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Journalist Markham Hislop interviews leading energy experts from around the world about the energy transition and climate change.
Welcome to episode 323 of the Energy Talks podcast. I'm energy and climate journalist, Markham Hislop. Yesterday, July 18th, the senate of Canada passed bill c 50, the Canadian Sustainable Jobs Act. My guest, Senator Paula Simons, rose in the red chamber to deliver a very eloquent speech, as one might expect from one of Canada's premier journalists before her senate appointment. But all the speeches in the world don't guarantee that the act will translate into government programs that actually help workers transition from fossil fuel oriented jobs to those in the clean energy sector.
Markham:Premier dance Danielle Smith in Paula's home province of Alberta has been highly critical of the previous incarnations of this legislation, and I fully expect we will hear from her in short order. Well, what is the argument against the criticisms that Smith is likely to make? That's one of the things I'll be discussing with senator Simons. So welcome to the interview, Paula.
Paula:Great to see you, Markham.
Markham:Well, likewise. It's been far too long, and I'm glad to have glad to have you back. Though this is the first time on the Energy Talks podcast, we have
Paula:an energy iteration of your of your life.
Markham:Yeah. That's that's right. We've we've, we've had you on to do video interviews many times. And, I do wanna get into the reception that this bill might or might not have in Alberta. But let's start because many of our listeners are in the United States or in other countries.
Markham:Maybe let's start with an overview of bill c 50 if you don't mind.
Paula:Right. So bill c 50, which has the short title of the Sustainable Jobs Act, is designed to send a signal that Canada is serious not just about fighting climate change, but creating new sustainable jobs while paying jobs for people who are transitioning out of the energy sector. My challenge with the bill is that I spent a long time as a journalist, and so I like things where there is meat on the bone. And what bill c 50 does is it sets up a framework to have a 15 member committee, which will then have an energy secretariat, which will then come up with a plan, which will then report back in 10 years. And so, you know, there there are 2 sorts of objections to this legislation.
Paula:The objection that is coming from some people is that this is draconian. It goes too far. It needs the end of energy jobs. I don't think the bill does any of that because I don't think the bill does much of anything. It sets the table for future debate and discussion.
Paula:Whether you think that's a sufficiently bold step forward at this juncture in our planet's history, is a rather separate question. So, I mean, admittedly, the liberal government of prime minister Trudeau has to thread a needle here where they don't want to signal that they're shutting down the energy sector. But I'm skeptical that this bill does much of anything to ensure that we have the jobs we need for the future of my province, Alberta, and the future of the country.
Markham:I earlier this morning, I interviewed Colin McCarragher, who is the head of, transport, transport analysis for Bloomberg NEF about their electric vehicle outlook 2024. And I've had energy technology adoption. And there's energy transition theory has been around a long time. I I studied it 40 years ago in grad school. I've been doing energy transition analysis over that period of time.
Markham:And we're at the point now, Paula, where you can, all of the major clean energy technologies, including EVs, which will displace oil demand, have passed their inflection point. Now they're on the growth part of the curve, and we can reasonably project out when that is going to what the numbers will be, when it will begin to displace oil. And I have to tell you, and I hate to be the bearer of bad news for your province, but the Alberta oil industry is in big trouble. Not tomorrow, but in 5 to 10 years.
Paula:What I think is fascinating is that I think the energy sector knows that.
Markham:I mean,
Paula:I don't think
Markham:Do they? I I would I'm not sure they do.
Paula:I don't know. I mean, I it just so happened that the timing of my speech coincided. It was less than 24 hours after Alberta powered down its last coal generating power plant. Now we started to make the transition away from burning coal and for your for your listeners who are not from Alberta. In 2,001, 80% of Alberta's electricity came from coal combustion.
Paula:80%. And as of this week, it's 0%. And that's extraordinary because Alberta is a province that had rich coal reserves. The coal was cheap. It was accessible, and it had a reputation for being cleaner than eastern coal because it was lower in acid.
