Brian Zinchuk is editor and owner of Pipeline Online
Pierre Poilievre was talking pipelines and LNG on July 14. YouTube
On July 14 front-running Conservative leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre released a video on social media taking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to task for allowing turbines under repair in Canada to be returned to Germany for the operation of the Russian Nord Stream 1 natural gas pipeline.
The issue has become contentious of late as that pipeline directly supplies natural gas from Russia to Germany by way of underwater pipeline through the Baltic Sea. This set of turbines was in Canada for refurbishment by Siemens Canada. However, trade sanctions triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February led to Canada not allowing them to be shipped back. The pipeline has just been shut down for 10 days of annual maintenance, but the Germans suspect this will mean that pipeline might never return to service.
The situation led to Ukraine asking Canada to hold them back, lest that pipeline continue to provide revenue for Russia’s war. But Germany, a NATO ally how has heavily supported Ukraine with war material in this war, had begged Canada to send the turbines back. Despite its efforts to wean itself off Russian energy, Germany as well as other European nations is heavily dependent on Russian gas to fuel its economy and homes, and does not yet have an alternative source as it seeks to rapidly build liquified natural gas import terminals.
On July 13, Trudeau gave in and his government allowed the turbines to leave.
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The situation has put Canada’s government in a damned-if-you do, damned-if-you-don’t situation. Poilievre took issue with the damned-if-you-do part.
You can watch the video here, or read the transcript below. In it you will find several key points which he touched upon in his speech to the Saskatchewan Oil and Gas Show in Weyburn on June 1. (The video for that is at the end.)
This is the compete transcript from Poilevre’s YouTube video response:
So Trudeau finally found a pipeline that he supports. Problem is, it’s not a Canadian pipeline, it’s a Russian pipeline, the Nord Stream 1 which transits natural gas from Russia to Germany and the Germans pay Russia for that energy and indirectly fund Putin’s war in Ukraine with the those payments.
Now here’s where it gets interesting.
The turbines that push the gas through the pipe are in Canada for maintenance and Trudeau says that he’s put in place sanctions against Putin which should stop him from returning those turbinesto the Russian-owned pipeline
But the Germans, because they have no other source of gas to replace what they’re getting from Russia, have begged Canada to send the turbines back and to keep that gas flowing.
So here we are, in Canada, helping maintain a Russian pipeline that is used to raise cash for Putin’s war in Ukraine. We’re supposed to be on the side of the Ukrainians. This is an obvious outrage and a betrayal of our Ukrainian allies.
But it’s also an admission of a painful failure in our energy policy.
Why is it that we think it’s acceptable to maintain Russian pipelines using our companies here in Canada but we don’t believe in building pipelines of our own?
Think of this: when Trudeau took office there were about 15 proposals to build liquefaction facilities that would allow us to put natural gas on ships and send them overseas, including to Europe. None of those projects have actually got built because Trudeau has created a gatekeeper economy where it is
impossible to get building and other permits necessary for these projects to go ahead even though they are very profitable and pay massive wages.
So here’s the solution: get the gatekeepers out of the way. R epeal the anti-energy laws and signal that a government in Canada will fast-track sign off on projects like those proposed in Newfoundland, New Brunswick and Quebec to liquefy natural gas and ship it over to countries that desperately needed either to displace the energy they’re getting from dictatorship ships like Putin’s, or to shut down dirtier sources of energy like coal fire in Asia.
I would go even further, as prime minister, and I would offer the Germans that we as Canadians would sign a 50-year natural gas supply agreement that would give them predictable energy to break their dependence on Putin and give our investors predictable revenue and sales that would allow them to make the upfront investment so the government doesn’t have to pay any of the cost.
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There are projects right across this country that are ready to move forward if the government would give clear sign-off and we have over 1000 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that we could bring to the surface and liquefy using the cleanest electricity grid in the world, and the cold weather that makes it possible to liquefy gas huge advantages.
And finally, we have the geographic advantage that Newfoundland and eastern Canada is the closest point in North America to Europe, and British Columbia, where I’m standing now, is the closest point in North America to Asia. Shorter shipping distances, clean electricity to power the systems and cold weather to make it less expensive to achieve.
Now what we need is a government that will remove the gatekeepers, unleash the production of our clean Canadian natural gas to bring dollars from dictators and turn them into paychecks for our people
No, it won’t happen overnight. But if we don’t start now, then the next time there’s a crisis we’ll be in exactly the same humiliating position where we’re not only indirectly helping a foreign dictator, but, in this case, directly serving his interests because of this outrageous turbine concession.
So let us take back control of our energy. Let’s put paychecks in our people’s pockets and let’s make this the energy superpower of the world.
Here’s the video of his speech in Weyburn:
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