Carbon capture project goes from ‘fatalistic uncertainty’ to key Canada energy plank
CBC
When Martha Hall Findlay heard Canada’s prime minister and Alberta’s premier speak with enthusiasm Thursday about the necessity of the Pathways carbon capture project to their long-promised “grand bargain,” she felt herself moved.
“The support wasn’t always there … to have those two in those roles talk about how absolutely critical the Pathways project will be to making all of this happen, I felt like I wanted to cry,” said the former Liberal MP and oilsands executive, who played a key role in the development of the Pathways Alliance.
She's currently the director of the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary.
“For those of us who’ve been working on some of these things for a long time and feeling like sometimes it was just like banging our head against a wall, or a few walls … there’s a huge amount to do, but today was extraordinary.”
On Thursday, Alberta and Ottawa reached an agreement that laid out the groundwork for a new bitumen pipeline through British Columbia, part of a suite of changes to Ottawa’s environmental regulatory landscape that charts a course for the country’s energy sector over the coming decades.
As a precondition to the approval of a bitumen pipeline, federal officials said Pathways Plus must move ahead.
That’s the major project proposed by the Pathways Alliance, a consortium of major Canadian oilsands companies that have committed to achieving net-zero emissions from oilsands production by 2050.
It would see a major carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) project established near Cold Lake, Alta., trap carbon dioxide emissions from more than 20 oilsands facilities in northern Alberta before being transported 400 kilometres by pipeline to a terminal in the eastern part of the province. The companies first proposed the project in 2022.
“Pathways Alliance appreciates Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney’s leadership to create the conditions for growth of this important industry and its associated contribution to the Canadian economy,” reads an emailed statement attributed to Kendall Dilling, the CEO of Pathways Alliance.
“Canadian oil is an important economic driver for the country while supporting energy security in an uncertain world.
“We look forward to working with the Alberta and federal governments in the coming months on their shared objective of establishing Canada as a global energy superpower.”
The categorical commitment to the project is a striking development for those who have studied and evaluated Pathways over the years.
Peter Findlay, the director of CCUS and carbon management global with Wood Mackenzie, said his research and consulting firm has done detailed economic valuations of Pathways for about two years now.
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