Foreign Affairs committee  We don't particularly talk about energy independence because I'm not sure exactly how you would define those words. We have the tremendous opportunity to be more energy self-sufficient in North America. I think two of the biggest obstacles, obviously, are improving the energy inf

Foreign Affairs committee  I'm sure Ambassador Jacobson has a thought on this as well, but as I'm sure you know there is an existing Canada-U.S. Air Quality Agreement that needs to be strengthened and enforced. I don't know the exact status of it, but it is under negotiation. The air quality is actually

Foreign Affairs committee  I'm sure the ambassador dealt with this during his time. There is an existing Canada-U.S. agreement.

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes. That's in fact what the industry is working on right now, a standard. They have best practices on things like disclosure of what's in the fracking fluids. But yes, it is—

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would like to present a few ideas about energy and the environment. We start from the premise that North America is blessed with a tremendously diverse array of energy assets. ln addition to the traditional fossil fuels, we are seeing growth in a wide v

Foreign Affairs committee  Mr. Chairman, can I just respond to a couple of those points?

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. It seems to me there are a couple of premises to what Ms. Simons has said, which we fundamentally reject. The first is the suggestion that when the profit motive somehow conflicts with environmental protection or human rights, companies will always choose to ignore

Environment committee  Most of the economic studies that I've seen--and I'm not sure about the one Mr. Sawyer is referring to--usually assume that the rest of the world is acting in concert with Canada, or at least there are no major differences in the way we're acting. That's a critical assumption in

Environment committee  No, I'm not trained as an economist.

Environment committee  We have several economists who work for us.

Environment committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I don't think any of us, certainly not my organization, are here to suggest that aluminum production should move out of Canada. Clearly we want that to continue. We have companies and facilities that are world class when it comes to that sort of thing.

Environment committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. We've said quite clearly for some time that Canada is going to need all forms of energy. We shouldn't be discriminating against any. Energy demand is growing, not just in Canada but worldwide. We need all forms of energy.

Environment committee  Well, I don't think we're saying we support the bill, in any event, as we indicated earlier, but to answer your specific question, I don't have the analysis. We haven't done the analysis. I think, as Mr. Sawyer has suggested, the regional impacts are much more difficult to quanti

Environment committee  Mr. Godfrey, I'm sure you appreciate we can't get there in one step. Many analyses have suggested we need to be moving in that direction; we need to be moving in ways that send the long-term pricing but allow the adjustment to be made. Consumers and businesses have already made s

Environment committee  And I'm very excited to answer you, Mr. Cullen. I have two points. First of all, the suggestion that I took in your premise is that right now pollution happens at no cost whatsoever. Clearly that is not true. We have scads of regulation at municipal, provincial, and federal le