Paula:And so people thought that we would mine coal and burn coal to have cheap power forever. So getting Albertans to shut down their coal mines and shut down their coal plants was a huge psychological as well as economic and political step. And Alberta did it, and we've completed that transition 6 years ahead of schedule, not because energy companies are noble and pure of heart, but because they saw that this is the way the market was going and that they had to make those transitions. And so you had big energy companies like ATCO and Capital Power making these choices because they got a clear signal that this was necessary, not just from government, but from markets. So I think that Alberta's energy companies, the smart ones, especially the big ones, not so much the the, you know, the the midsized players, but I think people understand that the energy sector is not gonna look the same in 2050.
Paula:It's not even gonna look the same in 2030. The problem I have with c 50, because people are gonna say, oh, well, she voted against it, so she must be like Danielle Smith. That wasn't my argument at all. My argument is that Albertans can make this transition, and indeed they're making it. I mean, we now get 30% of our electricity from renewables, which nobody would have thought possible 10 years ago.
Paula:So, you know, I think the capital is there. I think the business will is there, but I think that until both the the provincial and the federal government stop dithering and start doing, why would you I mean, why would you make that capital investment decision unless you're getting a very, very clear signal that this is really the way we're going now and we're not gonna blink halfway?
Markham:Let me present a counterargument to that. I have argued in columns that in fact, the Smith government, in particular, is its intent is to shield the, Alberta oil and gas companies from the forces of disruption that are taking place already in its markets. I mean, we've seen you know, you've been around for a long time. You know that there used to be
Paula:So long.
Markham:Well, you and I are of the same vintage, so I can get away with that. But you know that that, you know, 20, 30, 40 years ago, there were, like, 100 of junior comp oil companies. Yeah. That sector has almost been wiped out in Alberta. Yep.
Markham:Very few. There so there are already significant changes happening in oil and gas, many more to come and more dire stuff. But the the the Smith government, it's like putting up the stasis shield on Star Trek. You don't want don't let in those disruptive forces that force the guy that that force higher costs upon our producers and make it more difficult for them to be profitable, and maybe, you know, some of them don't survive, etcetera. That is my that's my concern.
Markham:And I think the oil the big oil companies for the most part are kind of playing along with that. That's my take.
Paula:Well, you know, it's interesting. I mean, certainly, again, people who may not be following over politics as closely as I do, but people may know that our renewable sector was booming with wind and solar, especially in southern Alberta, and that the Smith government has made some really counterintuitive would be the polite way of putting it. Some counterintuitive moves to, to really limit new solar and wind even though there was money pouring in. You know? And the pretense is that we have to do this to protect the views, and we have to protect the soil.
Paula:Now I'm the deputy chair of the agriculture committee. I'm all in favor of protecting the soil, but solar farms are not the major threat to agricultural land in Alberta. That's urban sprawl. And having, you know, smart land planning policy doesn't preclude having wind and solar. So it's hard for me to know sometimes because, I mean, it's just so illogical when the business community was telling the Smith government not to do this.
Paula:That said, there's almost like I sometimes feel like the Smith government has 2, you know, 2 faces. There's this one that is very bullish on energy and is talking about, you know, dumping out of the Canada pension plan so they can have an Alberta pension plan that invests in oil and gas. And meanwhile, in another part of the forest, they are investing in hydrogen. They are investing in carbon fiber technology. So I think there are some other people in the back rooms who are understanding that we are gonna need to make this energy transition.
Paula:I mean, what Alberta is doing in hydrogen is pretty exciting. The carbon fiber stuff, you know, people keep talking and talking and talking about it. It hasn't quite achieved that inflection point that you talked about. But, you know, now they're talking about having, you know, government thinking about doing a green train between Edmonton and Calgary. So on the one hand, you're right.
Paula:Forward facing, they are absolutely, going to the mattresses to protect oil and gas. But somewhere else in that in that government, there are people making cannier decisions about what the future of Alberta requires.
