Tag: oil

Canada Just Admitted Justin Trudeau’s Climate Agenda Was A Scam

Former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave Canada a lost decade. A key contributor to the country’s stagnation was the Liberal government’s obsession with climate change and its ushering in of green energy policies that were disastrous for a nation rich in natural resources. To make Canada great again, Prime Minister Mark Carney is abandoning climate alarmism and embracing what made the country wealthy in the first place: crude oil.

Canada Loves Oil Again

On June 30, the prime minister published a 17-minute YouTube video, focused exclusively on his predecessor’s climate agenda. He used words like “expensive” and “divisive” to describe Trudeau’s environmental endeavors. Carney essentially admitted that Pierre Poilievre and the Conservatives were right.

For right-wing political pundits, this was a rare win for the incumbent. Indeed, in a bid to resuscitate the ailing Canadian economy, Carney is trying to make the country fall back in love with fossil fuels – and appease Alberta – despite years of climate doomerism.

Ottawa announced earlier this month a new West Coast pipeline that will ship up to one million barrels of crude oil per day from Alberta to Asian markets. The federal government gave its blessing to a new west-east crude oil pipeline that will run from Alberta to Ontario. This comes as the Carney Liberals begin to expand liquefied natural gas exports, scrap the consumer carbon tax, and remove the cap on the oil and gas sector’s pollution levels.

Carney already accepted that Canada’s emissions will be higher in the coming years, a fact that was inevitable. Various models currently indicate that the Great White North has been missing its emissions targets, even before the current government’s reforms. Canada lags behind other G7 countries in emissions reductions, and even the United States is outperforming its northern neighbor.

“The certainties of the world of 2015 are long gone. Our neighborhood hasn’t been this hostile since Canada was founded,” the prime minister said. “The world hasn’t been this unstable geopolitically since the end of the Second World War.”

Of course, skepticism is warranted because Carney has spent much of his tenure just talking with his elbows up. From housing to pipelines, it has been all talk and no action. Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Germany surprisingly sprang into action and constructed Floating Storage and Regasification Units (FSRUs) to import seaborne liquefied natural gas in fewer than 200 days.

The prime minister has been in office for 15 months with nothing to show for it. Still, capital might be optimistic about Canadian energy moving forward, having been hesitant to invest in various projects across the country over the last 11 years.

What About America?

America’s decision last week not to renew the USMCA could be a major blow to the Canadian economy. The post-NAFTA trade deal will now be subject to annual reviews as the United States raises grievances over production quotas, supply management, rules of origin, and other provisions.

Despite Ottawa’s efforts to diversify its trade by importing more students from India and exporting more oil to Asia, the country still needs its southern neighbor. More than 90 percent of its energy is shipped to the United States, making it an extremely difficult market to replace, even if Canada desires to become an energy superpower.

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Why are taxpayers paying for pipelines private companies used to build?

Canada’s pipeline sector, once entirely funded by private investment, is now leaning on taxpayer subsidies after years of federal regulatory hurdles.

On Tuesday’s episode of The Ezra Levant Show, Noah Jarvis, Ontario director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, joined Ezra to discuss two newly floated pipeline proposals — one from Alberta to the Port of Vancouver championed by Prime Minister Mark Carney, and another to Ontario backed by Premiers Doug Ford and Danielle Smith. 

Both projects are expected to require significant government subsidies, in sharp contrast to a decade ago, when private companies competed to build pipelines without a dime of public money, including proposals that were later killed by federal decisions, such as Northern Gateway and Energy East.

“The government is very much in the way right now,” Noah said, pointing to the Impact Assessment Act, passed by the Trudeau government in 2019, and the industrial carbon tax as key barriers driving up the cost of producing Alberta oil.

Noah cited a recent Fraser Institute report suggesting the industrial carbon tax, if it climbs to $140 per tonne, could add roughly 20 percent to the cost of producing a barrel of Alberta oil. Canada, he noted, is the only country that levies such a tax on its oil and gas producers. He urged Smith and Ford to pressure Ottawa to repeal the Impact Assessment Act and roll back the carbon tax, rather than turning to subsidies. 

Ezra questioned why neither proposal has any backing from producers, calling the Vancouver route’s estimated $30-billion price tag “insane,” and describing the Ontario pipeline as “at best, PR gimmicks, and at worst, government white elephants.”

