Separatists ‘aren’t going to be any better off’: professor on Alberta’s economic, pipeline MOU impact

Martha Hall Findlay, with the University of Calgary, joins Alberta Primetime's Michael Higgins to discuss the meeting between Danielle Smith and Mark Carney.

With the pipeline memorandum of understanding (MOU) yet to cross the finish line, there are calls for a key component of the agreement to be suspended and efforts to be refocused on producing more oil. Martha Hall Findlay with the University of Calgary joins Alberta Primetime’s Michael Higgins to discuss Friday’s meeting between Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney in Ottawa.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: You’re calling for the Pathways Carbon Capture and Storage Project to be shelved and you’ve even written an op-ed in The Globe and Mail taking this stance. Why is now not the time to fulfill this commitment?

Martha Hall Findlay: First, I’m only suggesting we postpone it. As you would know, I put a lot of years into helping create the Pathways Project starting in 2020, so it doesn’t come lightly to me to actually be calling now for it to be postponed. But the world has changed so dramatically since 2020. It started to change very dramatically when the Russians invaded Ukraine for the second time, by the way. But in 2022, people started to realize that things are moving under our feet. Then Donald Trump was elected and created all sorts of additional challenges for Canada.

From a geopolitical energy security perspective, from a Canadian perspective, where now we recognize we have to be spending much, much more on national defense, on Arctic sovereignty, on our economic diversification, which includes infrastructure like ports, rails, pipelines and all of those things that we need as an exporting country to really enhance both our prosperity and our economic security.

With all of those things now facing us, it became pretty clear to me that spending billions of dollars, collectively, by the private sector, both provincial and federal government, wasn’t the time to spend billions of dollars on something that was not revenue generating. And particularly at a time when the rest of the world is not actually doing their part in terms of reducing emissions. It didn’t make sense for Canada to do that in effect on its own.

MH: To achieve all of those infrastructure elements that you listed off, that will take a considerable amount of time. What would then need to change for Pathways to be a viable exercise? Or do you see this as potentially being the end of the line?

MHF: I can’t predict what will happen from a geopolitical perspective. I can’t predict when the Strait of Hormuz is going to be open again. I can’t predict when the American government starts realizing that we’re, in fact, a partner and an ally, not something else. With that uncertainty, it just became clear that we needed to look after Canada first.

I recognize people have said, “Why did you support building Pathways in the beginning?” The phase one of Pathways would reduce global emissions by 0.02 per cent. This is negligible, right? But when we were putting it together, it was a time when almost all the countries around the world were acknowledging that we all needed to collectively do our part in terms of reducing emissions because it’s a global challenge. It’s not something Canada is going to solve on its own, but in a moment when you had so many countries expressing willingness each one to do their part, then it made sense for Canada to participate, right? We want to do our part, so it was entirely appropriate for us to participate. But that’s not happening now.

There’s virtually nowhere in the world where countries are paying attention to the Paris Accord targets. It’s just not top of mind. Energy, affordability, energy security, and access, frankly, to Canadian energy because a lot of our allies, lots of countries, are now really clamoring after what we have, which is oil and gas. It just seemed to me to be a moment to focus on the MOU, focus on this historic relationship between the federal government and the province of Alberta and reframe it enough to actually build what we need to get built.

MH: The premier also made a comment that the industry is getting a bit impatient and Albertans are getting a bit impatient. What’s your read on why the MOU has not yet crossed the finish line?

MHF: I can’t speak for the discussions that have been going on behind closed doors. Let me just say, I think the MOU is wonderful. I was hugely glad when I saw that happen. In Canadian history, we’ve never been able to build big infrastructure projects without significant federal, provincial collaboration and significant public private financial collaboration, so this MOU is fantastic.

It’s just tied to building a pipeline, to building the Pathways Project, and my recommendation now, for all the reasons I’ve explained, let’s put that collaboration to work to actually build the pipeline. Because that is by far and away the most immediate priority that we have for our economic diversification, for our prosperity, for our responsibility to allies around the world who are really worried now about energy security. It’s not a shelving, it’s a postponement to focus on the things that are real priorities for us as Canadians.

MH: Where the MOU is concerned, to what degree is the clock ticking here and to what degree is momentum around the issue of separation weighing on that agreement?

MHF: There’s no question that the MOU was, and I hope is, really important from a national unity perspective. There’s no question a lot of the separatists feeling in Alberta has been based on a view that Alberta was just not understanding what was going on in Alberta, and was preventing Alberta from the economic prosperity that was certainly possible.

My message to the people who are talking that way: you’re not going to be any better off. There’s no way that separation from the rest of Canada will make it any easier to build a pipeline or enhance your economic diversification. That’s just nonsense, but the anger was still there. There’s no question now that the MOU was signed quite a while ago, that people have been waiting and saying, “love the idea, but we need to see action, not just words.” I do think there’s some frustration that aspects of the MOU just haven’t been moved forward yet. So it would be a very good thing for all sorts of reasons if we could get this thing moving.