you, Mr. Bigras...and you're fully aware, you're talking about the Liberal plan. I want to emphasize that this was a plan of the old LIberal government. Greenhouse gas emissions, as you're fully aware, are 35% above the target set when they signed on to Kyoto--29% above, plus the minus 6.

Greenhouse gas emissions went up each and every single year under the old administration. So no, we are not going to accept every single part of its plan, and when we are ready to give you our details, we will. We already have announced areas where we're moving forward on reducing greenhouse gases, and I can tell you, yes, we are very much looking at large final emitters. When we're prepared to give you what we believe is in the best interests of Canadians, where we can create that balance to clean up the air and we can ensure the sustainability of where we want to go, as I've talked about in our strategic energy plan, we will let you know.

I do want to emphasize you can pull out bits and pieces of the old Liberal plan you think you might like, and I'm more than willing to sit down with you and listen to you as we evolve and develop our programs. But you shouldn't be surprised that everything the LIberals did we're not just going to pick up and say, that's great, that's what we're going to do--we're not. We're not going to.

We are going to make changes, and we want to ensure that at the end of the day we're getting results, the taxpayers are getting value for their money, and we're getting the greatest impact out of those investments. That is something where, as you can appreciate, after a government has been in power for 13 years and we take office, and we've been there for six months, we are moving forward.

As you know, we've made our announcement on renewable fuels, we've made our transit pass. We think it's important to get people out of their automobiles in some of the most polluted air basins, and yes, we're looking at other parts of the file. We're very committed with the large final emitters on carbon dioxide capture and storage. This is something where we think there's great opportunity.

So yes, we will be working with them, but you should not be surprised that every single thing the previous government did is not going to be adopted by this government, because we're not going to.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

Thank you, Mr. Minister. Thank you, Mr. Bigras.

Mr. Ouellet will have to wait until the next round.

Mr. Bevington, go ahead, please.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Lunn, for coming in today.

I think I want to follow this with my first question. I attended the SCM meeting last weekend in Montreal, and there was unanimous resolution that the EnerGuide program be reinstated in your made-in-Canada option. That's a validation from a fairly large group of serious people across the country, and non-partisan as well. That's an important consideration.

As far as our ability to analyze how we can help in terms of moving forward with a made-in-Canada option and assisting the government goes, I think it is important that we understand how the decision was made to remove the EnerGuide program. I'd like to see you table these reports to this committee, so that we could see where the program was falling down, and where we could work with you to improve that program if required.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Let me respond. First of all, these decisions, as you're aware, are not made by individuals; they are made by government collectively. So the decision to not continue with the current version of EnerGuide that was crafted by the previous Liberal government was a decision of the Government of Canada. It was made collectively, and there's nothing more I can say than that. My deputy said it was a cabinet confidence, but it was a decision by the government. Every decision that's made is a collective decision of the government. We can just leave it at that.

Let me just say that energy efficiency is very important to me personally. I believe there will be enormous opportunities for energy efficiency in homes in the years and the decades to come. Let me tell you my vision of where we are going.

There are some great opportunities in things like the heating and cooling of homes right across Canada. Ground-source heat pumps are an enormously efficient way of heating and cooling homes. The technology is there. It's been there for years. It's economical. I think we need to move the entire construction industry and the renovation industry to getting into these forms of energy efficiency.

Solar is still relatively expensive, but when I speak to people in the industry, I can see a day coming--whether it's 20 years from now--in which, when you will build a new home and put in a hot water tank, or you put in a heating or cooling system, you're going to put in a solar system, and we will have homes that are net zero users of energy. We will actually be able to put energy back on the grid. That technology exists today, and we want to support those technologies so we can move forward. Yes, we will come forward with energy efficiency programs.

There were parts of the EnerGuide program that were working, and there were other parts that were not. We're looking at those areas, as we develop our programs, which we think are in the interests of every single Canadian taxpayer. We're going to work with our provincial counterparts in the months ahead and partner with them again to ensure that we get the greatest value.

I want to say very strongly that I believe energy efficiency in the industrial sector, in our transportation sector, and in our housing sector plays a very significant role on this file, and it's something I'm very committed to. I look forward to your suggestions and to working with you.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

It would certainly help if we had some information about why this program was deemed inefficient. Certainly, the need to use energy audits to advance economic development in terms of retrofitting is something that I think should be taken into account and should be part of that.

However, to go on from there, I'm interested of course in some of the talk about the national energy strategy. We had the energy group here earlier this week. The energy group's framework discussion was only about the market forces. I'm pleased that you're talking about values here, and I assume that the values include the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, improvement of the environment in terms of the use of energy, and the question of imports and exports of non-renewable resources from this country.

