The Future of LNG in British Columbia
This week our guest is Stewart Muir, founder and CEO of Resource Works. Resource Works is a public-interest advocacy and communications not-for-profit based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Their mission is to reignite the promise of Canada’s economic future by leading respectful, inclusive and fact-based dialogue on natural resource development.
Here are some of the questions that Peter and Jackie asked Stewart: How have politics in B.C. changed with the new Premier, David Eby? How is LNG viewed in B.C. now? Is LNG considered as green energy and a way to reduce the use of coal in Asia? What do you think are the chances for the second phase of LNG Canada? What is the sentiment from Indigenous groups on resource development? Explain the Blueberry River First Nations agreement with the B.C. government and how it impacts industrial development in other areas of the province? Do you expect large scale CCS projects to be developed in Northeast B.C.?
Content referenced in this podcast:
- From Peter Tertzakian’s Energyphile “Stairway to Hell” the story of the ghost coal mining town of Bankhead
- Government of Canada’s Sustainable Jobs Plan
- Stewart’s new company Tersa Earth Innovations
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Episode 190 transcript
Disclosure:
The information and opinions presented in this ARC Energy Ideas podcast are provided for informational purposes only and are subject to the disclaimer link in the show notes.
Announcer:
This is the ARC Energy Ideas podcast with Peter Tertzakian and Jackie Forrest. Exploring trends that influence the energy business.
Jackie Forrest:
Welcome to the ARC Energy Ideas podcast. I’m Jackie Forrest.
Peter Tertzakian:
And I’m Peter Tertzakian. Welcome back. Well, I should say that to myself: I welcome myself back from the UK. I was there for 10 days. It was quite lovely, and I missed all the cold weather.
Jackie Forrest:
Yeah, lucky you. The rest of the country, across the country really suffered with the cold weather in the last few weeks.
Peter Tertzakian:
Yeah, lots of storms going on. Well, speaking of storms, this whole “Just Transition” thing was somewhat of a minor political storm, the whole discussion about how workers are going to transition away from oil and gas. But the federal government published its long awaited, well, they’re calling it now the Sustainable Jobs Plan Interim Report. It came out couple days before I went away. Let’s talk about it. What did you find interesting about it, Jackie?
Jackie Forrest:
Well, a couple things. First of all, there was a very long discussion on the naming of it because it was so controversial. The just transition for workers was found not to be as appropriate, although a lot of people use it, including unions. There’s a lot of history on that. They felt that “sustainable jobs” is better because it’s not only about jobs that are helping with the environment and net zero, but also has the element of well paying, high quality jobs.
Peter Tertzakian:
When you say they, it’s the federal government changed the whole thing from Just Transition, which was an artifact of… I guess it originated with unions?
Jackie Forrest:
It did. They said it came from the unions, that it was developed because they wanted to secure workers’ rights to fundamental shifts in the economy. That’s where it started. They actually have a definition, a sustainable job is any job that is compatible with Canada’s net zero path, but then they add, it also has to be a good paying job and other elements. That’s why this is a more evergreen term, they described it best.
Peter Tertzakian:
I have to be honest, I mean, I never did understand the fuss about the whole just transition thing. I have a better, I guess, realization about knowing that it originated with unions. But this whole idea of, what did you say, fundamental shifts in the economy, I mean, nobody talked “Just Transition” when all the newspaper workers lost their jobs to the internet publishing, when small retailers lost their jobs to big box stores. I mean, you can go on and on in terms of transition in the economy as a consequence of technological changes and fundamental shifts in the economy.
Why would we treat this separately? I mean, frankly, workers in Alberta over the course of the last century and a half, resource workers have shifted from agriculture to coal to oil and gas. And now, as you know, we’re one of the largest developers of solar and wind energy. What’s the fuss?
Jackie Forrest:
I don’t like just transition, actually. I don’t like the term because it brings to mind charity or welfare for people who lose their jobs. Like oil and gas workers, they just need welfare. It for some reason has that…
Peter Tertzakian:
Connotation.
Jackie Forrest:
Yeah, it does. Well, it may be true in some cases, like a coal mine closing in a small town.
Peter Tertzakian:
Bankhead.