Markham:I think this is an important point to make. Alberta is not a political monolith.
Paula:Not anymore.
Markham:I don't know. It hasn't been for a long time, in my opinion. It's particularly in the big cities, Edmonton and Calgary. And even I I think I've reached a set of places like Lethbridge and Medicine Hat. It's not a monolith.
Markham:And there are, you know, for instance, I had, coffee in Calgary with a friend of mine who's been in the energy industry her entire career. And I asked her, what percentage of oil and gas workers from from you know, in the the halls of the the downtown, offices of these companies, how many of them might be considered progressive or people who see the energy transition coming and wanna go quicker? And she said over 50%. They don't always raise their voice because of the dominant political culture would which would penalize them, but they're there, and they're advocating for the very projects that you're talking about. And so Alberta is much more dynamic than we often give give it credit for, and and and more dynamic than it may look, if you're looking at it from, you know, outside the province.
Markham:Yeah.
Paula:But that's
Markham:why this act is so important.
Paula:Well, is that why this act is so important? I mean, this act this is what I worry about. This kind of act serves as a red flag and a provocation. Right? I mean, because people are already spinning this, I would say, benign and not ineffectual.
Paula:Is that the polite word?
Markham:Sure. Let's go with that.
Paula:This sort of this ineffectual idea, you know, I had a somewhat snarky line in my speech. You know? Will this will c 50 create jobs? Will it'll create jobs for the 15 people who are on the council? But, you know, if we're gonna use another Star Trek analogy.
Paula:Right? I mean, setting up the council of the federation to discuss how the jobs should go is far less effective than putting in place the tax regime that encourages the investment in those green jobs. Setting up a council is far less effective than investing seriously in the r and d that we need to get us to the transition. It's way less effective than investing money in technical colleges like NAIT and SAIT, the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology in Norquest and Bow Valley and, McEwen and the U of A and the U of C. I mean, invest the money in engineering schools.
Paula:Invest the money in technical institutes rather than investing the money in having a council to have a discussion to have a plan. But my other fear about c 50 is that it becomes a goad and to the Alberta government, like a burr under the saddle. Because they can say, oh, that bad Trudeau government, they wanna engineer the jobs. They want, you know, they wanna tell you what jobs to do. They wanna force you to go to job retraining like a Maoist prison camp.
Paula:You know? Blah, adi, blah, blah. So, you know, what frustrates me as an independent senator, and let us stress that I am neither a liberal nor a conservative. I am an independent senator. It's my job to hold the Trudeau government's legislation to account.
Paula:But this is the worst kind of compromise because it's a bill that doesn't actually do anything bold. And at the same time, allows conservatives in Alberta to rage farm and say, oh, you know, the bad Trudeau government is social engineering. The bad Trudeau government doesn't care about you. The bad Trudeau government wants to put you on welfare like, you know, like cod fishermen. It just it accomplishes very little and gives Danielle Smith a tool to rile up her base.
Markham:I would argue that, in fact, there is no possible legislation. There is nothing that the federal government could do under the Trudeau Liberals that would not provoke this kind of a response from
Paula:That that that is true. If if he made it rain lemonade, people would complain. You know? I mean, I know everybody in Calgary is particularly cranky at the moment, but, I mean and you're right. If there is nothing that prime minister Justin Trudeau can do to win hearts and minds in Alberta.
Paula:I mean, he already bought the province TMX, and all that did was make people grumble that, you know, well, he wouldn't have needed to buy TMX if he'd done things differently. That said, why waste political capital on something that accomplishes so very little that is tangible?
Markham:Well, let me let me provide an argument in favor of that. I can't I think that the, poke in the eye, for for Danielle Smith is is warranted and required at the moment. I think that she needs to be confronted about her, strategy of protecting the incumbents and even talking about, you know, doubling of oil production in Alberta. Alberta is already an energy superpower. El Canada is the 4th largest oil producer in the world, led by Alberta.