That brings me to the discussion around liquefied natural gas. There are two or three plants that have been approved already; there's another one coming up in Kitimat. These plants are going to link Canadians into importing energy into this country for a very long period of time. That is not going to be good for our balance of payments. That's not going to be good for the security of the nation in terms of where we're getting liquefied natural gas. I'd like to understand if the previous government has done any analysis in this regard and whether we're going to see some kind of analysis in front of this committee so that we can look at these decisions.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

I want to tell you that we import energy today. We are a net exporter of energy, but as you can appreciate, we're a very large country and there are certain regions of the country where it makes more sense to import energy because it's a lot closer and a lot more efficient, and then we export more energy from other areas. That's just the way the market works. In some cases, it wouldn't make sense for the Atlantic provinces to get energy from Alberta when they have other sources that are a lot more affordable and a lot closer. Alberta is going to export its energy to other markets that are close.

That's the supply and demand of the market curve. But as I said in my opening comments about the amount of energy that we do export and what it provides to the economy.... You've heard me say publicly in the House that in the oil sands alone, the amount of money that's being invested there, and the returns, which allow us to deliver other areas in our social programs, provide a lot of revenue. There are other opportunities. We just want to make sure we do it well, which brings me back to your comment on the energy strategy.

Our energy strategy can never just be about one dimension of energy. We have to look at all the dimensions. We have to look at the social dimension. When the price of energy skyrockets, it hits the poorest of the poorest people in our nation the hardest. That's something we have to be very cognizant of. We have to remember that in our energy strategy.

There's the prosperity side, which is so important, but balanced with that is the environment. As I said in my opening remarks, we need a strong regulatory framework.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Yes, but you're not importing--

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

We want to streamline that framework where we eliminate duplication, where we don't compromise the integrity. We can strengthen the regulatory framework but allow the certainty that the industry needs, and the security. The security of our energy supply and resource is obviously very important. Those are all parts of the energy strategy that we need to focus on and that we are focusing on as a government. With this, there are great opportunities.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

On liquefied natural gas, we've made decisions about this already. We have plants that are new. This is a new source of energy to Canada, and it's an outflow of our economy. We're going to be competing with our internal sources of natural gas for the provision of heating to homes in Quebec and Ontario. We're going to be competing with our internal sources of natural gas for the provision of gas to western industrial requirements.

So has this been decided already, or are we--

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Energy is a continental market. It's not confined to Alberta; it's not confined to Canada. It's continental.

Regarding LNG--

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

These aren't continental sources.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

--we'll be importing LNG, and we'll be exporting LNG. Again, it's driven by market forces, and we want to make sure we're there and that, whatever we do with the development of this resource and as we export it, we come back and do things: we ensure that we provide the greatest protection of the environment and we provide the greatest security and the greatest safety.

With the size of Canada, it should not be a surprise to anybody that one region will export and another region will import, but overall, Canada's energy supply is very secure. We are a net exporter of energy, and Canadians can be very confident.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Do I have more time?

[The Chair, Conservative, Lee Richardson]

You can have a short one, if you want. Everyone else went overtime.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

I would like to go to another matter, which is the development of the diamond industry in Canada and the relatively rapid expansion of that industry and the need to look at it from a national perspective. We had some discussions at the committee during the mining session, and I'd like to get your thoughts on moving ahead with this kind of discussion, at the committee level, in a more organized fashion.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Bevington, there's nobody who knows this better than you, as the member of Parliament for the Northwest Territories. There is a great expansion of the diamond industry in that area, and the jobs it is creating and the development of the economy is something I will be discussing with all the energy ministers from Canada as we meet at the Council of Energy Ministers in August, up in the Yukon.

Oh, the mines ministers....

[An hon. member]

You said energy.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Sometimes it overlaps. We are actually meeting at the same time in the same city.

This is something we want to continue to support. I have met with some of the people from this industry. There are great economic opportunities for the north. There are high-paying, good jobs. There is value-added that can evolve as the market grows, as you and I have discussed, personally. Natural Resources Canada wants to support this industry in every way we can. We think there's a great future for it.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

I do, as well. But at the same time, there is a need to have a national perspective. We made an attempt in the previous government to move forward--

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

That's exactly why, when we get together, we're going to meet with all the mines ministers from every single region of this country and sit down and discuss the opportunities and the interests and where we move forward. And I think that's a great opportunity.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

That will come back, of course, to this committee.

[Gary Lunn, Conservative, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Yes, well, I'll report. And as I said to you personally, I appreciate, as a member of Parliament from that region, your keen interest in this file.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Thank you.