Jackie Forrest:
Bankhead. You wrote a whole book about it.
Peter Tertzakian:
I wrote the whole book on it.
Jackie Forrest:
Maybe there is some stories where you have one community really reliance on an industry where all the jobs are gone and it turns into Bankhead, and it’s just an abandoned town. But I think with oil and gas, it’s much more gradual. It’s much more spread out. I don’t see a Bankhead type scenario. I don’t like it. I do think some of the positive things with the report is it talks about the fact that clean energy could grow by 3.4% a year for jobs, and that’s four times more than the Canadian average jobs growth.
The idea is we’re not going to have enough people that can do this work. We’re already seeing that: there aren’t enough electricians. I mean, there’s labor shortages everywhere, but that is a barrier to meeting net zero by 2050.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, it’s a huge barrier. A substantial number of, skilled labor, including electricians, retired or left during the pandemic. That’s documented. There’s actually a shrinkage of skilled labor. You have to recover from that. And then on top of that, I think that 3.4% is probably conservative if we’re going to do things like electrification in the pursuit of net zero by 2050, which is only 28 years away. I mean, it takes a lot of time to train people in technical colleges. I know I’ve spoken to some of the technical colleges and the deans of these schools, and they don’t have enough students to crank out to be able to fulfill the pull that this sustainable transition is going to need.
Jackie Forrest:
Right. The positive is there’s 10 actions and a lot of them around getting more skills training, getting better data on what we do today. Are the programs full? How do we fill them? I think from that perspective, it’s positive. There is going to be surprisingly legislation to formalize these commitments as well apparently this year.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, okay, it’s good. I mean, it’s 35 pages. We’ll put a link on the website, and it’ll talk about transition of skilled workers in the pursuit of sustainability in the resource economies, right?
Jackie Forrest:
That’s right.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, speaking of resource economies, shall we move on to our special guest? I’m delighted to introduce Stewart Muir, who’s founder and CEO of Resource Works. He’s hailing to us from Victoria, British Columbia. I’ve known Stewart for a long time. In fact, Resource Works, which he’s going to tell us more about, was in part conceived on my patio in Calgary I don’t know how many years ago, when Stewart and I shared a drink on the patio and talked about the needs of not just oil and gas, but resources in general. Well, I’ll stop talking. Stewart, welcome.
Stewart Muir:
Yeah, well, thanks, Peter. Hi, Jackie. I’m just in awe of your podcast, and I feel so lucky to be invited here. Thank you very much for that. When we sat on your patio and looked out to the Rockies and had those conversations, Peter, and you also were sharing with me the ideas that you’ve been developing on energy transition, as you’ve been talking about, it was a big part of the genesis. As a native born Albertan, raised in British Columbia, and worked around the world, I’ve always come home to this region. I think of it as one place, Alberta and BC together.
Unfortunately, there seem to be forces that drive it apart, but I think Resource Works, we saw as a Vancouver- based group that wanted to ask questions in a place where… It’s called the Left Coast, I guess. It’s a place where tectonic plates clash, but ideas clash over time. Out of that heat and tension, there are interesting things that sometimes emerge.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, tell us about Resource Works and a bit about yourself, how you got the idea to set it up, and we’ll take it from there.
Stewart Muir:
It was about 10 years ago, and a lot of us on the West Coast were looking around asking, in a setting where it seemed like all these big projects were being proposed at that time, what happens if we lose out on these? These are environmentally sound. They’re going through all the regulatory processes, they’re meeting the ESG requirements and the investors, all the right things, and yet they’re being fiercely opposed by some groups that are very effective at stopping projects.
I think we found in this process of saying, what are we going to do about it, that led to Resource Works. We discovered that what industry at that time was great at talking about its own agenda, but sometimes forgetting that there’s others who benefit when projects are successful even more than industry.
Peter Tertzakian:
When you talk about industry, it’s not just say oil and gas, it’s any resource like mining, even wind projects, right?