Markham:Doubling it in the face of an energy transition is ridiculous. That's the direction that she is going, and I think it's time to have that fight. I and and Energy Media has been participating, and this bill
Paula:could help. That may well, but how does this bill help? How does this bill
Markham:help? The eye. I don't I don't think she can be poked at she hasn't got enough eyes for the sticks that I would be poking her with.
Paula:I know, but I think this is a pretty soft this is like this is like poking her with the marshmallow that you put on the end of the stick. I don't think there's anything here that is gonna make her have a road to Damascus moment. I think what has to happen is that, you know, Albertans Albertans are not idiots. You know, you look around the world and you see which way things are headed, and you look at the number of people who are already making these choices in their personal lives and in their market lives. I mean, you know, market economies, I don't wish to sound like an apologist for capitalism with a capital c, but markets markets can't be defeated by premiers.
Paula:And if the market decides you know, I said the other day to my rather conservative brother who drives a red pickup truck, I said, you know, I think my new vehicle is gonna be a Prius. And my brother said, I think that's a good idea. I think the Prius is a good car. And, you know, bit by bit, voter by voter, consumer by consumer, people are gonna understand that, you know, when the whole province is on fire or when the river levels are so low that you can't, you know, you can't bring barge goods down the Mackenzie River. I mean, I'm I'm talking to you from Ottawa today where there's been a heat warning on for the last 2 days.
Paula:I think with the with the Humidex today, it's 45 is the forecast for Ottawa. So, I mean, in Edmonton, it's cool and rainy, and the only heat and joy is coming from the Edmonton Oilers. God bless them. But,
Markham:Go Oilers.
Paula:Go Oilers. 53 last night. I don't know when people are listening to this. By the time you're listening to this, they may have already lost, and then I will sound foolish. But let's just assume
Markham:Don't don't say that.
Paula:Into the into the void that we're already that we're dancing in the streets while you're listening. But, you know, eventually, this will be unassailable. And and for people who think that they know Alberta politics, I mean, it's important to understand that every single seat in Edmonton, every single one, and a good number of them in suburban Edmonton are held by the new democrats. The the new democrats had half the seats in Calgary and that, you know, that I'm speaking to you against the backdrop. By the time people listening, the new democrats may have a dynamic new leader.
Paula:Not that Rachel Notley wasn't dynamic, but they will, you know, they will be reinventing themselves under new leadership. And so Alberta is not a political monolith, and it's not an economic monolith either.
Markham:I would argue. I agree with you. I think that the you can begin to see the forces of change in Alberta within the energy sector. And by energy, I don't just mean oil and gas. I include the power sector, the electricity sector.
Markham:Yep. All of that comp constitutes energy. But but what I would argue because I do half of my work is interviewing experts about the global energy transition. Yep. And what I fear is the energy, the global energy transition is moving so rapidly that Alberta only has a few years.
Markham:It doesn't have eventually we'll get around to at time. It has to it needs a plan now supported by the federal government, including other provinces, and it needs to do it begins needs to act in the very short term, and I don't see that action happening.
Paula:Because we because we need these jobs. I mean, let's come back to what this is really all about. This is really all about making sure that thousands and thousands of people who have high paying jobs Exactly. Are not are not left stranded. I mean and I think hydrogen is one of the best answers to that because you can retool and and, you know, and take skills that were developed in one energy play and and move it to hydrogen, but people need the training and the upskilling to do that.
Paula:You know, when I talked to in my speech about carbon fiber and bitumen, I mean, imagine if we didn't burn our bitumen, but actually exploited it as a high value natural resource and built a manufacturing sector around carbon fiber. So, you know, there
Markham:I have to butt in. I rarely inter intervene with, interviewees, but I will I have to say that energy media since 2017 has been a voice for that very transition over to build an advanced materials industry that would become a domestic market for bitumen as American markets decline. So you're you're preaching to the choir here.
