Natural Resources committee  It is a very large area, the supply side. There are quite a few companies with very different perspectives. In some provinces there are utilities that belong to the crown. We have to work with very different proponents in all of these types of projects. One of the real challenges has always been trying to get various performers to work together and to bring the best minds together to address the issues we're trying to solve.

Natural Resources committee  Oh, there is very much strength in having a unified type of process to fund single projects that have many proponents. In fact, it's something we tried to do under the ecoENERGY innovation initiative; we went through regional workshops using regional development agencies, but also through webinars and putting online collaboration tools in place whereby proponents or researchers could identify themselves.

Natural Resources committee  Innovation is a system that has quite a few performers as far as R and D is concerned, but it goes beyond simply the R and D component and has to consider other instruments, so as to make sure, for example, that as technologies are developed, they get to market. I think a broader look at the innovation system is required—not just a look at the performers, but at how technology moves along as well.

Natural Resources committee  The Office of Energy Research and Development is the coordinator of R and D and in a broad sense represents Canada in energy matters in a number of international fora, such as the International Energy Agency's committee on energy research and technology or the carbon sequestration leadership forum.

Natural Resources committee  It is less than 10%. In any case, we could provide you with the exact figure.

Natural Resources committee  I don't have the numbers here—

Natural Resources committee  I just want to add that most of the investments do not go towards fossil fuels.

Natural Resources committee  Are you talking about the federal government?

Natural Resources committee  More than $500 million are being directed at carbon storage. This includes the development of technologies for the capture and study of watersheds where carbon storage could be achieved. This also includes large-scale demonstration projects, particularly Shell's Quest project, which we were discussing a few minutes ago.

Natural Resources committee  The first pilot projects started a dozen years ago and those in Weyburn-Midale began in 2000. At that time we did a number of things. In particular, we took the basic steps before filling the reservoirs with CO2. We wanted to be certain that we understood the physical soil parameters, for example the acidity, before even adding the CO2.

Natural Resources committee  I believe the report was published last week. As far as the policies on carbon pricing or mechanisms to give carbon a value are concerned, that is a political and not a technological issue. What is clearly a technological aspect is that we can really see things over the long term and do projections for the next 20 to 50 years.

Natural Resources committee  According to what I can see from the data Statistics Canada has collected for the International Energy Agency, the private sector invests more in energy than the federal and provincial governments combined. Again, without saying anything about the various accusations, we can simply look at the facts and see that the industry is spending a lot of money in this sector, compared with some other science and technology sectors, in order to achieve its goals.

Natural Resources committee  There are quite a few examples. I think we did mention them already a few times on this issue of how industry can actually work together. For the energy industry to work together and put aside and figure a way to deal with IP in a fairly competitive area is really significant. From the point of view of system of innovation, that to me is quite the significant piece.

Natural Resources committee  We review our research and development priorities on a regular basis. That does not always fit in to this type of exercise. Over the years, we are always changing the research and development areas on which we want to focus. We have started working in areas which we did not cover a dozen years ago, such as carbon capture and storage.

Natural Resources committee  For 2010, the numbers do not seem to match. In fact, according to the numbers published in the report by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, in 2010, 21% of the funding was spent on fossil fuels and 17% on carbon capture and storage. Even added together, these numbers do not correspond with the data showing that three-quarters of the money is allocated to this type of energy.