Natural Resources Committee on March 22nd, 2021

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Well, that's for him to say.

Of the officials who are here, I'm not sure exactly which official should answer, so the first one to answer. My question is, can we name any significant bilateral victories for Canada vis-à-vis the United States in terms of our natural resource sector in the past couple of years?

[Shawn Tupper]

I would point to critical minerals as a pretty significant success in terms of our dialogue and engagement with our American counterparts. We moved very quickly with the former administration to establish a working group. We've been able to identify areas of common interest. We've begun to work with industry. We've done work between our labs in terms of identifying areas of success. I would say that's a really great example.

Nuclear would be another area in which we've established a table with our American colleagues and are advancing work with respect to uranium and small modular reactors on the regulatory front. That has been quite significant for us, because it is a component of what keeps Canada at the forefront of the small modular reactor file, just as an example.

Regulation at large is another area in which, with the alignment of our regulation and the work we've been doing with our American friends as we look at over 100 pieces of infrastructure across electricity and oil and gas infrastructure, we've really benefited Canada by finding that alignment and looking at the North American footprint.

Those would be elements where we have a really successful relationship with our American colleagues, particularly on the government front.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

I can appreciate that this is important work, but it sounds like it's a lot of planning for future success, which we all know is essential. I'm wondering if there has been anything in the past couple of years of which the government can say, “We got this done, and this is now directly leading to benefits for Canada.”

[Shawn Tupper]

As I said, keeping the border thin with the advancement of a common regulatory framework is crucial to industry. Avoiding the barriers and making sure that industry has a transparent operational framework in which it can engage are fundamental to its survival.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

If your argument is that the status quo is a victory, I don't think Canadians will be generally enthused by that. What has been advanced that has created a positive impact for Canada?

[Shawn Tupper]

Again, I would say it's the work we're doing on nuclear. We anticipate up to a $300-billion marketplace on the small modular reactor side. The work we're doing with Westinghouse—

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

I appreciate that, but that's in the future. In the future, yes, we'll get hundreds of billions of dollars. Can you point out any successes within the past couple of years that our government has achieved to create a real impact for industries in natural resources in our country?

[Shawn Tupper]

On the forestry side, the softwood lumber administrative review is a component. We stand ready to engage with our American counterparts. It takes two to get to that table, but I think on the softwood lumber front we continue to have a large degree of success in the disputes that arise. That would be a critical element of success.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

What would you define as success in these disputes?

[Shawn Tupper]

When we have reviews and whatnot, and the outcomes favour the Canadian position, those are successes. We can't always control how the Americans react to some of those decisions and some of the things we do, but those are elements where we're using the tools that are available to us to advance Canada's positions. We seem to be pretty successful in doing that. Those are things we just have to keep at.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

What you're saying is that we're successful at arguing our cases. We're winning some of the disputes, which, yes, I think is important. Has this resulted in any action that has benefited our industry, though?

[Shawn Tupper]

Our paper industry would say they have been able to continue to sell into a marketplace. We continue to sell lumber into the marketplace. Those are components of success. We've managed to advance Canada's interests and to, as I said, keep that border thin and keep it open, allowing Canadian industry to compete in the North American marketplace equally—

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

I appreciate what you said—

[The Chair, Liberal, James Maloney]

I'm sorry, Mr. Lloyd. That's all your time.

Ms. Jones, I understand your camera is not working. We can hear you, so please go ahead. You have five minutes.

[Yvonne Jones, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Hello, Mr. Chair, and good afternoon, committee. I've had the best IT people working on my system, but unfortunately my video is still not working.

I want to welcome the officials who are before the committee today and to thank them for the work they do on behalf of all Canadians in promoting the energy and mining sectors in Canada.

Obviously, I live in Labrador, so I'm next door to some huge rare earth findings and a relatively new mineral development. My questions today will be somewhat geared around that in terms of what we're doing to help incentivize the industry itself and what we're doing to help those companies innovate around rare earths in Canada.

From many of the discussions I've heard, there are very few experimental labs to do the kind of testing they need to do. It's very expensive, as is the extraction technology. I'm wondering if the officials could bring me up to speed on what the future direction is around this particular commodity and where we're going in supporting these companies.

[Shawn Tupper]

The Canadian minerals and metals plan is the foundational piece that provides us with guidance, and the importance of that is that it was done in partnership with the provinces and territories. We've been trying to build a consensus in terms of approach.

