Michael Binnion is the Executive Director of the Modern Miracle Network.
Canadians have historically had good reason to be proud of our contribution internationally, and recent global events have most of us thinking about our role.
Although we are a mid-sized economy with a small population, the world has consistently been able to count on us to be the junior partner who punches above our weight.
Recently, international concerns have changed focus to the environment as the top policy issue – and Canada once again has aggressively sought to do more than our share.
However, we have been missing a fundamental change and opportunity. Canada has the capability to step up as a senior partner in a world concerned about resources and the environment. There have been many voices warning about the importance of including energy security and our strategic interests as part of our policy on environment. Unfortunately, the Canadian response has been mired in 20th-century environmental ideas. We missed several opportunities for mega projects to bring resources with world leading environmental performance to international markets. Sadly, where the world and Canada finds itself in the present moment, ’I told you so’ is cold comfort.
The growing fracture lines on a global response on climate was shown in Glasgow, as China and India both said they would not commit to 2050. Russia has been rogue on climate all along, and it is obvious they prioritize their strategic interests ahead of global environmental challenges. Russia’s pursuit of strategic interests in Europe has not only created a humanitarian crisis, but it has also set up China as a reliable Russian ally. It seems inevitable that China will ‘belt and road’ Russia in its time of need and effectively take control of Siberia and its vast resources. Only a country like Canada can claim resources as rich as Siberia without a population that can use them all.
The Russian invasion has exposed the importance of security for people – safety, food, shelter, and energy are all sharply in focus. Even those trapped in old ideas of bans and blockades to stop petroleum use have agreed we need to end being dependent on countries who don’t share our values, especially for critical commodities like energy. The clear advantage to Russia, including finances from control of much of the world’s energy supplies, has reignited the discussion over what and where our energy should come from. We again see reports recirculating of Russian financing of anti-natural gas and anti-fracking groups to eliminate competition. One commentator even noted that Putin had successfully mobilized ‘useful idiots’ in the West to support his agenda.
In Canada, the widely under-reported Allan Report was not able to trace the original source of foreign funds flowing to anti-Alberta oil and gas campaigns. However, it did expressly find hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign funding flowing to groups operating in Canada, giving at least some plausibility to the reports on Russian disinformation and finance. Some of those groups were very active in the campaign to ban LNG and natural gas production in Quebec which, for the moment at least, has made it impossible for Canada to help with the gas crisis in Europe.
In our myopic Canadian debate on energy and environment, we compare two 20th-century ideas. One being ’business as usual’ – which in a world growing to 10 billion energy-hungry people in the 21st century seems unsustainable to most. At the other side of the spectrum is the idea of a transition off of and ban of fossil fuels – an approach many believe threatens 21st-century human progress. The debate between the two ideas presumed fossil fuel technologies were static, which supported the non-progressive idea of a ban. It also presumed technologies for renewables would advance faster than they have.
What we have not considered seriously is a third option. An all-of-the-above approach to energy security and our strategic interests – using incentives for technological advances for all our energy sources. In a third option, we would have a race to net-zero emissions and hope all our energy choices win. The recent embrace by Ministers Wilkenson and Guilbeault of carbon capture, utilization and storage technology as a major tool to reduce emissions gives some hope that perhaps the federal government is moving towards a 21st century approach to a ‘wicked’ policy problem.
The war in Ukraine gives Canada yet another chance to step up as a senior international partner guaranteeing energy and resource security for our allies. Holding on to old-fashioned and non-progressive ideas of moratoriums will cause Canada to let down the entire Western world in its time of need. It is not just a chance for Canada; it is an imperative.
The path Canada is on now is to remain a junior partner, increasingly punching well below even that smaller standard. The other choice is to make the 21st century the Canadian century. Canada can and must step up as the senior partner guaranteeing security of resource supply that is environmentally responsible. We need to not just continue to be a leader in renewables but also a leader in an emerging trillion-dollar market in new carbon-tech. Through new efficiencies, sequestration, and recycling of CO2 into valuable products, Canada can lead the way on an energy transformation that will see fossil fuels like natural gas competing with renewables to be low emissions energy.
If Canada does step up, it will empower our senior partners to stand up along with us to confront authoritarian states like Russia. It will also finance Canada’s ongoing leading environmental and social programs – and it might even allow us to consider investing in becoming northern military specialists and guard the Arctic not just for Canada but for our NATO allies.
The world is watching us in their time of need. It’s time to drop old and failed ideas of bans and blockades. Embracing a third option of transformation for energy and the environment can allow us to lead not only our allies on resource security but also the planet on environment. We’ve historically been proud of our international contributions, and now is the time for us once again to show the world what Canadians can do.