Stewart Muir:
Oh, sure. We’ve been a big house here with forestry and mining critical minerals, as every politician is now talking, oil and gas, energy generally, like Site C in the north. Even aquaculture we thought was interesting because it’s a natural resource too. We set out to find some principles. We did economic studies to determine the impact. We found that there’s more jobs created in Greater Vancouver from growth in the resource sector than there are outside of Greater Vancouver, which floored a lot of people.
But when you ask, well, why is this? It’s manufacturing, transportation, training and education, and health. Of course, it’s the glass offices and all the finance and trading and marketing and law and all that stuff that happens in those. It’s a huge impact on the economy.
Jackie Forrest:
Stewart, you said you’ve been at this for almost 10 years. Just give us some examples of some of the areas where you think you’ve made a difference with the work that you’ve done, some just tangible examples.
Stewart Muir:
Well, right now, a lot of people think about the four big projects that are still underway in British Columbia as being defining of the resource sector. Why don’t we go through those? I mean, the first one, a friend of mine, that’s in the news a lot is Trans Mountain expansion. That’s the twinning of the pipeline. The first line was there from the 1950s, but the new one, which is two-thirds bigger, is now 75% built. When it’s done, together the old one, it’s going to bring the equivalent of four tanker trucks a minute of refined fuels and crude oil from Edmonton to Vancouver. That’s how significant this is. We know the opposition was fierce, but I think through that process, Resource Works did a lot of reports.
We were there in the media talking about this. When I first looked at the project, I had my own questions, and I was able to ask people who knew the regulations, who knew the industry enough that I was able to become supportive of this once I had the facts. I think a lot of people were the same. I think the low point of that project, one where Resource Works was looked at as a source of, I guess, analysis, was when Kinder Morgan said, “You know what? We’re out of here. We’re not going to build this thing. Federal government, you take it over,” and the Canadian government basically had to buy the project. They didn’t have a lot of choice, in my opinion.
It wasn’t an outcome anyone wanted, but it’s worked out and now that pipeline is going to be finished mechanically by the end of this year, and in service not long after. I think that’s one signal that you can make a difference by being factor oriented and keep at it. Site C is another one. That’s a power plant being built an electricity dam. Falling water is about as greenest source of energy as you could imagine. But again, here is a project in Northeast BC. In this case, it was fiercely opposed by a lot of groups on environmental arguments.
We supported the project. It did ultimately move ahead, and it’s going to be finished by the end of 2025. It will power a lot of homes. Industry mining allow for expansion of the gas sector in a green way. This is what you should want to see.
Peter Tertzakian:
Stewart, that’s Trans Mountain and Site C and there’s two others which I want to get to, but I want to just rewind back to Resource Work and its mission. Maybe I’ll preface the question by observing that, whether it’s the mining associations or forestry, hydroelectric, no doubt, utilities, oil and gas, each have their own industry associations. The question is, well, where does Resource Works fit into this? Are you a holistic umbrella PR organization trying to champion the virtues of what these industry associations are doing or can’t do? Where do you fit in the big scheme of things?
Stewart Muir:
We don’t want to be an association. We think that groups like the business councils, whether it’s Canada, Alberta, BC, have a holistic role for representing different industries. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce and different chambers, they have a role there that is kind of big tent. We didn’t really need to fill that. I think that the missing thing was trying to take a community-focused view and say, look, what are the benefits of having responsible resource industries that are successful, not to the shareholders of the companies only, but to the communities, to First Nations that are trying to get involved in a pathway out of poverty, to the labor unions that want jobs.
Governments are the single biggest beneficiary, even more than industry because of all the enormous benefits they get from taxes, permits, and GDP growth. All these interests have not been very well organized. Meanwhile, I think what’s happened is that there have been countervailing forces that have developed really strong community gains in terms of bringing together those voices. Very effective, unfortunately, for the most part in stopping an investment from happening, even though there’s strong argument. We’re flipping it around, we don’t need more lobbyists.
Industry is really good at doing the stuff it has to ask governments for the changes that needs to be successful. They’re fine, but it’s that other side, and that’s really what we’ve tried to do bottom up, not top down.
Jackie Forrest:
Well, Stewart, talking about opposition to projects and concerns around projects not going forward, let’s talk a bit about some of the politics in British Columbia now. We had a change with the BC and NDP, their Premier John Horgan stepped down and David Eby has come in. Tell us about how that may change things when it comes to resource projects in BC.
