Juno News - December 31, 2021


The uphill battle of telling the Canadian energy sector's story

Topics
Canadian energy sector advocacy for oil and gas industry blockading oil and gas energy prosperity in Canada
Mentioned
Andrew Lawton Show Cody Siona Steven Guilbeault Rachel Nolley David Suzuki Stephen Guibo Greenpeace Goliath
What’s in store at True North in 2022？ Will there be less societal division in 2022？

Episode Stats


Length

20 minutes

Words per minute

186.77

Word count

3,829

Sentence count

202

Harmful content

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Coming up, a big picture look at Canada's energy sector and environmental activists seeking to undermine it. In this episode of The Andrew Lawton Show, host Andrew sits down with the CEO of the Canadian Energy News Network, Cody Sioni.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's most irreverent talk show. This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.
00:00:12.480 Coming up, a big picture look at Canada's energy sector and the environmental activists seeking to undermine it.
00:00:20.860 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.
00:00:24.440 Welcome to the Andrew Lawton Show, Canada's most irreverent talk show here on True North.
00:00:33.000 As you've noticed, throughout this month we've been doing a bit of a bigger picture look at some of the big issues that we've covered in the past year
00:00:39.780 that are certain to rear themselves again in the year ahead.
00:00:43.760 And one big one is the energy sector. We've had a lot of instability in this sector on a number of projects.
00:00:50.120 We had the report from Alberta about the influence of environmental NGOs on the pipeline process and other energy development projects in Canada.
00:00:59.880 And in the year ahead, we have a number of these projects that are still very much relevant and pertinent to Canadians.
00:01:06.500 And I thought it would be good to take a bigger picture look at what some of these issues are.
00:01:10.520 And also one of the big players in trying to expose and really tell the story of this sector.
00:01:17.580 And that is the Canadian Energy News Network, a fantastic resource.
00:01:21.320 If you haven't checked it out, you certainly should.
00:01:23.280 And definitely subscribe to their newsletter.
00:01:25.420 And at the helm of that is Cody Siona, who joins me now.
00:01:28.940 Cody, good to talk to you again. Thanks for coming on today.
00:01:31.620 Yeah, thanks, Andrew. It's good to be here this morning.
00:01:33.900 I don't know what it's like where you are, but it's starting to snow here in Alberta.
00:01:37.220 Well, I think that's like a regular occurrence out there, but nevertheless, we survive.
00:01:42.520 For those not familiar with it, what is the Canadian Energy News Network?
00:01:46.720 So the Canadian Energy News Network is kind of like a rapid response research centre.
00:01:50.740 So what we attempt to do is we like to provide counterpoints to some of the attacks on industry.
00:01:56.940 We like to provide some research. We have studies, articles, anything you kind of need.
00:02:02.140 We have graphics videos to help support kind of our industry's voice.
00:02:07.220 One of the big challenges is that that voice just simply isn't being heard in a lot of mainstream media coverage.
00:02:14.500 And I know that this is something that might sound like an obvious point to a lot of our listeners,
00:02:19.100 but to the general population, I don't know if they necessarily know that.
00:02:22.380 And it's really pertinent, I think, when you're talking about the environmental questions,
00:02:27.740 the stuff that the energy sector is doing isn't really heard.
00:02:31.360 And also a lot of the other two sides of the story sort of thing.
00:02:34.800 We only hear one side of it.
00:02:36.060 Yeah, no, and that's very true. 0.76
00:02:39.080 And it's, you know, the energy industry is kind of painted right now as like nobody really trusts them.
00:02:46.360 And I don't think really many people really trust many media organisations right now either.
00:02:51.440 So I don't know if, I'm not sure if them actually being in more mainstream media outlets,
00:02:57.060 I don't know if that would actually do much to help with that reputation.
00:03:01.900 Because, you know, you talk about, you know, the Angos have done very good at this.
00:03:07.360 They've been able to paint the industry as, you know, big evil, big corporations, big money.
00:03:11.320 And it's really hard to shirk that kind of identity, especially once it's been, you know,
00:03:16.700 it's been circulating here in Canada for at least the last three years, if not more.
00:03:20.180 You raise a valid point there.
00:03:23.100 There's a lot of baggage that is brought to some of these discussions.
00:03:26.760 So for your job, as far as someone who's trying to right this wrong and someone who's trying to tell the other story,
