Evidence of meeting #79 for Natural Resources in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was lng.
A recording is available from Parliament.
President, Chamber of Shipping of British Columbia
I'm talking about the west coast. The Kinder Morgan project has actually been functioning since the 1950s and there have been no related accidents to tanker traffic in and out of the Kinder Morgan facility throughout that time. The only incident was the land-based spill.
Conservative
Joan Crockatt Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you.
Mr. Rubin, I will go over to you. I appreciate your pragmatic approach; it's direct, and it's very entertaining as well.
I agree with you—or you agree with us—that when we're talking about export market diversification, the issue is to get the oil to markets where it's going to get a higher price so that we can be price-makers rather than price-takers in Canada. Would you agree with that?
Economist, Author, As an Individual
Yes, but we don't have to ship the oil to China; not that there is anything wrong with shipping the oil to China—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
—but once you get to a port, once you get to the west coast, you can just ship it—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
—to the United States. The United States is importing 10 million barrels a day. Why are they importing oil from Saudi Arabia? Why are they importing oil from Venezuela? We may be a lot farther than other places to China, but why wouldn't we increase our market share of U.S. imports, because instead of importing oil from Saudi Arabia—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
Do you understand what I'm saying? Because it's really important to understand—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
Because I don't think you do understand that it's not a question of finding different markets.
Conservative
Economist, Author, As an Individual
It's a question of getting the right prices.
Conservative
Joan Crockatt Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you.
You talked about the whole gas equation being turned on its head and we've gone from $9 down to $4. I think you are the gentleman who predicted that we'd have $225 WTI—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
I said $100 when other people were talking $50, by the way.
Conservative
Joan Crockatt Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
But $225, I think, at your peak, and we're at $91 now. I wonder—
Economist, Author, As an Individual
That's the problem. Brent is what you need to get.
Conservative
Joan Crockatt Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Yes, but I was just comparing apples and apples for you.
However, the point that I'm really asking about is given that we've had a lot of these new discoveries.... You talked about the Bakken, and we also have the Permian Basin, the second largest discovery in the world, and Delaware, for example. Are we, in your view, at risk of potentially missing the market for utilizing the Canadian resource of the oil sands in light of tight oil and these other discoveries?
Economist, Author, As an Individual
I guess what you're asking is, will the prolific growth of tight oil from U.S. shale formations displace Canadian imports? Is that what you're asking?
Conservative
Economist, Author, As an Individual
Well, what I was trying to say in my earlier comment that obviously flew above your head was that the United States is still importing 10 million barrels a day, so there is a lot of room to increase domestic production, from the Bakken and from the Eagle Ford and from all manner of shale formations. But if we can get the oil to the coast, then what we can do is displace oil imports in the United States from third destinations. Do you understand that?
Conservative
Joan Crockatt Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Yes.
My question had more to do with the fact that we now are competing on a global market for oil. Oil prices are declining. Oil sands is expensive oil. Because of the new discoveries, are we at risk of missing the market if we don't get our oil onto the market quickly ?
Economist, Author, As an Individual
Ms. Crockatt, you say that oil prices are declining. Are you aware that Brent averaged $112 last year? Are you aware that is an all-time high price for oil?