Evidence of meeting #43 for Natural Resources in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was billion.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
James Maloney Liberal Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
Okay, so to be critical of the government about that is unfair, then. I think you have to agree with that.
Liberal
James Maloney Liberal Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON
Okay. I'm glad we cleared all of that up. I just wanted to clarify that. One thing that is troubling about these discussions is the political overtones. Sometimes many of us are on the same page and that gets lost in the discussion. That's why I wanted to make that point, and that was the only point I wanted to make.
Thank you, sir.
I will give the rest of the time to my colleague, Ms. Dabrusin.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
My question is for the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, if they are still there. It's about hydrogen and investments.
When we're talking about federal investments in hydrogen, I believe you wrote about the export of hydrogen and the opportunities. Can you tell us a bit more about that?
Senior Fellow, Macdonald-Laurier Institute
Thank you very much for the question.
Again, here is another natural resource that is getting a bit politicized in Canada. There are tremendous opportunities, including in the oil and gas industry, to do blue hydrogen. There are huge markets for blue hydrogen. There have been multi-billion dollar investments in this, including in the carbon capture to make it blue.
The government has taken a pragmatic approach, which I very much appreciate, that includes financing for blue hydrogen in their hydrogen strategic plan. B.C., Alberta, Ontario and Quebec all have hydrogen [Technical difficulty—Editor] which is a good indication that support for this resource is on all ends of the political spectrum.
As to the profitability or the feasibility of green hydrogen, on the Atlantic coast, which was the main focus of discussion with the European Union, it remains to be seen. Every forecast—and there is private money coming into this sector—expects a very large hydrogen economy. I would be cautious about how fast—and how profitably and how soon—green hydrogen can come out of Atlantic Canada. Blue hydrogen is much cheaper and has much bigger markets heading into Asia.
In general, I would say that Canada is on the right track. There is broad political support for this, and it is very encouraging.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
Thank you.
Next we'll go to Mr. Simard, who will have two and a half minutes.
Bloc
Mario Simard Bloc Jonquière, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I would like to take this opportunity to discuss the motion for which I gave notice and that has been sent to all members of the committee. I can read it for you:
That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(1)(a), an order of the Committee be issued to require the Canada Energy Regulator to produce, no later than December 16, 2022, an unredacted copy of any notices, analysis and recommendations of Canada Energy Regulator relating to the Government’s decision to acquire, expand, operate, and eventually divest of the Trans Mountain Pipeline System, and any other relevant documents; if no such analysis has been produced by the Canada Energy Regulator, that the Canada Energy Regulator provide the Committee with written confirmation.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
I think it's a pretty straightforward motion. Coming out of our meetings the other day, I didn't feel that I got a very clear set of answers from the Canadian regulator when we asked questions about the tolls and the other elements. If there are documents that would be helpful to our committee, I look forward to seeing them.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
I have two things.
How long do we think this conversation is going to go? I suggest that we may want to dismiss the witnesses if we think we're going to be talking about it for another 10 minutes, because we are running into the end of the meeting.
That's the first part, and then I was going to propose an amendment.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
As I was saying, I have amendments to propose. That's why I asked the question first.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
I would normally let our witnesses go, but there may be a chance that I get my two and a half minutes in, and Mr. Simard has stepped on my toes. If we get this thing passed, then we can finish off our questions.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
Just so the witnesses know, we have only until 1:02 p.m. with regard to the resources. If we finish this before then, we can get another couple of minutes of questions in. If you can bear with us until one o'clock, we'd invite you to stay, and we'll see how quickly we get through the motion.
Ms. Dabrusin, we'll go back to you. I think you were going to speak about some amendments.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
The first amendment that I want to propose is actually right off the top. It is that we change the word “require” to “request”. The reason is that there hasn't been a refusal from the Canada Energy Regulator. This is really just a request at this point. There's nothing to show that they're trying to stop this production.
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
Do we want to put that amendment to a vote?
(Amendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings])
We have another amendment, and then we'll come back and deal with the motion as amended.
Ms. Dabrusin, what is your second amendment?
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
My second amendment would be to replace the words “an unredacted” with just “a”. You were asking for a series of copies. I don't have the exact wording right here, but the amendment would be to just replace “unredacted” with “a”.
Liberal
Julie Dabrusin Liberal Toronto—Danforth, ON
I can tell you why.
The main reason is that we don't even have anything yet showing that there are going to be redactions. We don't know what that would look like. We don't have an idea of what the extent of the redactions would be if there are any. We can ask first for just the copies, and if turns out that there are all sorts of redactions that we want to question, then we can go back to them.
Bloc
Mario Simard Bloc Jonquière, QC
Obviously it would be unacceptable to receive copies with information blacked out. That would not help us do our work. The Canada Energy Regulator has to provide us with the documents we ask for, and I think it would be unacceptable to allow certain parts of its analyses to be redacted.