Quote:
Originally Posted by DoubleK
Doesn't need to be in atlantic Canada, pipeline from Hardisty to Churchill.
A company like Brookfield could make this happen with meaningful Indigenous participation. By meaningful, I mean 50.1/49.9% equity split.
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The Churchill idea sounds great on paper and has been a conservative wet dream for ages but in reality, it's not going to happen.
The rail tracks are garbage and expensive to maintain because they're built on muskeg. A pipeline would be insanely expensive to go through the Canadian shield or muskeg.
Once you get to Churchill, Hudson Bay has ice on average, 112 days per year so you'd need an entire fleet of icebreakers, more than Canada currently has. Right now the port is only open for shipping from July to October.
Not to mention that it's critically sensitive environment and crosses several indigenous territories, to an indigenous owned port and they have already voiced concerns about spills if oil was to be transported up there. Even if you manage to build a pipe, clear the ice, get indigenous ownership on board, now you need to get all the staples that the workers need up there. (guess we're back to fixing that garbage rail line that the company pulled out on because it was too expensive to maintain so the government had to bail it out). The economics just don't work out.
Here's a couple takes (on the oil idea rather than NG but same challenges) where they all conclude the same thing. .
https://www.sasktoday.ca/north/opini...peline-4145175
https://www.brandonsun.com/opinion/e...ded-in-reality
https://www.thompsoncitizen.net/opin...ctical-6069049
https://thenarwhal.ca/port-of-churchill-explainer/
Even Brian Jean says it's a pipedream:
https://twitter.com/BrianJeanAB/stat...41526026780672
Stop trying to make Churchill happen, it's not going to happen