“You don’t have to spend all this money,” Ezra said. “Just get rid of those blockages and blockades and regulations.”

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Ottawa’s carbon capture obsession is making Alberta oil more expensive for customers who aren’t asking for it

Prime Minister Mark Carney wants Alberta’s oil industry to spend tens of billions of dollars on carbon capture before Ottawa will fully embrace new pipeline projects. The problem? The evidence suggests customers aren’t demanding “decarbonized” oil in the first place.

A new Fraser Institute study concludes that carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) faces enormous technical and economic hurdles. Despite decades of investment, large-scale projects have routinely fallen short of expectations, often capturing less carbon than promised while costing far more than initially projected.

The study also notes that scaling CCUS across the energy sector would require building an entirely new network of pipelines and storage infrastructure comparable to today’s oil and gas system itself.

In other words, politicians are asking Alberta to construct a second energy industry just to support the first.

That wouldn’t matter if customers were demanding it. But there is little evidence they are.

Instead, buyers continue to purchase Canadian crude because it is reliable, competitively priced and comes from one of the world’s most politically stable energy producers.

The Canada Energy Regulator reports Canadian crude exports reached record levels following the Trans Mountain expansion, with Alberta supplying more than 90 per cent of Canada’s exports. New customers in Asia have rapidly increased purchases, not because Canada branded its oil as “decarbonized,” but because they wanted dependable supply from a democratic country.

Reuters has also reported that the Carney government is linking future pipeline approvals to large-scale carbon capture commitments and net-zero requirements, effectively making Alberta producers absorb billions in additional costs before projects can move ahead.

The theory behind this policy is that customers will reward lower-carbon oil. Yet commodity markets have rarely worked that way.

History offers an uncomfortable but revealing example. During its control of territory in Iraq and Syria, ISIS financed much of its terrorist operation by selling oil through black-market networks. Buyers still purchased that oil despite knowing where it came from because oil markets are driven overwhelmingly by price, availability and logistics.

No one is comparing Alberta producers to ISIS. The point is the opposite: if even oil produced by one of the world’s most notorious terrorist organizations found buyers, it demonstrates that commodity markets are driven primarily by economics, not moral branding.

That reality raises an obvious question. Where is the evidence that refiners are willing to pay a significant premium simply because Canadian oil has a lower carbon intensity?

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B.C.’s oil tanker ban exposed: Why U.S. oil gets a pass but Alberta doesn’t

B.C.’s oil tanker ban is once again under scrutiny as questions mount over why it restricts Alberta crude while allowing foreign oil shipments to pass through the province’s coast.

Drea Humphrey argued that Premier David Eby has emerged as the biggest winner from the latest pipeline discussions between Alberta and Ottawa. “He’s getting exactly what he wanted,” she said, pointing to billions in promised infrastructure spending while any potential pipeline benefits remain years away.

Humphrey also questioned the province’s opposition to transporting Alberta oil by tanker, noting that large foreign vessels already travel the same waters. “How is that any less of a risk to the North Coast?” she asked.

Sheila Gunn Reid argued the federal approach ignores what she sees as an obvious alternative. She noted that American tankers from Alaska are permitted to use the same coastal route, saying, “The tanker ban only applies to Alberta oil. It doesn’t apply to American oil.”

Rather than reviving the cancelled Northern Gateway route to Kitimat, Gunn Reid said the proposed pipeline would head south to Vancouver, making it “infinitely more expensive and inconvenient.”

“I refuse to see this as the win everybody is touting it as,” she added. “It’s likely never going to get built.”

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DOJ urges states to join investigation into major oil companies

The Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are urging states to join a sweeping probe into major oil companies.

In a joint three-page letter sent to state attorneys general on Friday, federal antitrust regulators called for localized investigations into oil distributors for potential price-fixing, market monopolization and consumer fraud.

Federal antitrust lawyers are asking states to deploy all tools available, as they believe several companies are keeping prices high despite a steep drop in wholesale crude costs.

The coordinated federal-state push comes on the heels of an executive directive from President Donald Trump last week.

On Monday evening, the president accused oil corporations of “gouging” American drivers.