Stewart Muir:
Well, I think your listeners will be familiar with John Horgan. He was five years as Premier of British Columbia. He proved to be a really skillful politician and retired recently. He had some health challenges, and that was the reason for his stepping back. Now, initially, he relied on the Green Party of the BC Greens to hold power. He put together a power-sharing formula that was quite successful. He, kept his own opinions to himself about major energy projects, which broadly were opposed by the NDP. They didn’t want those in opposition. In government, it’s been different, but John Horgan was very careful about it. I never thought he personally opposed those projects.
He actually became quite outspoken toward the end of his time about the growing use that we’ve seen of extremist, even violent tactics to stop pipelines and forestry. I thought that was really courageous for a leader. Now we have a new Premier of BC: David Eby won the leadership race. He is a bit like Justin Trudeau right now in that he can’t bring himself to say some of the letters “LNG”, for example, that energy people are looking to hear him talk about. The throne speech recently didn’t have anything to say about the biggest not just for BC, but for Canada economic opportunities in front of us. That’s a funny thing not to be in a throne speech.
I was at a speech recently. He talked to the National Resource crowd in Prince George, 1,400 people. That’s a great audience to talk about things that are happening, but not even willing to do it there. I think why is this? We have a BC government that is more wary than before of the climate lobby voices who are more influential now than ever because there’s more members from those interests who are in the provincial cabinet room. Even if you care, as we certainly do, about the need to reduce GHG emissions, it feels like this is a group that is actually threatening to take BC backwards, not forwards. I think some people will hear that claim and not be convinced.
I’d like to get into it if we can. But just setting that aside, I think the political atmosphere we’re in right now is quite interesting: there is actually very strong support for LNG. When it comes to attitudes towards resource development, British Columbians are typically very supportive as long as they can see it as being green. If it’s responsible and going in the right direction, people are fine with it. The onus falls to, industry most of all to be persuasive in showing that it’s as great as you say it ends.
Jackie Forrest:
Well, let’s talk a little bit more about LNG. You say that people are fairly supportive, but potentially the existing government right now is a little bit less supportive of things that would increase greenhouse gas emissions. One of the issues with LNG projects is that they are going to increase the greenhouse gas emissions here domestically, although they probably have a huge benefit if you look at it more broadly because they’re displacing dirtier fuels like coal overseas. Maybe we’ll start with how are people in BC thinking about LNG and have things like, for instance, the war in Ukraine helped bring people more supportive of these projects.
Stewart Muir:
BC, I think, there’s a solid majority that’s in favor of LNG development. I’ve looked closely at about four different polls over the last six months or so, and you can see that it’s there. In Canada, in general, it’s there. Recently, I sat in on a pollster in Ottawa, David Coletto from Abacus, who said that, and I love his quote, “There are no votes to be lost for supporting LNG in Canada today.”
Peter Tertzakian:
Can you give us a sense of the number? That’s an interesting quote, but when you say solidly in favor, like from a polling…
Stewart Muir:
Two-thirds.
Peter Tertzakian:
Two-thirds?
Stewart Muir:
Two-thirds in favor, or probably two to one, those in favor versus those against. I think that applies broadly in British Columbia. The thing about the current government in Victoria is that it is acutely affected by the power dynamics within the NDP Caucus, and there are some really strong voices that want to inhibit the development of gas exports. They have been, I think, very effective in building up the size under the new Premier David Eby of that viewpoint, to the point where visible manifestations of this include the lack of expected decisions on some major LNG projects.
There’s one in Delta in Vancouver, there’s a couple in the northwest on the coast, all of which involve First Nations very heavily, which are not able to proceed yet because there’s no decisions.
Peter Tertzakian:
I want to come to some of these big projects again, but I want to key in on your quote that the people of BC are fine with energy projects as long as they’re green. Specific to LNG, it seems like 50 shades of green. I’m not sure, everybody has a different perspective. But do people in BC buy the argument that LNG reduces emissions by displacing coal in China or Southeast Asia or wherever it goes? Does that resonate at all, or is it just as long as it’s green in my backyard rather than somebody else’s backyard?
