Could we interest you in a pipeline perhaps?

Better talk to Quebec first. Apparently they don't have a problem with pipelines per se, just pipelines that run Alberta oil through them.

Pipe it as far as Toronto, put it in tankers and ship it the rest of the way.

Bonus points if it takes less than a year to implement the same tanker ban in the Great lakes as is in place in the North BC straights to Haida Gwai.

Pipe it as far as Toronto, put it in tankers and ship it the rest of the way.

That’s what I have been wondering. Is there any restriction on oil tankers in the St. Lawrence?

Does this mean that tanker traffic inbound with foreign oil products do not affect St. Lawrence beluga populations, or present significant environmental concerns to Canadian waters, while proposed outbound Canadian oil traffic does?

Natural Resources Canada reports that in 2016, Canada imported crude oil and equivalents from many countries, including Saudi Arabia (nine per cent), Algeria (nine per cent), Nigeria (eight per cent) and Norway (four per cent), with much of the product entering Canada through ports in Quebec, a province that consumes over 350,000 barrels per day of gasoline and diesel fuels, representing approximately 20 per cent of total Canadian oil demand. Quebec receives 25 million tonnes of crude oil and various petroleum products of which 89 per cent enters through ports in Quebec City and Montreal.

More broadly, Transport Canada estimates that there are approximately 20,000 oil tanker movements off the coasts of Canada each year. The Clear Seas Centre for Responsible Marine Shipping calculated that annual Canadian oil transported on the Pacific Coast amounts to six million tonnes, while U.S. oil tankers that transit through those Canadian waters transport six times as much, at 37 million tonnes. The estuary and Gulf of St. Lawrence import, largely through the ports of Montreal and Quebec City, receive 67 million tonnes.

Could we interest you in a pipeline perhaps?

You can bore everyone to tears by playing Nickelback every 10 minutes 24/7 with Canadian content laws. You can totally fuckup your military procurement with Canadian content laws to the extent that someone actually thought that the CH-124 was still in use yesterday. Put that in perspective for a minute. President Kennedy was in office when the CH-124 was first being built. That is way too fucking long to find a replacement!

If ever there was a chance for Canadian content laws to actually do some good, it is in the oil and gas sector. Irving oil should not have a choice in where they buy their oil. Canadian content laws should dictate. If I had to watch all those Beachcomber/ Danger Bay episodes on the CBC, than they can buy some Canadian crude oil. Irving oil has more gas stations in the U.S. than they do in Canada. Look how much that would help Canada with exporting refined products if the crude oil was coming from Canada instead of Venezuela. Make them buy Canadian oil. Force the pipeline through. Don't ask, tell! The Irvings have been acting like the royal family of the Maritimes for far to long now.

This is actually a fairly patriotic thing for Irving to want. It's the first time I can recall them ever saying they wanted more western Canadian product to come to them. The bigger meta remains the same problem though. There's no pipeline to get the stuff to them efficiently enough, hence resorting to tankers and all the problems associated with sea shipping.

There's also no way that the anti-oil left wing in this country will sit back quietly and let this occur without a fight. No pipeline like Energy East ever being built is a given so there's no point in wasting breath discussing it. So expect them to go after shipping regulations again. Like clamping down harder on the exports from Burnaby BC with more nonsensical rules. And start charging up a campaign for enhanced regulations for the east coast and St. Lawrence River, with the rules aimed only at tankers with western Canadian product in them while the rest from the Middle East, Nigeria, and Venezuela benefit from a hands-off business-as-usual.

Just the way things are done in Canada. Enjoy the bit of national unity over COVID while it lasts because it'll end soon enough and the normal divisive regional politics will resume, especially over fossil fuels.