Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
This has certainly been an interesting conversation this morning with actors who understand what is taking place in the pipeline industry. I'm certainly pleased to hear that.
One of the key things we're talking about is net benefits. We often hear about the political action and the discussion in that regard. Of course, you just mentioned energy east and the significance that it could have had, but it was blocked politically. We have seen the same type of thing when taking energy across the border into the U.S. We know how much that has affected our opportunities.
Finally we get a pipeline that allows us to move a product that means so much to Canadians and allows us to start to realize the benefits from this, and not only to realize the benefits but also to recognize that we are taking the safest and cleanest product and moving it to market, which allows us to replace the type of energy that, otherwise, the world is going to get from different actors.
I applaud the efforts, and I appreciate the fact that we're talking today about the difference between the urban pipeline process and the hopscotching that you have to do in order to get this project done. I think a lot of folks look at it and say, “Well, there was a right-of-way there before.” Maybe it had to be wider. Maybe different things had to happen.
How did things change so much when you went from the traditional pipeline that was built decades ago versus this particular one? I think that's part of the question. Certainly, we didn't have the same type of urban footprint at that time as we do now. What lessons have we learned for the future for that type of project? I think that was one of the other concerns.
I was also concerned when you talked about other infrastructure projects. It is as though we've set the mould and that mould is extremely costly. I'm looking for some thoughts. Hopefully, people such as you can come up with plans for the future so that we can get a little more responsibility.
Perhaps, Mr. Maki, you could speak to some of those comments.