So AEMERA is gone and the monitoring will be done by the civil service now.
It sounds like CAPP will keep providing $50 million annually to the monitoring, I wonder how far that will go to in paying the entire bill on monitoring. Not very far I bet.
I wont be so quick to condemn the NDP on this decision. Environmental monitoring is in the wheelhouse of the government's mandate and with existing infrastructure; the process may even be better served to Albertans and industry than what AEMERA was providing. The comments by CAPP and the Wild Rose are supportive of this decision.
It is a sad fact the political rhetoric often blurs the reality of situations in industry and government that must offer some direct cooperation. I attended a talk yesterday by Hans Custers from Alberta Energy, and he very effectively outlined the challenges facing the Alberta's Energy perspective. Government is very aware that a huge factor is "social license" in the immediate need to get our oil to market and build pipelines. It is a fact that perception (right or wrong) is standing in the way of getting pipelines built whether it be: Northern Gateway, Keystone, Canada East, Trans Mountain. Hell, the Americans are standing in the way and so are BC and Quebec. Many of the decisions that government is making now are attempts be build "social license" in order to meet our main objective of getting Alberta oil to world markets. These announcements on environmental monitoring, green energy initiatives, conversion of coal to natural gas electrical generation, etc, are all attempts to build better social license in order to facilitate the bigger issue i.e. pipelines.
Old political hacks like McIvor have to stop with the political rhetoric and face the reality of Alberta's big picture in the energy downturn. It is his party's failure to secure access through pipelines to world markets that is the issue here. AEMERA had to change and that is a fact!