00:03:33.000 what do you find are the biggest sticking points?
00:03:34.860 What do you find are those biggest points of resistance you have to confront?
00:03:37.780 Are you talking about some more or less the attacks in the industry or resistance to, you know,
00:03:45.020 learning about the positives of the industry?
00:03:47.880 Sorry, I just need to go.
00:03:48.500 Well, I think both.
00:03:49.420 I mean, you're countering the negative, but also countering people that just don't know what the positives are,
00:03:53.740 or even that they're out there.
00:03:55.760 Oh, God.
00:03:56.420 I mean, it's, I mean, for me being in the industry, it's kind of, you know, it kind of just comes to me.
00:04:02.800 But, you know, people still have this perception that there's pipelines tearing up northern Alberta.
00:04:08.220 They still think that the oil sands are, you know, this big, massive blight on the environment.
00:04:14.400 And that's just simply not the truth.
00:04:16.240 Of course, there's impacts, but there's impacts for all types of energy, whether it's wind or, you know, traditional fuels.
00:04:22.400 So people still don't understand, like, the difference in impacts or the actual impacts that happen,
00:04:29.900 which aren't actually as bad as the Anglos say they are, which is huge because they think, you know, 0.99
00:04:36.460 for example, you know, northern Alberta just looks like, you know, looks like something out of Middle Earth.
00:04:42.360 When, in fact, the oil sands have only disturbed, I think it's, and I might be wrong on this one,
00:04:47.920 but 0.03% of the boreal forest in Canada, which is, you know, we have, Canada's massive.
00:04:53.420 So it's not really that big of an impact compared to the, say, actual cities.
00:04:58.200 Yeah, and you mentioned earlier the impacts on wind.
00:05:03.100 I mean, you look at some of these reports, and I don't have the numbers handy,
00:05:05.460 but just the environmental impact of some of these solar panel factories in China
00:05:10.220 and some of the mining operations that are involved in getting the products necessary for solar.
00:05:16.740 And it's not about whataboutism, because ultimately, if we say there's a problem and we need to fix it,
00:05:21.620 it doesn't matter who's causing it.
00:05:22.960 But it is speaking to that idea that people are only interested in scapegoating one particular sector,
00:05:28.420 and in Canada, that's the oil and gas sector, by and large.
00:05:31.740 Yeah, and it is.
00:05:32.640 And it's, you know, if there's a solution and someone has a better solution than what the oil and gas industry is doing,
00:05:39.300 by all means, we need solutions.
00:05:41.160 We can acknowledge that there's, you know, the human population is growing and there's going to be more consumption.
00:05:46.440 And we need to find a solution to that.
00:05:48.860 And if that's wind or if that's carbon capture or whatever, we need to acknowledge that there's something.
00:05:54.680 But we can't jeopardize the benefits of one energy source to only highlight the benefits of another one.
00:06:01.620 So let's talk a little bit about the ENGO factor, because I know this was something that came out in that Alberta report,
00:06:10.780 which a lot of people kind of mocked the idea of the report, I noticed, when they started doing the investigation.
00:06:16.740 They sort of just rolled their eyes and thought that it was just, I don't know, this right-wing fantasy project of some kind.
00:06:22.200 But the reality is we are looking at a pretty significant volume of groups that are very well-funded,
00:06:30.460 that really just seem to not be interested in creating or finding solutions, but just destabilizing this sector.
00:06:36.680 Yeah, it is true. I know there was, you know, there was a lot of heat around the conclusions.
00:06:42.960 One of the conclusions was, like, there was foreign funding coming in, but they couldn't really tell how much because of the nature of it.
00:06:49.920 You can grant and re-grant and all of a sudden the money goes from one source to, you know, 20 sources.
00:06:55.300 So it's actually fairly hard to track it and do an actual forensic accounting, which I know the mandate of the actual report changed a little bit throughout the two years or two or so odd years.
00:07:06.920 But they still found $1.28 billion in funding coming in, not necessarily to attack, you know, Alberta oil,
00:07:14.520 but there's still quite a large amount of money coming in from foreign sources.
00:07:18.460 And that's just the stuff that they could track.
00:07:20.360 I mean, they think it's much larger, which, I mean, I wouldn't be surprised.
00:07:23.360 Now, I could be wrong, but I don't think you are getting $1 billion of funding every year, are you?
00:07:28.800 No. If I was getting $1 billion of funding every year, I feel like we'd be a lot more in the mainstream and be able to better effect, advocate for the industry.
