First of all, let me start by acknowledging the good work that was done by the previous government on this file. We did not start the trilateral conversations. There was a memorandum of understanding that was signed in December 2014 which led to some good energy mapping continent-wide that we unveiled in Winnipeg. That work was started by the previous government. We give them credit for that. We built on that good, solid platform in meaningful ways. We have established six working groups, all of which will be led by Canada, the United States, or Mexico, and you mentioned some of them. Key areas include low carbon electricity, clean energy technologies, and energy efficiency. We have a lot to learn from our partners continentally on energy efficiency.
With carbon capture, you know there are some high-profile projects, particularly in Saskatchewan. Carbon capture and storage is very expensive at the moment, but we also know, and everyone who owns a device understands, what you pay for it in year one is not always what you pay for it in year five or year eight. These technologies have front-end costs, but over time they become far more reasonably priced. We believe that will be true in some of the cutting-edge technologies, including carbon capture, use and storage.
As for climate change adaptation, I come from a flood-prone province and we understand too well what this means. Just to harken back, my personal mentor in politics was a Progressive Conservative. His name was Duff Roblin. You may recall the name because he built what was known as “Duff's Ditch”. Duff's Ditch was a $63-million or $64-million project that was agreed to by John George Diefenbaker when he was prime minister. He and Duff Roblin were two good Tories, one more progressive than the other. It has saved, in the 50 years that it has been taking all of that excess water from the Red River and channelling it around the city, billions of dollars and countless moments of misery among families. This was a visionary decision about flood mitigation. There will be other opportunities for this government and succeeding governments to have the courage to make a decision that might be unpopular at the moment, but would make sense for generations to come. Adaptation is part of it, and reducing emissions from the oil and gas sector, including from methane.
The three countries will work together to increase alignment and to ensure the North American energy sector is developing responsibly, effectively, and efficiently. We all know that the American administration is working toward a political deadline, and that the political season is well under way, as if any of us haven't noticed. It's going to get more and more intriguing, no doubt. There is a sense at least from our government's perspective that now is a good time to aggressively look at ways of deepening the continental relationship, and that's what we're doing. We're doing it through official groups, and we're doing it with frequent ministerial meetings. In fact, I'll be up early tomorrow morning to catch a plane to Houston for the CERAWeek international conference on energy, one of the most important energy conferences in the world. I will either be on panels or meeting with the secretaries of energy from the United States and Mexico again, only a few weeks later, and also with Australia, Israel, and other countries.
We will take the very good start, we think, that we have established trilaterally in North America and also widen the conversation, particularly around mission innovation, which I described in my remarks.
There is a lot more to do, but it's a very good start. I was thrilled, as I'm sure the member for Portage—Lisgar was, to host this meeting in Manitoba, and it won't be the last meeting that we host in Manitoba.