“Gasoline Retailers must get their Prices down, IMMEDIATELY! They’re too high considering that Oil is now at $68 a Barrel, and heading south,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “The Retailers must quickly react to this statement, and so what they know is right — DROP YOUR PRICE FOR OUR GREAT AMERICAN PEOPLE!”

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“We’re Running Out of Oil”: The Lie Used to Support the Green Energy Agenda

In 1874, the state geologist of Pennsylvania, then the nation’s leading oil producer, warned that the U.S. had only four years of oil remaining. Forty years later, in 1914, when oil still hadn’t run out, the federal government said the U.S. had only a ten-year supply remaining. In 1940, the government announced that reserves would be depleted within a decade and a half.

An article published on August 3, 1966, reported that “a geologist stuck a figurative dipstick into the United States’ oil supplies Tuesday and estimated that the country may be dry in 10 years,” placing the projected date of U.S. exhaustion at 1976. The most widely cited doomsday prediction came in 1972, when the Club of Rome’s Limits to Growth report calculated that global petroleum reserves, growing at then-current consumption rates, would be exhausted within 20 years, implying oil would run out by 1992.

For the past several decades, the claim that oil will run out has been used to promote the green energy transition, framing the use of solar and wind power as necessary to preserve human life. However, the people and institutions promoting the “oil is running out” narrative are the same people and institutions advancing the climate crisis narrative. As with other forms of propaganda, new vocabulary had to be invented, including the term “peak oil.

Peak oil is the theory that global oil production rises to a maximum point and then declines irreversibly as a finite resource is depleted. Yale Environment 360 reported that Rystad Energy expects natural gas production to peak and decline as renewables take over, and that the International Energy Agency (IEA) in 2021 called on oil companies to immediately end oil prospecting and pull back on production as part of a net-zero pathway explicitly grounded in the “peak oil” framing.

The context of the Yale report, and the peak oil claim in general, is somewhat dishonest. If they really believed the world was running out of oil, they wouldn’t need to warn anyone or demand that we stop looking for or producing oil. Instead, they could simply wait ten or twenty years, or whatever the latest prediction is, until oil runs out naturally. At that point, the world would transition to green energy out of necessity, and the climate advocates would win. The fact that they continue pushing the issue suggests they don’t really believe oil is running out.

A Cambridge University Press academic text states plainly that the peak oil belief is a myth, “at least for the next decades,” and warns that peak oil framing can backfire on climate advocates because the oil industry echoes the peak oil argument to convince governments to approve, and even assist with, new fossil fuel projects whenever prices spike. Effectively, the article presents circular logic. It suggests that the peak oil argument should be abandoned to prevent the oil industry from drilling for new oil, which would prevent the world from running out of oil.

All of the peak oil predictions had a common flaw: they made straight-line mathematical projections, assuming that no alternatives or solutions would be found. Each treated known reserves and existing extraction methods as fixed, when, in practice, both variables continued to change simultaneously.

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California’s Self-Inflicted Squeeze

Energy Island

Long time readers may recall the many articles we wrote over many years highlighting the madness of California planners and policymakers. We were born and raised in the land of fruits and nuts and lived and worked there for over four decades.

About four years ago, we made our California exodus. At the time, we thought our coverage of the Golden State’s self-destruction would continue. We still have family and friends there who we visit from time to time. But, as we’ve found, without a front row seat to the big show we’re less inclined to gawk at the insanity. Articles on California have diminished to a slow trickle.

Today, however, following a recent conversation with a friend and California resident, we aim our sights at our former home state. Once again, California delivers a rich example of what happens when central planning outweighs economic reality. Here the specific example involves extreme intervention in oil and gas markets.

Policymakers in Sacramento, over many decades, have operated under the assumption that if petroleum production, refining capacity, and fuel consumption were made sufficiently difficult and expensive, the market would rapidly transition to their preferred alternatives. The California Air Resources Board (CARB) has been the principal vehicle for implementing this vision through increasingly stringent fuel regulations, emissions mandates, low-carbon fuel standards, permitting requirements, and compliance costs imposed upon refiners operating within the state.

Yet the result has not been the energy transition that was promised. Instead, California has become increasingly dependent on foreign suppliers for products it once produced itself. This trend is particularly problematic because California is effectively an energy island. Unlike much of the United States, California lacks extensive pipeline connections to the major refining centers along the Gulf Coast.