Stewart Muir:
I think for the public, people who are paying attention to the issue, those issues resonate. I think the security issues over the last couple of years, not just Ukraine, but also Covid-19 highlighted some of our vulnerabilities. We are seeing, a general consciousness.
The problem is that British Columbia specifically is hamstrung by climate legislation that has a very parochial view of emissions and is constituted, set up, and written specifically to exclude Canada and BC from being a globally significant actor in emissions reduction, which to me is a terrible piece of legislation when you consider that the markets in Asia that need LNG. I mean, they’re telling us they need LNG. Let’s trust them to know what they need. They’re decarbonizing at a different pace than us because of the type of growth in their economies and the shift in energy mix and what’s available, and they’re going to need gas to reduce coal reliance over the next 30 to 40 years.
I’d love to be able to get into some of the examples of this, but I think the BC NDP, the legislation’s in place, and yet if you try to engage any member of the caucus or cabinet in a discussion about the global side, it’s like, “no, we’re not talking about that, that’s not a discussion we’re interested in having whatsoever.” I think anyone who is an environmentalist who’s concerned about global issues gets very frustrated in this.
Jackie Forrest:
Stewart, just for our audience, the legislation is such that there is a cap on emissions, emissions in BC cannot go over a certain number, and one of the concerns is LNG. Let’s talk specifically. We haven’t talked about the last two big projects, Coastal GasLink and LNG Canada. First of all, I want to talk about the first phase, where that’s at. But if you bring on a second phase, that would be a problem because it would mean that you go above that stated target or limit. Talk a little bit about the potential for that project to go to phase 2 considering this legislated limit.
Stewart Muir:
Well, a lot of the play right now is around electrification. Because if you can go from gas drive on the coastal liquefaction plants to electricity, obviously you can reduce the emissions from that activity. Where that’s available in those projects like the Wood fiber LNG plant near Vancouver, they voluntarily decided a number of years back to go electric because they could, they had the electricity available. The problem on the Northwest Coast is that we don’t have the transmission infrastructure in place to be able to get sufficient amounts of electricity so that LNG Canada can do that.
Because there is goodwill in the BC government. It might sound like I’m really down on the BC government. I think there’s a lot of good people in that government who are working very hard right now to achieve good outcomes so that the job and economic benefits and climate benefits of having LNG Canada Phase 1 and Phase 2 be successful will have those conditions. I know in Ottawa there’s a lot of engagement on the structures needed. You can’t just wish a transmission line into place in this day and age. It doesn’t matter what the infrastructure is, someone’s going to oppose it, so it needs time and commitment.
Jackie Forrest:
What do you think the probability is that Phase 2 does move forward?
Stewart Muir:
Let’s call it 65-35, 70-30. There’s so much benefit. As long as they can get the electricity to the coast and have a plan for that, getting BC Hydro into the mix here to solve this, it should be a really easy decision because all of Canada will benefit so greatly if it’s built.
Peter Tertzakian:
I want to talk and move on now to talk about the Indigenous aspect of all of this. Because a decade ago, a lot of the First Nations in BC were suspicious or opposed to any kind of development and the infrastructure that it entails, whether it’s pipes or wires or facilities. What is the state today of Indigenous participation in these project attitudes, and how has the Resource Works worked with them?
Stewart Muir:
Well, back in 2019 and then 2020, we saw UNDRIP legislation, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, come into force in British Columbia, and then in Canada federally. This to me was a sea change. We partnered with Indigenous leaders to bring forward a new event. We call it the Indigenous Partnership Success Showcase, because we saw that there was a huge amount of demand to understand how industry and First Nations, whether governments or First Nations economic development arms, could participate together to get to the outcomes that were now being driven not just by doing the right thing, but also by legislation saying, “You have to take this approach.”
We’ve created a stage. It happens every year. It happens again in Vancouver on June 1st and 2nd this year, where we bring the stories and examples and best practices forward so that it could be part of it. Because right now, frankly, no LNG project or almost no mine or any other project that is on First Nations territories or any Indigenous territories traditional or treaty lands or really anything are going to go forward without not merely say benefit agreements, which was kind of like 1.0, but now we’re into 2.0 or 3.0 of equity partnerships.