00:07:39.620 Yeah, you might not be wasting your time talking to me.
00:07:41.720 But again, the serious point of that is how do you and people like you who have a fraction of that money go up against that Goliath?
00:07:50.620 Um, it's, it's difficult sometimes, you know, there's, there's, there is this perception that advocacy is a little bit siloed.
00:07:58.720 But I think now we're starting to break down those silos between the different advocacy organizations,
00:08:03.880 because there's, there's hundreds of them, hundreds of groups on our side that are trying to promote positive message about the oil and gas industry
00:08:10.920 and that's the necessity of it for Canada and the economy.
00:08:14.960 But I think, again, it's just one of those, you know, people hear, oh, you're advocating for the oil and gas industry.
00:08:21.820 You must be, you know, XYZ, you know, super heavily funded by them, AstroTurf, you know, any number of accusations.
00:08:28.860 I think the environmental means has that weird term, but that angelic idea about them that they're, you know, trying to take or trying to promote what's best for Canada
00:08:43.220 when sometimes maybe what's best for their ideology or their, you know, funders.
00:08:48.480 Well, that, that's a really important point because I do think that one of the cultural problems here is that in a lot of cases,
00:08:56.140 the climate change alarmist position or the environmental activist position has kind of become presented as the neutral position.
00:09:05.220 And everything outside of that is radical.
00:09:09.040 So, you know, if you think, yeah, you know, oil sands are bad, that's the basic starting point.
00:09:13.260 And then when you come in and say, actually, maybe they're not, you're the guy that looks crazy to them.
00:09:17.580 So there is a cultural aspect here.
00:09:19.460 And I know your pessimism in the mainstream media earlier, I don't think is necessarily misplaced,
00:09:24.560 but there is a challenge of an idea that is in many cases radical having become so mainstreamed.
00:09:32.360 Yeah.
00:09:32.880 I mean, we saw that the other week with David Suzuki's comments.
00:09:36.720 I mean, I mean, he's torn apart a little bit in the media, which is, which is good.
00:09:40.580 We need to highlight that, but it's not surprising that he said it.
00:09:44.260 But that's the thing, the people he hangs out with, that's a very valid idea.
00:09:48.040 They're moving, they're moving the window, the Overton window of, oh, you know, sure, oil sands are bad.
00:09:54.400 That's the starting point.
00:09:55.360 But now they're moving it to the point where you can say pipelines will be blown up.
00:09:59.020 And people are like, oh, yeah, well, that kind of makes sense.
00:10:01.580 I mean, they've been doing all this other stuff, you know, blockades and all that.
00:10:04.720 It's not a big jump in their minds that they're going to start bombing pipelines.
00:10:09.100 I'm not saying they're going to, but it's legitimizing that language that is kind of shifting everything around, much like they've shifted the goalposts for, you know, emissions and all that and other, you know, technology that the industry is actually trying to implement.
00:10:23.760 Yeah, and I spoke a few weeks ago on the show, maybe a couple of months ago with some innovators and entrepreneurs that are doing a lot, most of them in Alberta, I think all of them were in Alberta, that are doing a lot of work to recycle carbon and to try to find ways to make it into something positive, taking it out of the environment, all these things that government should be celebrating.
00:10:48.260 But the theme was that the government isn't really interested as much in those solutions.
00:10:53.700 The government has taken a very narrow view, which happens to align in a lot of cases with what a lot of these activist ENGOs are pushing.
00:11:02.080 Yeah, there's a lot of reflection in that.
00:11:04.460 And, you know, I'm hesitant to say that it comes from the environmentalists that are already in the bureaucracy.
00:11:13.460 I mean, look at our new environment minister, Stephen Gobo.
00:11:17.860 I mean, he founded Equitair, he was Greenpeace.
00:11:21.860 You know, there's a lot more, I guess, communication on that front between the previous higher-ups and the environmental movement and the government.
00:11:34.180 I'm not saying that's officially what it is, but, I mean, it's not hard to see where some of the policy comes from.
00:11:40.280 Back in, God, it would have been January or February of this year, I had a piece in the Financial Post about the net zero bill.
00:11:50.700 And it was pretty much ripped off right from a, I think it was an environmental defense document and a couple other ENGOs.
00:11:57.480 It pretty much reflected the same writing, so I had a piece about that.
