CAGC Column

How can anyone be wrong when both sides are right?
Commentary on the Democrat-Republican shutdown of the US Government

Two men say they’re Jesus, one of them must be wrong.
Industrial Disease by Dire Straits

I deal in scientific facts, so I have no opinion on what Jesus might do.
Found on the Internet

The new Single Regulator will fully come into effect over the next six months. As we have seen in other jurisdictions, things generally get worse for Industry before they get better. Our biggest concern is Aboriginal Consultation. It is not handled by the regulator and instead will be handled by the Government themselves and in particular Alberta Aboriginal Affairs will have the file and ultimately determine adequacy of consultation. Having such a Ministry involved poses a number of risks to Industry as they are new to the file (Industry consultation) and they feel they have a balanced duty to both sides. Some excerpts from letters the CAGC has written over the past couple of months to the Government follow:

Honourable Robin Campbell

I would like to make the following comments on behalf of the CAGC:

1. The Aboriginal Consultation file and process may in fact be the biggest impediment to the Oil and Gas Industry in the near future. Once the wheels are set in motion in terms of a new regime we can never go back. We do not see this exercise as balancing the wishes of either side. Instead we believe the Government needs to enable Industry as best as it can while meeting its fiduciary responsibilities under Constitutional law.
2. The process of consultation must be concurrent with the AER Approval process. Currently for Geophysical these are concurrent processes. The new process cannot be a layered on approach for reasons of time, money and efficiency.
3. The operational component of the Consultation Office for Oil and Gas must be housed in Calgary. It must work closely with AER.
4. The Consultation Office must separate the regulatory element from the policy element – similar to what the AER and the PMO has done.
5. The Consultation Office will require a Commissioner on the operations side. This cannot be someone on the Policy side such as a DM or ADM.
6. The new matrix has much less detail than the current SRD matrix. Whereas the SRD matrix has areas for “no consultation” the new matrix does not contemplate this. As well the new matrix puts very little in the Level 1 – Notification but seems to contemplate putting almost all of Oil and Gas into Level 2 – Consultation being required to be completed by the proponent. This is not helpful for Geophysical as our smaller projects have previously fallen into either “no consultation” or notification. As well by sheer numbers smaller corporate entities never get into see First Nations. FN’s interests lie with larger entities that have the ability to work out economic benefits. These projects should either be in “no consultation required” or in “notification” or the Government should take over the consultation requirements on these smaller projects in order to meet the fiduciary requirement (BC does this) as these interests never make it to the table with the First Nations in order to consult.
7. The pre-consultation assessment must be completed within 2 business days. It currently is for Geophysical.
8. In discussions of a steering group for the consultation levies it was mentioned that there may be 6 reps from the Aboriginal side and 2 from Industry. What would constitute such a balance? How can Industries that are expected to pay not be represented at the table?
9. Grazing leases under long term tenure should be treated as private land. It is offensive to the lease holder for Industry now to be showing up with Aboriginals to look at land they have not used in generations.
10. We need consistency in pre-consultation assessments and the need for consultation to be applied uniformly across the Province.
11. We do not see Aboriginal Consultation as balancing the wishes of either side. Instead we believe the Government needs to enable Industry as best as it can while meeting its fiduciary responsibilities under Constitutional law.

And now for something quite different...

Dinosaurs ruled the earth for about 180 million years. Depending upon definition Man has been around for about 2 million (only about 150,000 years as something close to modern man). This may mean that if you don’t do anything to affect your environment you will be around until someone gets bored with the experiment and crashes a meteorite into the earth to hit the reset button. After the dinosaurs the next experiment called for intelligence and sentiency. The only way to win the game of course is to get the species off the planet before another meteorite hits the reset button or the sun becomes a red giant and consumes the earth. Actually the earth becomes uninhabitable long before that – probably life on the planet has somewhere between 500 million years and 1.5 billion years. It seems unlikely that we will be leaving in spaceships as we do not really live long enough to get anywhere. Instead it is more likely that something like cryopreservation (or cryogenics) will be used to launch DNA from the earth into the universe to start life on some other possible earth-like planets. Is that an ethical dilemma if there is life on those planets already?

From the Thursday Files

“Mother Nature is a Serial Killer. No one’s better, more creative, but, like all Serial Killers she can’t help the urge to want to get caught. And what good are all those brilliant crimes, if no one takes the credit? So she leaves crumbs. Now the hard part, why you spend a decade in school, is seeing the crumbs for the clues they are. Sometimes the things you thought were the most brutal aspect of the virus, turns out to be the chink in its armor... and she loves disguising her weaknesses as strengths.”
Movie – World War Z