The Coastal GasLink gas pipeline supplying LNG Canada, last year they announced a historic 10% equity partnership ownership stake from a syndicate, or a group of First Nations located along that corridor. That was the first in the world, and it’s happening right here, social innovation, financial innovation to make projects successful. Last week I met with the First Nations LNG Alliance. That’s a group of elected First Nations leaders from around initially BC, but now from across Canada where they have LNG opportunities, who are doing the heavy lifting of building the consensus needed for this.
Peter Tertzakian:
It’s peculiar then that given the advances with Indigenous Peoples, given the polling that you talked about, that it’s still the things like LNG don’t make it into the throne speech. I’m still puzzled. What is it going to take? What is the resistance here?
Stewart Muir:
It’s I think a question of doctrine. We have a doctrine approach by environmental pressure groups that have said, “You just can’t have any fossil fuel development period”, without recognizing how the world really works and depends on these fuels. When you look into the details… Here’s a great example I can give you remember the Pacific Northwest LNG Project a few years ago? $36 billion. It was all but ready to go on the Northwest Coast of BC. Malaysia, which owns Petronas, that was the proponent, they wanted it because their dependence on coal was growing, not shrinking. It was supposed to be their alternative to that so they could have electricity to grow their economy that was greener.
In just the two or three years before that project was canceled in 2017, they increased their coal use by about a quarter. And then since then, they’ve gone from 7% coal in Malaysia to almost half from coal. Why did Canadian environmentalists oppose a project that would have allowed Malaysia to do that? But it’s not just Malaysia, Pakistan, just a couple weeks ago, they said, “Hey, we’re out of LNG. We’re not going to get gas. We can’t afford it because the war has made it unstable. We’re just going back to coal.” And now they’re going to quadruple their domestic coal fire capacity.
What if Canada had gotten our LNG to the shores of Pakistan? They wouldn’t be needing to do that. I mean, I can give you examples from all over the place, but this is the reality of what’s happening in the world today. Canada could be part of it and we’re taking ourselves out of it. To me, that is not environmentally sound.
Jackie Forrest:
All right, Stewart. That’s a thorny issue trying to convince people of the logic, but I’m convinced. You painted a picture that things are going better with Indigenous groups getting more cooperation, but yet there’s signs that that isn’t the case. I mean, we saw people attack the Coastal Link Pipeline, and most recently, this Blueberry First Nations won a legal decision that would limit the industrial development on their traditional lands, which has stopped permitting ever since 2021.
Now, I know there’s been some interim deal that’s been struck, or maybe it’s a final deal. I’m not sure. But I understand that there’s negotiations occurring with other Treaty 8 First Nations around a similar line of them having more say about what industrial activity occurs on their traditional land. Can you tell us what this new deal is, and does it create a lot of risk associated with big projects going forward in BC in your view?
Stewart Muir:
Yeah, it’s created over a year of uncertainty. There were no permits being issued in that region of British Columbia, which is a very important economic region for not just gas, but forestry and mining. That was creating a lot of unease. The decision is indeed influential beyond just that area. We got similar claims now happening in Alberta, the rest of BC, out there in Ontario. Yeah, definitely it sets a template going forward that should be listened to far and wide. The state of purpose here, they had a court ruling and then a period of negotiation. And then recently, they’ve been able to unfreeze things and permits are being issued again, but not at the same scale as before.
The big single phrase to remember here is “cumulative impacts”. The whole basis of the lawsuit was that, look, without asking anyone, industry just ramped up and went too far. That’s the argument. It was accepted by the court, and that’s really what this is about. The purpose of the new agreement is to put natural resource management and protection of treaty rights into a different management regime. They’re looking at restoration of land, protecting some new areas from industrial development, but making sure there’s also areas that are accessible. How does it end? I don’t know, but just a little insight from the market.