00:12:03.620 But definitely, they're definitely more willing to listen to that side, I would say, than industry.
00:12:09.980 But I think they're starting to kind of get the idea a little bit.
00:12:15.160 I mean, Stephen Gilbo is here, or sorry, Minister Gilbo was here last Friday talking with some CEOs.
00:12:21.560 I'm not sure how it went, but I think if they're not thinking about it, they're thinking about the idea of it, which could be bad or good.
00:12:31.820 Yeah, and when we talked earlier about the mainstreaming of, you know, what are ostensibly radical propositions,
00:12:37.360 I have to mention, because I didn't get a chance to cover it when it happened, this thing.
00:12:41.120 And you wrote about it, I think I actually might have learned about it from you.
00:12:43.140 The Alberta NDP Youth Association had adopted a motion, and I just want to make sure I get it right here,
00:12:50.120 supporting blockades of coastal gas link.
00:12:52.960 And they said there's no Indigenous consent, which in and of itself isn't true.
00:12:57.100 But this is, again, you know, you could look at it and say, oh, well, you know,
00:12:59.940 youth association for a political party, who cares?
00:13:02.700 But the NDP is the most viable alternative to the UCP in Alberta.
00:13:07.480 So you've got within the Alberta NDP a sentiment that thinks, yeah, blockading oil and gas is fine.
00:13:13.140 Yeah, I mean, it's interesting.
00:13:14.360 I mean, I think they've always had a little bit of that before they, you know,
00:13:20.620 before Rachel Nolley became premier back in 2015, obviously.
00:13:25.540 Yeah, I mean, you'd think that being within arm's reach of government would make them smart enough.
00:13:29.760 Yeah, and I don't know if that was just, you know, a logistical mess up or if that was,
00:13:35.340 like, I'm not sure if it came down directly from the head of the party.
00:13:39.980 I'm not sure.
00:13:40.860 I'm not going to make any assumptions on that.
00:13:43.340 But it's concerning when a mainstream political party that might potentially be the next political party
00:13:50.680 in charge of Alberta when they don't understand necessarily the energy issues at hand or are ignoring them.
00:13:57.280 Yeah, so I guess if we take the bigger picture look at this, where do we go from here?
00:14:02.240 Where is it that you feel the discussion needs to be for people that think what you and I think about this
00:14:08.660 to start perhaps feeling a little bit less like we're on defense?
00:14:12.940 I really think, and this is, you know, unfortunate, but I think we need to highlight some of the energy crisis going on in Europe.
00:14:18.880 I know a lot of the groups have been, but I don't think it's really been highlighted in the mainstream.
00:14:23.720 I'm sure we see gas prices are going up and we saw the concern about Line 5, but I don't think people quite understand that,
00:14:32.200 oh, yeah, if something like Line 5 went down, that's most of the gasoline for, you know, Toronto International Airport
00:14:39.120 or that's most of the oil that goes to the refineries in southern Quebec and Ontario.
00:14:44.120 I don't think people really understand that.
00:14:45.900 And it's there's no silver bullet.
00:14:48.600 So it's a it's a lot of it's a lot of repeating messages, a lot of amplification, a lot of getting other groups like Canadian Energy News Network
00:14:57.920 or whoever that are in the pro resource, pro oil and gas kind of advocacy space to really keep hitting home and get boots on the ground
00:15:05.580 because you can you can lead a horse to water, but you can't necessarily get it to drink it.
00:15:10.280 Yeah, and you're right. And I mean, a lot of the time people tend to and this is, I realize, a political statement,
00:15:19.220 but people tend to put a lot of emphasis on who's in power.
00:15:22.780 And I'm not as convinced that that's as relevant here.
00:15:25.800 I mean, sure, we can talk about the federal government and its attack on the oil and gas sector.
00:15:30.740 But, you know, perhaps there could be a more oil and gas friendly federal government.
00:15:34.080 And then the provincial government in Alberta is not in alignment and whatever.
00:15:37.380 I mean, my general approach to this is that the industry has to exist no matter what.
00:15:41.880 And I know it, generally speaking, does have to adapt and does adapt quite effectively.
00:15:46.940 But you have to find a way to work to swim upstream, basically, because that's the only option.
00:15:53.840 Yeah. And I mean, we like to we like to say that, you know, the people affect the policy and we do like that's that's the point of lobbying and advocacy.
00:16:02.500 You get inside, you know, MPs, MLAs, ears and you tell them about your issues.
00:16:08.440 But I think that necessarily hasn't.
