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By Bart Mongoven
On Feb. 14, the lower house of the Canadian Parliament passed a resolution that calls for Canada to rededicate itself to environmental commitments made under the Kyoto Protocol. On the same day, al Qaeda's branch in Saudi Arabia issued a call for jihadists to attack energy industry assets in Canada because it is a key supplier of oil and natural gas to the United States.
Both events are important -- not because the calls of either Canadian lawmakers or Islamist militants are likely to bear significant fruit (they are not), but because of the way they intersect with public sentiment and policy prospects that are likely to impact the future of the country's energy industry.
Earlier this month, Canada's Conservative government launched into a series of meetings with environmentalists, industry groups and local politicians on issues relating to energy development. The meetings are noteworthy because Prime Minister Stephen Harper -- both in his 2006 election campaign and throughout his political career -- has unwaveringly advocated rapid development of Canada's energy potential. Harper is widely expected to call for a new election before the end of April, and, significantly, his government appears to be considering a different approach to energy development in the run-up to that election. In short, Canada's long-term vision for its energy industry could be changing.
At the same time, the support that Canada provides to the United States on numerous fronts -- most notably, military support in Afghanistan and exports of natural resources for U.S. manufacturing -- is growing increasingly controversial, and moving to the forefront of Canadian political debate. Though exceedingly unlikely to have been purposely timed to coincide with the climate change debate, the al Qaeda threat that surfaced Feb. 14 will only add to the questions and public dissatisfaction over the U.S. relationship.
Taken together, the two events add another layer of complexity to the debate over how freely Canada should send natural resources to its neighbor to the south. This is a debate that is extremely important to the United States, which is looking for ways to reduce its own dependence on energy sources in the Middle East. A new energy plan proposed by President George W. Bush would require not only that Americans become more efficient in their consumption and make greater use of nonoil sources of energy, but also rests on the assumption that Canada would make up for the loss of any oil imports from the Middle East -- as well as for dwindling output from domestic oil sources and Venezuela.
The Politics of Energy
To fully understand the issue in the wider context, it is important first to examine the role that Canada already plays in the U.S. story and perspectives on the growth of the Canadian energy industry.
Currently, Canada supplies more than 21 percent of the United States' crude oil imports, far more than any other country. The 2.1 million barrels per day come primarily from traditional oil fields in the far northern and Rocky Mountain regions. The U.S. Energy Department projects that Canada will increase its total oil production by almost 50 percent in the next four years, and that U.S. imports from Canada will increase in the coming decade. As Washington considers a number of policy options to reduce imports from the Middle East, however, the percentage of U.S. imports from Canada likely will be even higher than the Energy Information Administration estimates.
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