There's a conception, particularly with regard to the oil sands, that they're so high priced they're uncompetitive. But in 2014, if you look at the SAGD, the in situ production, the average costs were cheaper than they were in the U.S. They were cheaper than what they were in Norway and in Russia.
Half the industry is competitiveness. In this low-priced environment, just over the last year Canada's major companies required a $92 break-even price. That's fallen to $53 in the last year. It's more than a 40% tumble in cost—they have found efficiencies and inflationary pressures have been relieved.
Then there's the fact that innovation is happening. One of our members, Nsolv, has the next generation, the third generation of solvent-based technology, in the commercialization stage. It has a price of $50 for new builds. It's pretty cheap and it reduces GHG emissions by 80%. So the short answer is that innovation will keep Canada's sector competitiveness. We shouldn't assume Canada can't compete in a lower-price environment.
As for the carbon price, it would ideally be better if it was globally applied. There are things you can do, though, to reduce an economic impact. One of these is tax rebates. You take some of the money and make the program revenue-neutral. You're using what you're reducing on carbon, and you're playing with the tax system to help competitiveness, or you're investing in clean technologies that might have a competitive impact on the industry.