00:16:13.240 Aside from the last probably five to 10 years, I don't think that was necessarily the biggest issue that the industry was dealing with.
00:16:19.000 I think they're, you know, keep keep our heads down, keep working.
00:16:21.800 There's no way we're going to, you know, be targeted and there's no way we're going to we're going to, you know, get, you know, cut off by the government.
00:16:29.060 There's no way they're not going to, like, support, you know, the natural resource industry.
00:16:32.720 But yeah, well, there was a bit I don't know if naivete is the right word, but perhaps misplaced optimism.
00:16:39.380 Maybe misplaced optimism.
00:16:40.640 And again, that obviously goes to you got to, you know, you got to deal with the government that you have at hand, whether it's pro resource or maybe not as pro resource as maybe some of the industry would like it to be.
00:16:52.600 So you got to kind of play play ball.
00:16:55.820 And I mean, sometimes sometimes they're just on the bench straight up with political or policy issues.
00:17:02.560 Sometimes they're just not even in the room, which isn't necessarily on them.
00:17:06.040 That's kind of just how the government, it seems, does it.
00:17:08.900 They kind of, you know, shake a hand and then, OK, we're not going to have you in the room.
00:17:14.280 And that's just my perception of it.
00:17:16.880 And that's, you know, it's a big issue because as much as, you know, it could be a communication thing, which the industry has been trying to work on communication for three years.
00:17:25.500 Because it really does come down to the brass tacks of also lobbying, too, and getting not just civil society on board, but, you know, officials on board, too, the bureaucracy on board for the ideas of, you know, carbon capture or, you know, carbon recycling and stuff like that.
00:17:41.020 So looking into 2022, would you say you're optimistic, pessimistic, or still oscillating between the two, perhaps?
00:17:48.660 I'd say I'm pretty optimistic, actually.
00:17:50.700 I think the industry is starting to see, you know, a turnaround a little bit.
00:17:54.840 I think more and more people are starting to realize that, you know, it's necessary and we can't just, you know, get rid of it overnight.
00:18:01.500 Because, quite frankly, that would cause quite a bit of issues, not just for Alberta, but for, you know, energy security in general in Canada.
00:18:10.340 We just, we don't have the infrastructure set up to immediately go to zero emissions or solar or wind or whatever that may look like in an energy context.
00:18:20.140 Um, so I think with, you know, groups like Canadian Energy News Network and groups like Resource Works out in BC, you know, Canada's energy citizens with CAP, and I think once we get those voices a bit more amplified, because I think they are starting to get more amplified, I think people start understanding the importance of the industry.
00:18:41.700 Sounds good. Well, the Canadian Energy News Network, always a great place, and I do liberally take some content for the show from there, and make sure to keep up on the newsletter.
00:18:51.540 And I would encourage listeners and viewers to do the same. Cody Siona, thanks so much, and Happy New Year to you.
00:18:56.680 Yes, thanks, Andrew. Much appreciated.
00:18:58.460 That was Cody Siona of the Canadian Energy News Network. Like I said, a bigger picture look at some of the major themes and challenges in the energy sector.
00:19:08.720 And I know we often use, just as a general thing, I should mention this, we often use Alberta and oil and gas in a synonymous fashion, which isn't entirely true.
00:19:19.500 And a lot of the people in British Columbia, for example, who are so hellbent on destroying the oil and gas sector, forget how pivotal oil and gas is in BC to the BC economy, although it tends to be Vancouver activists, and Vancouver is not where a lot of the oil and gas workers are.
00:19:36.760 But Saskatchewan, same sort of thing, a very resource-rich province. So it isn't just Alberta.
00:19:40.940 And the one point, I think, broadly, is that energy prosperity in Canada results in prosperity Canada-wide.
00:19:48.760 And that's why pipelines are national projects, because they benefit everyone in getting access to Canadian energy and reducing dependence on foreign oil.
00:19:59.160 So I do think it's important to talk about these issues, and we'll certainly continue to in the year ahead.
00:20:03.760 My thanks to Cody and also to all of you for tuning in.
00:20:07.420 This is our last show of the year. We will be back next week with brand new, fresh 2022 content for The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:20:15.060 Hope you had a great time with our shows in 2021. Looking forward to seeing you next time.
00:20:20.240 Thank you, God bless, and Happy New Year.
00:20:22.660 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show. Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.