Paula:Yeah. So, you know, I mean, there are things we could be doing that will ensure that there are good, high paying I hate to use the phrase blue collar because it seems so pejorative, but jobs for working people. Because, you know, sure, Alberta has a really great AI sector. 1 of the you know, the University of Alberta has one of the best AI, machine machine learning programs in the world. Most people are not gonna be working in the AI sector.
Paula:Alberta has, you know, huge potential in other, you know, highly skilled areas. You know, we've got, you know, a booming pharmaceutical sector, carbohydrate chemistry sector. There are not gonna be mass employment in those fields. But manufacturing, hydrogen generation, I mean, these are areas where we could put people to work without getting them a PhD in molecular engineering.
Markham:I absolutely. I can't tell you. There is not a scale. If it was on 1 to 10, I agree with you a 150%, or a 150. So look, I mean, we're agreed on that.
Markham:Let's talk about the sustainable job secretariat. That seems to be where the
Paula:Sorry. Good.
Markham:Yeah. I know. But is is this just is this just just fluff, or is there actually some meat to to that secretariat?
Paula:Well, it all depends, doesn't it, on on what that secretariat is made up of. So, you know, one of the things I find a bit precious about Bill c 50 is that it's got, you know, this many seats for this lobby group and this many seats for that interest group as opposed and, you know, and the fact that the bill is not coming from, you know, Randy Boissonow, the minister of employment, but is rather coming, you know, from from from, like, the energy perspective, it just doesn't make any sense to me. And so what will the secretariat look like? I don't know. I mean, one of my senate colleagues, you know, a senator whom whom I adore, was a little frustrated with my speech and said to me last night, you know, this is what every nation in the world that is ahead of us does.
Paula:Like, this is what you have to do first. It's the first step. We at least have to take the first step. And maybe I'm being impatient, and I wanna jump us to step 5. But I am dubious that setting up a council, which strikes a secretariat to have a framework, to have a plan is enough.
Paula:I just don't think it's enough. And it's not because it's not because I don't think we need to transition. It's because I think we need to transition a lot faster than than the timelines of this bill.
Markham:Bingo. There we are in absolute agreement. And I I have to say that as much as the federal the the Trudeau Liberals after they were elected in October of 2016 have done more on clean energy and climate policy in the last, you know, 8, 9 years than the the governments that preceded them. That said, very often, they come out with these grandiose kinds of legislation and and program announcements, and the actual implementation is much less impressive.
Paula:You know, the word framework is much beloved in the nation's capital. I feel like I look at a bill a week that is a framework, whether it's brought by the government or as a private member's bill or as a senate public bill. If we think about the roots of the metaphor, a framework is by its nature naked. Right? It's just the scaffolding.
Paula:If you don't do something, if you don't hang some sheets on the framework, it's just a bunch of sticks. So, you know, if I never have to pass another bill that has the word framework in it again, I would be a happy camper. But, you know, again, you can't if you're going camping and you put up the frame of the tent and you don't put up the walls, you get pretty wet.
Markham:Oh, on that metaphor, I think we'll end our conversation. I this has been very insightful. And one of the reasons why I enjoy talking to you, Paula, is because you talk to both people in Alberta and in the nation's capital. And that I think is a very valuable perspective and I appreciate your take on this bill because frankly I wouldn't have thought that myself, even though I listened to your your most of your speech.
Paula:And clearly you are a better person than I am. I mean, it is a sad fact that all those years as a political pundit have steeped me in cynicism. And I would like to tell you that 5 years in the senate have filled me with girlish idealism. And some days I feel girlish idealism, and other days I just wanna say, you know, cut to the chase. Fish your gut bait.
Markham:Well, you know that newsrooms, old style newsrooms anyway, were filled with with legions of cynical reporters. It just comes with the territory. So you're you're forgiven you're forgiven for that.
Paula:At the age of at the age of 59, I at the age of 59, I can be a curmudgeon.
Markham:Oh, my goodness. You're a spring chicken. Anyway, continue your good work in Ottawa. We'll have you on more often. Thank you very much for this.
Paula:Take care, Malcolm.