Alberta Politics & Government Thread 3.0

[Leeman4Gilmour]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Spoiler!

https://twitter.com/user/status/1693682798924824944

They paused geothermal too??? What a bunch of morons. Good thing they are helping our homegrown energy companies find markets in Europe, since they've been kicked in the balls here. The incompetence is incalculable.



Oh please, UCP defenders of our brittle deregulated energy market, tell me how this makes sense.

Just a point of clarification. In that graph it says "No" under the "Paused column". Unless I'm reading it wrong.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Leeman4Gilmour

Just a point of clarification. In that graph it says "No" under the "Paused column". Unless I'm reading it wrong.

You have to click the tweet, as the circled bit is below. Here:

Spoiler!

You can tell this is ideological, because "other biomass" is also paused. These would essentially be thermal power plants providing stable generation and not using crop land, so it fails all of their stated objections. In short, she's lying again.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

https://twitter.com/user/status/1693682798924824944


They paused geothermal too??? What a bunch of morons. Good thing they are helping our homegrown energy companies find markets in Europe, since they've been kicked in the balls here. The incompetence is incalculable.



Oh please, UCP defenders of our brittle deregulated energy market, tell me how this makes sense.

Isn’t that list saying they didn’t pause Thermal projects?

Edit: I see you have to click the tweet.

Geothermal is also stable baseload.

[GGG]

Nm

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

That's basically a whataboutism.

Their policy on renewables is absurd. That doesn't mean they should enact a similarly absurd policy on the oilsands, it means they should cancel the absurd policy on renewables.

That's my point...we don't pause any other industry to make policy adjustments, because it is insane.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

That's my point...we don't pause any other industry to make policy adjustments, because it is insane.

When you say "we" do you mean Albertans or Canadians in general? There are many examples of government's in Canada putting a pause on industry while the evaluate regulations or impacts or other aspects of the industry. You can look at the Maritimes and the examples of temporary fishery closures or BC and their suspension of timber license sales during various times (like late 2021 when they wanted input from First Nations on traditional land use) or when the federal government suspended the temporary foreign workers program to evaluate the impact on businesses and the rules around the program.

[Cappy]

Originally Posted by accord1999

Installing Chinese solar panels and American wind-turbines isn't much of an energy industry.

Does the general public still remember when Ontario killed its renewable energy industry? It even had factories building wind turbines and solar panels, but without subsidies it was not competitive. And it wasn't even killed by Doug Ford, Katherine Wynne was still premier then.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/londo...sing-1.4210184

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/winds...uiet-1.5058216

https://www.guelphmercury.com/busine...567a1a98d.html

The issue is that the renewables industry in Alberta is actually growing! This is not pausing or cancelling a struggling industry. It is shutting it down at a bad time for "reasons"

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

That's my point...we don't pause any other industry to make policy adjustments, because it is insane.

No, we don't or haven't in the past. This is purely political.

Our stupid government has paused geothermal applications even though the AER has been working on a framework since 2020 and the government has already passed bills to support the application for posting land, tenure, defined thermal rights, and lifecycle requirements.

As of 2022 the following are already in place to support geothermal projects.
Mines and Minerals Act
Alberta Geothermal Resource Tenure Regulation
Energy Mineral Rights Information Bulletin 2022-02 (Administration of Geothermal
Resource Tenure)
Crown Mineral Agreement Holder Eligibility Guide
Geothermal Resource Development Act
Geothermal Resource Development Regulation
Oil and Gas Conservation Act

They AER has since Jan 2022 accepted applications and posted thermal rights lands for sale, bonuses paid, and is currently collecting rent from these leases. Our United Regressive Conservative Party at work.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by Cappy

The issue is that the renewables industry in Alberta is actually growing! This is not pausing or cancelling a struggling industry. It is shutting it down at a bad time for "reasons"

Those are gigs, not careers.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Originally Posted by Whynotnow

Where do you think most of the components are made for the oil sands? It’s not like that stuff isn’t coming from overseas, so not sure that should be your measuring stick.

As for Ontario, different time, different place, Renewables projects are pretty competitive in Alberta for a host of reasons, they are also increasingly viable in a lot of different jurisdictions that they weren’t 5 years ago.

As said just above, the pause is a failure of government, there was lots and lots of time for these issues to have been dealt with in advance and not cause this. I also don’t fully buy the pause is needed myself, the issues need to be addressed but not sure they warrant.a full scale shut down. I’m in the energy sector, have been for 25 years, we’ve had bigger problems that this and not once would the government even considered Ed a full shutdown. So ask yourself why treat renewables this way?

Its true, our leadership totally fumbled the assumptions about how the oilsands would actually be developed. Offshored engineering and fabrication. The facilities that did get built are ageing and running on skeleton crews. All financed by foreign capital, paying returns to non-Albertan or Canadian institutions and funds. Just... a giveaway.

The moratorium doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense given high VREs equate to long term lock in of natural gas consumption, and we will always be a gas first basin. VREs are without question good for owners of gas mineral rights and those who trade in gas and gas applications.

I think it comes down to keeping delivered costs of power down. Most people don't understand the difference between the choices a person investing in generation technology will make vs the impact those choices have on final delivered system cost. Solar and Wind could be ZERO forever, and it doesn't matter because their inclusion drives system costs up, period.

https://twitter.com/E_R_Sepulveda/st...427397/photo/1

Energy is THE base input to all other activity in an economy. Increasing delivered costs is the same as putting a massive tax burden on the entire economy which has obvious chilling effects on multiple participants in that ecosystem. This is the question that is worth examining dispassionately as opposed to brainlessly digging in on partisan ideological lines.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by SeeGeeWhy

Its true, our leadership totally fumbled the assumptions about how the oilsands would actually be developed. Offshored engineering and fabrication. The facilities that did get built are ageing and running on skeleton crews. All financed by foreign capital, paying returns to non-Albertan or Canadian institutions and funds. Just... a giveaway.