The state also requires unique fuel formulations that relatively few refineries outside California are equipped to produce. Consequently, California’s fuel market functions largely as a self-contained system. When local refining capacity disappears, replacement supplies cannot simply be redirected from Texas or Louisiana with the turn of a valve.

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Iraqi Police Discover $14 Million Stashed in Oil Minister’s Walls

Iraqi investigators carried out a major anti-corruption operation on Sunday, raiding several homes in exclusive Baghdad neighborhoods and arresting dozens of prominent public figures.

One of the most remarkable arrests was Deputy Minister of Oil for Distribution Affairs Ali Maarij al-Bahadly, whose home proved to have $14 million in cash stuffed into its walls.

The Iraqi judiciary released footage of investigators smashing through the wall of al-Bahadly’s pool house and discovering suitcases filled with American dollars and Iraqi dinars, plus a few luxury goods, such as a Rolex wristwatch.

The presiding judge of the Iraqi Central Criminal Court for Corruption, which has taken Bahadly into custody, said the suitcases full of cash were discovered during the “initial investigation” of the deputy oil minister. One can only imagine what the full investigation will look like.

Bahadly was directly in charge of selling and distributing refined fuel products across the entire country, which put him in close contact with traders, distributors, and numerous local officials. His position was considered exceptionally sensitive for this reason, although surprisingly enough, he was not caught with his hand in the biggest cookie jar.

That distinction belongs to another deputy oil minister, Adnan al-Jumaili, who had almost $86 million in cash when he was arrested in late May. The judiciary said that 70 properties, 21 vehicles, and 6.6 pounds of gold jewelry have been seized so far, in addition to the mountain of cash.

The anti-corruption crackdown was ordered by Iraq’s new prime minister, Ali al-Zaidi, soon after he was sworn into office by parliament in May. The Iraqi public was furious about corruption, mismanagement, and the reluctance of previous governments to take action against politically-connected officials.

The U.S. government also pressured the new prime minister to take action, and was specifically interested in Bahadly, who was targeted for sanctions by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in early May for “abusing his position to facilitate the diversion of oil to be sold for the benefit of the Iranian regime and its proxy militias in Iraq.”

“Like a rogue gang, the Iranian regime is pillaging resources that rightfully belong to the Iraqi people. Treasury will not stand idly by as Iran’s military exploits Iraqi oil to fund terrorism against the United States and our partners,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said when announcing the sanctions in May.

Other officials caught up in the anti-corruption dragnet include Raed al-Jubouri, current health director and former governor of the province where Adnan al-Jumaili lives, and Alaa Samir al-Jubouri, a top official with the Iraqi Ministry of Electricity.

In addition to the arrests, Prime Minister al-Zaidi canceled a massive $764 million Baghdad airport project on June 14 over corruption concerns.

Some observers worried that al-Zaidi’s long-overdue anti-corruption drive would stall out, despite some big early headlines, for the same reason that previous efforts to curb rampant corruption have failed: Iraq’s governing coalition is fragile, and could completely disintegrate if some factions think they are being treated unfairly. Many of the factions in that coalition are heavily armed.

“I would expect the campaign to stop once pursuing it further begins to carry significant political, security, or systemic costs. For now, however, there are indications that additional arrests may still be forthcoming,” Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies researcher Harith Hasan told The National on Tuesday.

“Corruption in Iraq is politically protected. Thus, it becomes a very complicated task to fight it. It is linked directly to the nature and the composition of the political system,” media professor Ghalib Aldaamy told Al Jazeera News.

“Can you imagine that some of those who commit such crimes believe they are not doing something wrong because they hold a religious doctrine that states that public funds belong to no one?” Aldaamy asked.

Former Iraqi Federal Integrity Commission chief Mousa Faraj told Al Jazeera he was impressed by the prime minister’s effort so far, but added that $14 million stuffed in a minister’s walls is a fraction of the stolen money that investigators might find if they look in the right places.

“My advice to the prime minister is to start with serious and major old files. At the top of them are the Central Bank currency auctions in previous years, where corruption reached tens of billions of dollars,” Faraj said.

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China Eyes Iran’s Postwar Reconstruction In Bid To Lock Up Future Oil Supplies

Beijing is positioning itself to lead the post-war reconstruction effort in Tehran – a move analysts suggest could secure China long-term access to critical Iranian oil reserves.