As you can imagine, many of the elements of the regulatory framework and the oversight of the sector lie under the jurisdiction of the provinces and territories. Through the partnership that we've been able to establish, we've been able to look at regulatory issues. We're looking at where government programming at the provincial, territorial and federal levels can come together to incent different kinds of investments.

On the rare earth elements side of things, we have been using the CANMET laboratories on the mining side to look at extraction technology and to help industry advance its ability to better extract more efficiently and to reduce costs for those extractions. We've been able to make contributions there.

Industry relies on a lot of the work we're doing on the geoscience side in terms of its ability to make sound investment decisions.

There is a whole lot of work that we do across the board, for Canada. We have the very fortunate situation in which, theoretically, we can look at 100% value chains in Canada. We have the minerals in the ground; we have world-class, world-leading mining companies that can extract that material from the ground; and we have the manufacturing and the capacity to turn that into high-value goods that go into wind turbines, photovoltaics, batteries and small modular reactors.

It is really for us now, working with industry and the governments of other jurisdictions, to make sure that Canada continues in its world-leading role on the mining side.

[Yvonne Jones, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Thank you.

If I have time I'd also like to ask a quick question with regard to the clean growth agenda that's been launched by the department and by the Government of Canada.

As you know, I represent northern regions in Canada where we're not just seeing many communities that are highly dependent upon diesel generation, but a lot of mining companies as well. If we're really going to cut emissions, we need to be able to reduce that reliance on diesel and other fossil fuels, both in the communities and across the industry.

Can you speak today about which incentive programs are out there to make this happen, and what we're doing with mining companies right now, in partnership with them, to encourage them to become less reliant on diesel generation in northern regions of Canada?

[Shawn Tupper]

I will pass this question to Mollie Johnson, who is our assistant deputy minister responsible for this area. Indeed, working with indigenous communities, remote communities, mining companies and mining communities has been a big feature of the work we've been doing to look at electrification and alternative fuels.

Mollie, maybe you could jump in and talk about CERRC and some of our specific programs.

[Mollie Johnson, Assistant Deputy Minister, Low Carbon Energy Sector, Department of Natural Resources]

Good morning, everybody.

The strengthened climate plan included a number of measures, 64 of them. We have spoken specifically about the off-diesel programming that came in under budget 2017. These main estimates include about $60 million so that we can continue to do off-diesel programming. That's helping communities get on to cleaner electricity sources—cleaner power sources.

There is an additional $300 million in funding in the strengthened climate plan, and we'll be looking to move forward on that.

That's just part of the funding that we'll be looking at moving forward. It complements clean fuels and electricity work, but it's specifically focused on our indigenous community. There is capacity building in there as well.

Mr. Chair, I'm mindful I don't have too much time, so I'll stop there.

[The Chair, Liberal, James Maloney]

Thank you, I appreciate that.

We will go over to Mr. Simard, for two and a half minutes.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Tupper, something surprised me earlier. You said that you had a lot of success stories with softwood lumber and that there would be administrative reassessments. Right now we are in a bubble where prices are very high, but we know that bubble will not last long.

For my part, I hear a different story from people in the business. First, I'm hearing that the cash access program doesn't meet the requirements of the various stakeholders. You almost have to be technically bankrupt to have access to it. Second, even forestry producers who have clients only in Canada are not entitled to request financial support from Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions. They must apply to Global Affairs Canada and their applications are consistently denied.

What I hear from people in the community on the forestry issue is that the department is often absent. That's the impression most of them have.

Can you update us on that?

[Shawn Tupper]

Across the board, if you're talking about the kinds of supports we offer as a department to the industry, again, I would make reference to the forest innovation program, the expanding market opportunities program and investing in forest innovation. These are all elements of things that the department offers and that industry is able to take advantage of. It is true that as the market is fairly good for components of the forest sector and prices are very high, it's counterintuitive in terms of the kind of programming government might offer by way of financial support, because in fact the sector right now is doing fairly well.

On the fact that programming exists at the Department of Global Affairs, we take very much a whole-of-government approach to these things. We work very closely with Global Affairs in making sure they have a good understanding of our industry and the sector, and that the decisions they are making through their programming are consistent with the market realities. In terms of the international component, an example of where Global Affairs led the charge for us and where we succeeded was in the reduction of the tariffs from 20% to 8%.

Again, those are elements where we rely on other partners within the federal family—in this instance, Global Affairs—to make sure we are defending the interests of our forest sector.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, James Maloney]

Thank you, Mr. Simard.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

I don't have much time left and I would like to know something. In the estimates, we see $560 million for the emissions reduction fund—