I look at some companies that have a larger significant exposure to the gas patch in BC like Ovintiv, Crew, ARC and Tourmaline. You look at what are analysts saying about that, they’re saying all of those are strong buy. Some of those are more BC focused than others, but it looks to me like every upstream oil and gas operator that I talk to is on top of things for themselves, because there’s a lot of local nuances. There’s not really a blanket takeaway from this. We’ll see how it plays out, but least we have some degree of certainty now. I think that’s a positive.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, we could talk a lot about all of this stuff, and I know our time is coming to a close. Maybe just a couple quick things before we wrap up. Give us a sense of the state of carbon capture and the development of CCS, CCUS facilities in Northeast BC.
Stewart Muir:
Well, it’s very much in the news today, especially because of the IRA. The Biden Administration is putting a huge push behind 45Q and creating enormous opportunities, lowering the threshold for getting credits. It’s at risk now. The whole Canadian carbon capture push is at risk because of the Biden Administration. What do we have in BC here? A couple of things. Geoscience BC is studying CSS. It’s identified saline aquifer sites and depleted or almost depleted natural gas pools that they think are suitable for CCS. They found about 4,000 megatons of carbon dioxide that could be stored there. We’re also seeing work and BC being a mining capital, as you expect. Lots of expertise there.
They’re looking at ultramafic rocks. Those are ones that are capable of sequestering CO2 by precipitating carbonate materials, so turning carbon in the air into rock. There’s a concept project on that. We don’t really have the assets to be on the scale of Alberta and what’s happening there already, but we’re going in the right direction. There’s other things too that are more creative and unique to BC, or this coast anyways, like the ocean and how that can configure into carbon capture initiatives. It’s good.
I mean, at the same time, I’ve been actually screamed at by a university student holding a megaphone very loudly, almost in my face, saying it’s greenwashing to try to remove carbon from the atmosphere, which to me is not what the industry is saying. It’s not what the Biden Administration is saying. It’s not what scientists all around the world are saying. I think as long as that wrong-headed view of things doesn’t take hold and become another doctrinaire blockade to good ideas, I think BC could be an actor in this space.
Jackie Forrest:
Do you think like Alberta we’re talking about potentially large scale projects being in place in the early 2030s? Do you think that’s possible in BC, or would it be later?
Stewart Muir:
Well, that’s the window because there’s a 10-year super incentive that the Biden administration has created with the IRA that I think will create a stampede during this next decade. If Canada’s not in it, we’re ensuring we’ve got the financial structures, incentives, et cetera, to match or exceed what the Americans are doing, then we won’t be in it at all. That’s a risk that can be managed by policy. In terms of having the natural capability, yeah, we can for sure be in this big time.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, it’s all very competitive, isn’t it? Well, you’ve given us lots to think about, Stewart, from your perch in Victoria, BC. Thanks for that. But in addition to talking about energy and Resource Works, you’ve also branched out and have got a new company venture. What is that?
Stewart Muir:
Well, I want to walk the walk as well as talking about things, and I have a side gig, you can call it that. I’ve teamed up with a chemical engineer from UBC, Vikram Yadav. He’s well known for some cutting edge work already in biotech solutions for oil sands wastewater remediation, very successful startup company that he spun out. But now we’re focusing on mining and appreciate the chance to tell you about it because the goal of our company, which is called Tersa Earth Innovations, is to commercialize a game changing all in one solution for recovering metals from wastewater, from treating the water, and then abating the carbon in mining.
It’s a three-in-one solution, a triple helix we call it. We think the opportunity’s here. In Canada alone, we think the value of critical minerals locked up in tailings water is about $10 billion a year. It’s huge. Gold, silver, copper, even lithium.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, it’s all here in Canada, in BC, in Alberta, and beyond. Thanks very much for shedding light onto what’s going on there. We’ll put the links up, right, Jackie?
Jackie Forrest:
Yes. We’ll put links to a lot of the things we referenced, including the story about Bankhead. About what happens when the coal plant shuts down in a small community.
Peter Tertzakian:
Well, fantastic. Thank you, Stewart Muir, CEO and founder of Resource Works. We hope to talk to you again.
Stewart Muir:
Thanks, Jackie. Thanks, Peter. Appreciate being here.
Jackie Forrest:
Thank you, and thank you to our listeners. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate us on the app that you listen to and tell someone else about us.
Announcer:
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