The diplomatic groundwork was laid during a recent meeting in New Delhi between Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and the deputy secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, according to Nikkei Asia. The talks underscore China’s broader strategy to expand its economic and diplomatic footprint in the Middle East amid the vacuum left in the wake of one failed US regime change and occupation war after another.

According to the report, Wang signaled Beijing’s long-term commitment to the Islamic Republic in the wake of prior weeks of heavy US-Israeli bombing, stating that: “China will continue to provide assistance to Iran while supporting reconstruction and peacebuilding efforts in the region.”

To date, China’s official involvement has largely centered on humanitarian logistics – at least according to its public-facing narrative.

This includes an upcoming deployment of emergency medical supplies to Lebanon, following recent Israeli military strikes in the country. However, observers note that the transition from humanitarian relief to large-scale infrastructure development is a key mechanism for Beijing to solidify energy security.

Nikkei Asia has issued the following commentary on China’s long-term plans in the Middle East:

Some observers argue that the U.S.-Iran war has strengthened Beijing’s presence in the Middle East. Rumi Aoyama, a professor at Japan’s Waseda University specializing in Chinese diplomacy, called China a “central hub where information on the situation in the Middle East was concentrated.”

China has dialogue channels with both Washington and Tehran, and it enjoys friendly ties with mediator Pakistan as an arms supplier. The Iranian and Pakistani foreign ministers frequently visited China during negotiations on ending the war to report on the situation.

The Iran war may also have worked to Beijing’s advantage in its dealings with Washington. With the U.S. prioritizing that conflict, it has been forced to ease up its pressure on China with regard to security and trade.

Yet Beijing has still welcomed the memorandum of understanding toward ending the war because stability in the Middle East is crucial for its energy security. Higher fuel and material prices caused by the war have dealt a blow to the Chinese economy.

Tehran, facing severe economic devastation and isolation from Western markets, has welcomed the Chinese overtures. High-level Iranian officials have made it clear they view Beijing not merely as an investor, but as a strategic anchor – akin to how defense ties with Russia have rapidly improved.

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Moscow Oil Refinery Faces Six-Month Shutdown After Relentless Ukrainian Drone Attacks

Moscow’s largest oil refinery is expected to remain out of service for at least six months after suffering significant damage in a series of Ukrainian drone attacks this month, according to Reuters, citing sources familiar with the matter, after Zelensky earlier vowed to bring the war to Russian territory. Kiev and the West are flirty with massive Russian retaliation at this point, which is precisely what Putin has vowed.

The refinery is located on the southern outskirts of the Russian capital and a major fuel supplier to the whole region. It was struck at least twice before this month – as dramatic and intense eyewitness videos captured – forcing operations to halt. Meanwhile via Newsquawk: 

Russia has reportedly asked for 50k tonnes of gasoline from Kazakhstan to help ease domestic fuel shortages, according to sources.

“Repairs will take at least six months,” one source said, describing the extent of the damage at the Moscow Oil Refinery.

The Gazprom Neft operatd facility processed 11.6 million metric tons of crude oil in 2024 and produced roughly 2.9 million tons of gasoline and 3.2 million tons of diesel fuel, according to public data.

It comes at a sensitive moment Russia continues to grapple with fuel supply challenges. At the moment, the Crimean peninsula is witnessing unprecedented government restrictions on selling gas to civilians, as well as half the population suffering an electricity blackout due to major Ukrainian drones strikes on Kerch port, and in particular damage to the large thermal power plant there.

Also, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said this week that Moscow is considering a ban on diesel exports to stabilize domestic markets amid emerging shortages.

Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) previously claimed responsibility for a June 16 strike that reportedly damaged the refinery’s primary oil-processing unit, described by Ukrainian officials as the plant’s “heart.” That’s when the facility first reportedly suspended operations following the attack.

Two days later, Ukraine launched another large-scale drone assault on Moscow. Russian authorities reported hundreds of drones targeting the capital, resulting in fires at multiple locations.

Since international crude oil prices surged following the war in the Middle East centered on Iran, Russia has boosted its oil revenues as not only prices have jumped – but Russian oil was made desirable in India again – thanks to American waivers for sales of Russia’s crude already loaded on tankers in connection to easing the global crisis due to the Iran war.

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