The Alberta gov’t and oil & gas industry are partners in a money laundering scheme. Just another massive subsidy ($100 million this time) to a multi-$billion profiting, horrifically abusive, lying, polluting, job decimating (by automation & greed) industry.
In my view, Kenney is doing whatever it takes, including abusing and stealing from Albertans by slashing health, education, parks and recreation, snatching pensions, etc., to give more and more billions to the ultra rich (mostly foreign, eg Mr. Koch), so that they make Kenney head cheese (PM) of Canada.
A few tweets:
marymaryFlag of Canada Victory hand@mmofcan
These people should be plagued by boils and cockroaches. Lightning strikes. Locusts. Evil entities. etc etc
Kevin Kent@KnifeNerd Mar 3
What a time to be alive. My provincial gov’t is closing or stopping services like garbage pickup at 20 provincial parks but have just given $100million dollars to clean up garbage left by oil companies who should be forced to clean their own garbage.
A few comments to the article below:
Mark Blain
Hey kids here is a hundred million to clean your room, pay me back when you get a chance.
Claude DeRoche
The Petroleum Services Association of Canada says there are 75,000 inactive wells in the province of Alberta requiring downhole wellbore abandonment and surface reclamation. They say cleanup could cost as much as $82 billion. Calgary Herald, march 15, 2016 The oilsands tailing ponds cleanup will be over a trillion dollar ! Canadian taxpayers will eventually pay.
Thomas Conway
“Loan”. Right. I forgot it is unpopular to admit to massive subsidies to the oil and gas sector these days. Chance of getting that “loan” repaid? Well, zero, of course. Duh. Where are you from? This is the industry captured Alberta government your talking about here.
Ken Hale
So we can kiss another 100 million goodbye because industry is too cheap to do the job when prices are high and just shuffle the dept to the taxpayer??
Time to revisit the rules and actually use them, this is 60 years of procrastination by government, regulator and industry coming to roost on my tax dollars now.
Geoffrey Pounder “Energy Minister Sonya Savage said the $100-million loan is an example of how the government is ensuring the oil and gas industry can be successful and responsible.” … Interest-free loans, a form of subsidy, teach industry to be irresponsible and stick taxpayers with the bill for their mess. Polluter pay? Not in Alberta.
Mervin Bamber
How about a loan to our educational facilities so they can keep their employees? Oh I forgot they are not the big business to which Kenny caters .
peter duncan
Wow can they pay to clean up my construction sites that would really help with my profit margin.The subsidies and low royalty rates for the oil industry in Alberta has kept us in the red for years this is very bad resource and fiscal management where is the money?
Earl Richards
The Alberta taxpayer does not owe the Alberta oil industry anything. They already received $4.5 billion in a tax giveaway.
Alberta is offering a $100-million loan to decommission 800 to 1,000 orphan wells, a move that is expected to create 500 direct and indirect jobs in the oil services sector.
I expect, with high certainty, those “expected” jobs won’t happen because this money isn’t for clean up, it’s to pay back companies for getting Kenney elected, and keeping the RCMP off his back and his ass out of jail. The Alberta gov’t is a money laundering operation, no better than the mob. Or maybe this $100 Million will be given to Encana (Ovinitiv) for moving expenses to run away like chicken shit to the USA.
The investment to the Orphan Well Association (OWA) will help the non-profit start 1,000 environmental site assessments that aim to return the land to its condition before the wells were built. The details on the loan will be finalized by April 1.
Premier Jason Kenney said the funds will provide a “lifeline” to oilpatch workers hit by layoffs. Bullshit, those funds will not help dumped workers. Industry is automating to get rid of workers because they eat up profit. The quote ahead is just money laundering lingo. “This is a very important announcement about getting oilfield workers back to work right now when we need it, there is more investment coming into the oilpatch. And we believe there’s a path forward through pipelines,” Fairy tales Mr. Kenney, tall tarshit fairy tales. Investors don’t want our highly polluting abusive products. No pipeline is going to change their wise minds. They’ve lost too many billions on the shit industry already. Kenney said at Savanna Well Servicing in Leduc on Monday morning.
In 2017, Alberta gave the OWA an interest-free $235-million loan to clean up orphan wells across the province. The Financial Post reported in December that there are still more than 15,000 wells drilled before 1964 that have not been remediated. The OWA sent a letter to the Alberta Energy Regulator in January, saying the province’s rules around reclaiming abandoned oil and gas wells are inadequate. More tall tales. The rules are ample adequate. The problem is that companies ignore the rules, and “No Duty of Care” AER and our industry-controlled “Piss on the Rule of Law” courts and gov’t let them.
Lars De Pauw, executive director of the association, said at the news conference Monday the organization has about 6,500 abandoned sites in its inventory. He said the loan will help speed up reclamation and reduce the impact to landowners hosting abandoned wells.
Energy Minister Sonya Savage said the $100-million loan is an example of how the government is ensuring the oil and gas industry can be successful and responsible.If you believe that crap, you need a new lobotomy
“Meeting their obligations includes bearing the cost of cleaning up inactive and orphaned wells. Because of recent challenges, orphan wells are becoming a growing concern in Alberta. And to be frank, it’s a situation that needs to be addressed,” We can thank ALDP and Dorin for that spin. This deliberate theft of Albertans by the oil and gas industry, enabled by the “regulator” and fraud of an Orphan Well Association, is decades in the making, not recent. she said. “Our government recognizes the pressing need to turn the tide on growing oil and gas liabilities.”
Savage said the funds would also create indirect jobs with suppliers, equipment and service providers, mechanics, and concrete manufactures, as well as local businesses as cleanup crews visit different communities. She also reiterated the government’s plans to release a suite of new laws that would address further enable (make it legal) companies orphaning facilities and wells in the next few weeks.
Irfan Sabir, NDP’s critic for energy and natural gas, said he’s glad to see funding to clean up wells, but questions the party’s decision to frame the investment as a job-creating tool.
“It’s not a long-term solution. They’re saying they will create 500 direct and indirect jobs, but since they took office we have lost 50,000 jobs,” he said. “I think they need to invest more in diversification, of creating, refining, opening new markets so Alberta can get back to work.”
Major oil and gas investment to be announced this month Last week, Kenney hinted the province may invest in a major oil and gas project. On Monday, he said details on that project would be announced by the end of the month that show “the government of Alberta’s commitment to getting pipelines built,the key part of infrastructure for the future.”
The premier also unveiled the party’s “Blueprint for Jobs” at the news conference.
As part of its short-term strategy to support business, the government plans to develop a rare-earth and mineral resource strategy to diversify the energy sector, create new investment policies for tech start-ups, and “demonstrate national leadership” in renewable energy.