1 week Ago
The LNG Canada industrial energy project under construction in Kitimat, B.C., on Sept.
28, 2022. DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press The U.S.
trade war has posed huge challenges, but Canada should take advantage of the time to diversify its economy toward exports to Asia, including shipments of liquefied natural gas, says TC Energy Corp.’s TRP-T chief executive officer. After the April 28 federal election, it will be important for the prime minister, premiers, business executives and Indigenous leaders to be aligned and strengthen ties with Asia, François Poirier said in a speech to Canadian Club Toronto that was webcast on Thursday.
“Collectively, we’ll have to travel to Asia and market ourselves and underscore that Canada is back in business and is a good risk to take,” he said. “They need to see our sincerity and our conviction.” Canada recently ranked the world’s fifth-largest producer of natural gas, but it doesn’t have any LNG export terminals operating yet.
Exports of Canadian LNG to Asia are slated to begin by mid-2025 from LNG Canada’s new terminal in Kitimat in northern British Columbia. Shell PLC-led LNG Canada will become the country’s first export terminal for the fuel, with an initial capacity of 14 million tonnes a year. A vessel, the Maran Gas Roxana, arrived on April 2 to unload imported LNG as part of the equipment-testing process at the terminal, which is located on a Kitimat industrial site on the traditional territory of the Haisla Nation.
In 2013, there were more than 20 proposals in B.C. to export LNG.
“We had the opportunity then to be No. 1, and now we are playing catchup,” Mr. Poirier said.
Today, three B.C. projects are anticipating exports within the next 45 months: LNG Canada by mid-2025; Woodfibre LNG by late 2027; and Cedar LNG by late 2028.
LNG Canada is also considering a Phase 2 expansion. Canada remains far behind the United States in developing LNG export terminals. The first LNG export facility in the lower 48 states began operating in 2016 and another seven U.
S. sites have opened since then. The U.
S., Australia and Qatar are the heavyweights in the LNG export market. “The threat of tariffs has exposed flaws in our economy , and the question is: Do we regress, or do we seize the opportunity that the world has put in front of us? Canada has a choice to make and, in my view, it’s a clear choice.
It’s between continuing the status quo or embracing a bold ambition,” Mr. Poirier said. He said the ambitious goal, with the political will, is to make Canada the world’s largest exporter of LNG to Asia.
The Coastal GasLink pipeline project began transporting natural gas last September to the LNG Canada joint venture in Kitimat as part of the commissioning process. Coastal GasLink is operated by TC Energy, which owns 35 per cent of the 670-kilometre pipeline across northern B.C.
After first supplying the LNG Canada megaproject, Coastal GasLink will then pipe natural gas to Cedar. The Haisla own 50.1 per cent of Cedar, while Calgary-based Pembina Pipeline Corp.
holds 49.9 per cent. A group of Wet’suwet’en Nation hereditary chiefs has led a campaign to oppose Coastal GasLink.
Coastal GasLink reached agreements with all 20 elected band councils along the route, including five elected councils within the Wet’suwet’en Nation. But Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs say they have jurisdiction over a 190-kilometre stretch of pipeline through their unceded territory. John Ridsdale, a climate activist whose Wet’suwet’en hereditary chief name is Na’Moks, criticized financial institutions such as Royal Bank of Canada for backing fossil fuel projects and pipelines.
“RBC risks its own credibility and financial stability by continuing on this reckless path of being Canada’s top fossil fuel funding bank,” Mr. Ridsdale said in a news release after RBC’s annual meeting on Thursday in Toronto. Only two other B.
C. projects are actively seeking to ship LNG in tankers to markets in Asia: Ksi Lisims LNG on Pearse Island; and FortisBC’s expansion plans at its domestic Tilbury LNG site in Delta. Achieving net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases in B.
C. has become a moving target, climate activists say. Ecojustice Canada, the country’s largest environmental law charity, warns that the B.
C. government is allowing companies to sidestep climate commitments. The proposed North Coast Transmission project would run along the existing route of the B.
C. line between Prince George and Terrace, but it could take a decade before it is in service. The B.
C. Ministry of Energy and Climate Solutions said LNG proponents must still show concrete steps to secure hydroelectricity. “Net-zero by 2030 remains the standard for LNG facilities,” according to a statement from the ministry.
“However, we recognize there is more work needed to increase access to clean electricity.” Ksi Lisims, a proposed project backed by the Nisga’a Nation, hopes to use two floating platforms to produce LNG, with hydroelectricity from BC Hydro powering motors that would drive compressors in the liquefaction process, instead of the industry’s traditional reliance on turbines powered by natural gas. “We remain committed to being net-zero as soon as the transmission grid can support our electricity needs,” Ksi Lisims spokesperson Rebecca Scott said in a statement.
.
