On June 2, Canada’s new Prime Minister Mark Carney met with Canadian premiers to discuss “nation-building projects.” Key among the ideas on the table was the prospect of building more pipelines. This raises serious questions around Carney’s approach to both addressing climate change and preparing for the economic realities of a world that is moving away from fossil fuels.
During the event, he stated: “within the context of national interests, the interest is in, as mentioned in the press release, decarbonized barrels. So, working alongside forms of decarbonization for those barrels.”
This plan relies on the unproven and undeveloped technology of Carbon Capture Storage (CCS). In stating this, the prime minister is furthering the myth that CCS can be used to keep the Canadian oil and gas industry alive, as the world moves away from fossil fuels.
The need to shift to renewable forms of energy was the first recommendation of 11,000 scientists in Bioscience journal, in 2019, as they declared a “climate emergency.” Collectively they stated:
The world must quickly implement massive energy efficiency and conservation practices and must replace fossil fuels with low-carbon renewables (figures 1h) and other cleaner sources of energy if safe for people and the environment (figure S2). We should leave remaining stocks of fossil fuels in the ground.
Of carbon capture, the scientists specifically warned that we “should carefully pursue effective negative emissions using technology such as carbon extraction from the source and capture from the air.” Carefully pursuing the technology in no way means that it can be used to “decarbonize” the oil industry. We must be careful because the oil industry is pushing for a lot of investment in this technology, while much of the money would be better spent in other areas.
In 2022, Environmental Research Letters published research which effectively made the case that almost forty percent of existing fossil fuel developments will need to decommissioned early for a chance at a fifty percent probability of keeping global warming to 1.5ºC, as recommended by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Canada should not be pursuing more pipelines at this time. The planet simply does not have the carbon budget for it. Nor do humans if we wish to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. Furthermore, pursuing new fossil fuel projects will prevent us from meeting our commitments under the Paris Climate Accord. At this point, the tiny remaining carbon budget for 1.5ºC should be spent on moving to renewables, rather than building infrastructure that will soon be a stranded asset.
Canada is currently not on track to meet the emission reduction commitments we made in the Paris agreement, according to bot the Emissions Gap Report 2024 (p.xv) and the Environment Commissioner.
CCS involves collecting carbon dioxide (CO2) at the source of the emissions, transporting it and then burying it in an underground location. The International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) published a report in 2023 which demonstrates that CCS is not a net-zero solution for Canada’s oil and gas sector. It stated that “industry representatives consider carbon capture and storage (CCS) to be the sector’s primary emission reduction solution, but there is a lack of evidence on the efficacy of this approach and its consistency with Canada’s net-zero commitment.” Authors Angela Carter and Laura Cameron describe CCS as expensive, “energy intensive, slow to implement, and unproven at scale.”
This has not stopped the Government of Canada from investing billions of dollars in CCS. The Canadian oil industry has effectively lobbied the government to obtain subsidies to pursue it. In this vein, we should view CCS as nothing more than a lifeline for a dying industry that is already heavily subsidized, according to the International Monetary Fund.
According to the IISD report, the United States key legislation for addressing climate change invested far less in CCS:
The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), by comparison, offers much less financial support for CCS than what is already on the table in Canada: by 2030, Canada’s CCS Investment Tax Credit is estimated to provide double the subsidy amount offered via the IRA to CCS.
The IRA is the most important legislation for addressing climate change in the history of the world. Of course, the Trump administration is working hard to undo its benefits.
Notably, this embrace of pipelines comes after the Kinder Morgan expansion was purchased by the federal government in 2017. The costs ballooned from the initially projected $5.4 billion to $34 billion. While the pipeline is producing now, it is “one of the most expensive routes for oil shippers to move their product,” and the crown corporation that runs the pipeline wants to raise tolls to address the many cost overruns on the project.
The Coastal Gaslink pipeline project also encountered opposition from Indigenous groups that resulted in the high-profile arrest of Wet’suwet’en protestors and environmental journalists. The police involved were accused of using excessive force, and this was supported by video footage. The CBC’s The Fifth Estate has established that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have been used as a security force to protect private interests at the site of the pipeline construction. This use of the RCMP shows the ongoing colonialism of pushing pipelines through Indigenous lands. It also demonstrates that pipelines have no place in a just transition strategy.
As the world moves away from fossil fuels, we should also consider that Canadian oil will only be valuable if there is a buyer for the product. While there is a lack of clarity around the future need for oil, related to Artificial Intelligence and the potential impact of Trump administration policies, the World Energy Outlook 2024 predicted that peak oil would occur before 2030. Canadian oil is not expected to survive long after the world reaches peak oil, according to research published in Nature Energy.
Most of the emissions from fossil fuels come from burning them and this is largely what the world must move away from to address climate change. Most emissions are downstream at the point of burning fossil fuels, rather than upstream when they are being taken out of the ground.
There are major efforts in place to end downstream emissions, or to end fossil fuels by taking away their customers. There have been large investments in electrifying transportation, to significantly curb the need for oil. Canadians must seriously consider the realities of investing in oil infrastructure, at this point in global economics. The oil industry is going through what Carbon Tracker has called “spiralling disruptions.”
It is also noteworthy that, at present, the prime minister is working to quickly push Bill C-5 through the House of Commons, which will enable the federal government to fast-track projects such as pipelines if they deem them to be “in the national interest.” The legislation is being actively opposed by environmental and Indigenous groups on the basis that the federal government has not sufficiently consulted Canadians. Liberal Member of Parliament Nathan Erksine-Smith stated that the legislation “would all actually make Harper blush.”
Prime Minister Carney has long presented himself as being in favour of the green energy transition and addressing climate change. However, at present, he is no friend to either planet Earth or the life that inhabits her.
Carney’s willingness to buy into oil industry talking points around Carbon Capture Storage raises important questions about the seriousness of both his economic and environmental policies.
Carney’s willingness to buy into oil industry talking points around CCS raises important questions about the seriousness of both his economic and environmental policies. His current approach is very far removed from what the political economy and scientific research is telling us about what needs to happen next.
Feature Image: “Mark Carney Remarks following the Cabinet Planning Forum 2025 (6m37s)” by Prime Minister of Canada is licensed under CC BY 3.0.
