Natural Resources Committee on Oct. 25th, 2012

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

How closely does Natural Resources Canada work with Environment Canada on projects in the energy sector?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

Within the federal government, aside from Natural Resources Canada there are a couple of key performers in energy research and development.

The National Research Council is one and Environment Canada is another. Fisheries and Oceans also does some work with energy development in the offshore, so there's close work and it's organized through a certain governance process with assistant deputy ministers and directors general. Environment Canada and a number of other departments are involved in the coordination of these programs and in the selection of projects.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

You mentioned energy R and D, the clean energy fund, and the ecoENERGY innovation initiative. You say there are 35 demonstration projects currently under way. Do you know the total number of projects?

When I look at the clean energy fund in the budget, I see $795 million, leveraged at 1:16. That must lend itself to a lot of projects. That money must really stretch out. Do you have an idea of the total number?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

On CCS, it's actually a small number of projects, because they are expensive. The Shell Quest project is over $1 billion. The federal contribution is $120 million to that project. Those are large-scale projects, so there are fewer of them.

On the small scale, for the $150 million, there are about 20 projects. Those are smaller-scale projects with less investment from the federal government.

[Martin Aubé]

In addition to the funding programs, we have laboratories. These laboratories work directly with universities or industry, and industry pays for the collaborative research, so we have even more projects going on outside the funding envelopes that Marc D'Iorio described.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

Okay, super.

You mentioned some leading-edge technologies in shale gas, heavy oil, traditional hydro, bioenergy, and nuclear. Do you have some specific examples of leading-edge competitive technology in heavy oil?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

The work that Canada has done over the last 30 years in heavy oil, going back to the 1970s, is now being adopted fairly broadly under the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas in which all countries in the hemisphere work together. There's a heavy oil working group, and Canadian innovations in heavy oil are now being adopted in countries like Brazil, Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago, and Colombia. There are a lot of small companies and there is a lot of innovation in these areas. There are also a number of geophysical firms involved in this type of work.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

Perfect.

Can you talk a bit about what benefits Canada would get from these competitive technologies? You're saying other countries and other industries are adopting some of this leading-edge technology. How does that benefit Canada?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

It can directly benefit through employment if it's technologies that we export. As well, it can have a positive influence as the processes we are using are getting cleaner and cleaner. It can really influence international developments following in the same track by having technologies that minimize the environmental impact. For example, as we go towards production—a non-aqueous process, for example, for oil sands, when that comes to be—will have a much smaller impact on the environment. It's directly a benefit, and indirectly I think we influence a lot what other countries can do.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

I appreciate that. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

Thank you, Mr. Leef.

We go now to Mr. Gravelle, followed by Mr. Sopuk and Ms. Liu. Please go ahead.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

We talked a little bit a while ago about cap and trade and a price on carbon. We know it's been part of the Conservative agenda since 2008. Has an evaluation ever been done on putting a price on carbon?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

Again, this is outside my area of expertise. I work in the S and T area and I'm not a policy person or a politician.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

If it's outside your expertise, who could we ask that question to?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

It would be to policy folks, whether they are in our department or in Environment Canada....

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

So you don't know if an evaluation has ever been done on cap and trade.

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

Again, it's not my area of expertise.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Thank you.

I want to move on to something you talked about, eco-energy innovation. We know that the ecoENERGY program was a very good program and it's been cut. It was a good program because it saved on electricity and it created a lot of jobs. Has an evaluation ever been done on the ecoENERGY program?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

There's a suite of ecoENERGY programs. This one, which is the ecoENERGY innovation initiative, is a follow-on to the ecoENERGY technology initiative. It was really restructured in order to look at specific challenges on the integration of clean energy. That's on the demonstration side.

On the R and D side, it was looking at a number of areas, including energy efficiency, bioenergy, unconventional oil and gas, and transport, specifically in the lightweighting of vehicles. It was basically energy efficiency applied more broadly than in communities and buildings. There were five areas of focus for that particular program.

Again, ecoENERGY is a very broad suite of programs. There were some on energy efficiency for retrofit and others that were technology-based.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Are you telling me that no, no evaluation has been done, or no, you don't know?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

We evaluate our own programs, such as the energy and technology initiative . We've looked at what was performed under that and did an evaluation of that particular program.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Can you table that report?

[Dr. Marc D'Iorio]

I can certainly provide the chair with our evaluation of the program.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Chair, it was brought to our attention by Mr. McGuinty at the last meeting that we had requested tabling of some reports that were never forwarded to the committee. Can the clerk keep track of this report and make sure it comes to the committee and let us know when we have it?

[The Chair, Conservative, Leon Benoit]

That's the normal process.