Teck Resources Withdraws Application for Alberta Oil Sands After Sustained Protests
HAVANA TIMES – In Canada, Teck Resources has withdrawn its application for the $15.5 billion Alberta oil sands Frontier mine, days before the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was to announce whether it would allow the project to go ahead.
It would have been the largest-ever open-pit mine and was expected to pump around 260,000 barrels of oil per day, producing 4.1 megatons of emissions each year.
Indigenous and environmental groups have been sounding the alarm over the proposed mine. Last week, a group of Nobel Prize winners called on Trudeau to stop the Teck Frontier mine.
Indigenous Climate Action, which led the grassroots campaign against the project celebrated the announcement, writing, “Our communities need a just transition, not more fossil fuel resource extraction. We need to be in charge of our own futures, lands, and job opportunities that work to solve the climate crisis, address inequality, and respect our rights and sovereignty as Indigenous Peoples.”
This project was doomed from the get go. It was initially proposed when the price of oil was around $100 dollars American per barrel. The price of oil is now, what, maybe half that price. This is not an economically feasible project with costs constantly rising and the price of oil falling.
Moreover, there is the environmental factor. Presently, the Canadian government is undergoing a substantial shift in its relation with the Aboriginal peoples of Canada. A group of Indigenous elders in northern British Columbia have put up blockades to a proposed natural gas pipeline. They have shut down this project. This gas line project ventured into unceded Aboriginal territory. According to the Indigenous elders the RCMP have no business on this land and neither does the gas line workers. The Indigenous elders want unequivocal removal of both police and pipeline workers. Period.
Also, in support of their Indigenous brothers the Mohawks in around Montreal and in southern Ontario have also put up blockades to show the federal Liberal government they are committed to the Indigenous cause and support for their brothers in British Columbia. The blockades in southern Ontario have since been removed by the OPP.
The Aboriginal cause or modus operandi is that they are a nation (Aboriginals) and they want a nation to nation (Canadian government representing the Crown) meaningful and respectful dialogue to resolve long standing disputes and for Aboriginals to be treated as rightful land owners. This stand off has been going on for weeks now with trains unable to transport goods to final destinations costing the Canadian government millions of dollars in lost economic output and hampering Canada’s reputation as a reliable supplier.
Teck Resources watching these dramatic circumstances unfold says we do not want to put our company and investment dollars into a project which will invariably undergo the same hurdles, delays, problems as the natural gas pipeline in northern British Columbia and will not deliver shareholder value to investors. Plus, the Liberal government probably would not have approved this project anyway because of the Liberal governments green house Paris targets which would not have been met. So, scrap the project much to the chagrin of Jason Kenney and his Conservative Party in Alberta and the Conservative Party of Canada. They and many, many Albertans are livid.
This whole situation is a powder keg for the Liberal government. On one hand it wants to please the environmentalist and meet its Paris climate change targets, and on the other hand it wants foreign investment in natural resources to spur jobs, and on the other hand, if there is a third hand, to please the Indigenous peoples who also are stewards of the land, air, and water and they want environmental sustainability, historical rights to their land, but also jobs to survive. It’s a jugglers (Justin Trudeau – P.M.) nightmare.
When Justin Trudeau, the Prime Minister, ran for his job initially he stated that protecting the environment and meeting Canada’s climate change goals as set out in the Paris accords AND have the development of natural resource projects together is absolutely attainable and can be accomplished. Enough Canadian voters believed him to give him a second minority mandate.
Well, according to the CEO of Teck Resources this pie in the sky vision is absolutely balderdash and he is having none of it. I think he may be right.