The moratorium doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense given high VREs equate to long term lock in of natural gas consumption, and we will always be a gas first basin. VREs are without question good for owners of gas mineral rights and those who trade in gas and gas applications.

I think it comes down to keeping delivered costs of power down. Most people don't understand the difference between the choices a person investing in generation technology will make vs the impact those choices have on final delivered system cost. Solar and Wind could be ZERO forever, and it doesn't matter because their inclusion drives system costs up, period.

https://twitter.com/E_R_Sepulveda/st...427397/photo/1

Energy is THE base input to all other activity in an economy. Increasing delivered costs is the same as putting a massive tax burden on the entire economy which has obvious chilling effects on multiple participants in that ecosystem. This is the question that is worth examining dispassionately as opposed to brainlessly digging in on partisan ideological lines.

Alberta is the only jurisdiction in Canada that cannot handle solar and wind and the only jurisdiction where their inclusion allegedly drives up the cost of electricity. It is the only jurisdiction with this massive tax burden.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

Alberta is the only jurisdiction in Canada that cannot handle solar and wind and the only jurisdiction where their inclusion allegedly drives up the cost of electricity. It is the only jurisdiction with this massive tax burden.

I mean, this policy is stupid. But Alberta does have a different power market than most of the rest of Canada. Specifically the lack of hydro. Hydro from giant dams is a great complement to intermittent renewables because it can be turned on/off fast.

To have the same effect we need gas peaking plants.

[Monahammer]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

I mean, this policy is stupid. But Alberta does have a different power market than most of the rest of Canada. Specifically the lack of hydro. Hydro from giant dams is a great complement to intermittent renewables because it can be turned on/off fast.

To have the same effect we need gas peaking plants.

We should probably take back the existing Hydro assets in the province from their private holders then though, as they are currently reserving use of those power assets for higher $ time periods. We don't need new peaking plants, we just need these assets to be actually useable for the population instead of purely profit oriented.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

Alberta is the only jurisdiction in Canada that cannot handle solar and wind and the only jurisdiction where their inclusion allegedly drives up the cost of electricity. It is the only jurisdiction with this massive tax burden.

Not true because Ontario went through similar turmoil with wind generation.

[TheIronMaiden]

Originally Posted by bizaro86

I mean, this policy is stupid. But Alberta does have a different power market than most of the rest of Canada. Specifically the lack of hydro. Hydro from giant dams is a great complement to intermittent renewables because it can be turned on/off fast.

To have the same effect we need gas peaking plants.

I'm glad we don't have hydro, I understand that it is less carbon intensive. I was doing some research contract work with respect to the legacy of the hydro system near Thompson Manitoba, and it is some real I don't want to live on this planet material.

The short version is: in l the late 70s early 80s the province, the federal government and the hydro company lied to Indigenous peoples and flooded their homes. Not just abstract " flood their home lands" but 100% flooded their reserves without informed consent.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by Monahammer

We should probably take back the existing Hydro assets in the province from their private holders then though, as they are currently reserving use of those power assets for higher $ time periods. We don't need new peaking plants, we just need these assets to be actually useable for the population instead of purely profit oriented.

The higher dollar time periods are when we're short power, so a non-market owner would presumably dispatch them in exactly the same way.

Our hydro capacity as a percentage of total generation is very, very small. If we built giant dams on the peace or athabasca rivers that might be different, but so far Alberta hasn't done that.

I'd actually be in favour of an "Alberta Hydro" crown Corp building some big dams using oil sands royalties.

[Aarongavey]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

Not true because Ontario went through similar turmoil with wind generation.

When was this? When Ford made a political announcement to rip the turbines out of the ground because of the cancer? I don’t recall Ontario having any issues.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Aarongavey

When was this? When Ford made a political announcement to rip the turbines out of the ground because of the cancer? I don’t recall Ontario having any issues.

There was Ford fighting against the wind industry and many other groups fighting against it. Some concerns were around the cost associated with selling the excess wind generation to other markets.

But there was also the government vs offshore wind and their imposed ban on a major project:
https://globalnews.ca/news/4175888/t...ments-lawsuit/

[accord1999]

Originally Posted by Street Pharmacist

Yes energy in Germany is more expensive, but it's more that Germany spends money to develop by purchasing/testing expensive set ups in order to bring costs down. They're the reason solar costs are now 95% cheaper than the first panels installed in Germany

China's industrial might is the reason solar panels are cheaper. Germany saying they kick-started it is something they say to console themselves after they lost 100K jobs in solar panel manufacturing.

The overall drop in employment has been mostly due to the collapse of Germany's solar power industry over the past decade, as many companies were forced out of business thanks to cheaper competitors from China scooping up most of the market. The number of jobs in solar PV panel production and installation fell from a record 133,000 in 2011 to under 28,000 seven years later. In the wind industry, employment dropped from its record level of roughly 108,000 in 2016 to under 70,000 just two years later.

https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news...ewables-sector

[Scroopy Noopers]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

When you say "we" do you mean Albertans or Canadians in general? There are many examples of government's in Canada putting a pause on industry while the evaluate regulations or impacts or other aspects of the industry. You can look at the Maritimes and the examples of temporary fishery closures or BC and their suspension of timber license sales during various times (like late 2021 when they wanted input from First Nations on traditional land use) or when the federal government suspended the temporary foreign workers program to evaluate the impact on businesses and the rules around the program.

Yeah, just the same. We might run out of wind if we don’t act fast.