This week, Prime Minister Stephen Harper traveled to Washington to meet with President Obama and congressional leaders on Capitol Hill.
CEA’s David Holt, who released this statement about yesterday’s meeting, was quoted in today’s Globe and Mail:
“Canada is among our most important economic and strategic partners and a critical supplier of secure, affordable energy to American consumers; indeed, we get more of our energy from Canada than any other country in the world,” said David Holt, president of Consumer Energy Alliance, an alliance of big energy producers and consumers.
The benefits of preserving our relationship with Canada on energy are overwhelming: increased security, reduced dependence from unstable regions of the world – including OPEC – the creation of good-paying American jobs, and stable energy costs for all American consumers, small businesses, manufacturers and retirees.
In fact, an Associated Press article that appeared in today’s Bemidi Pioneer under the headline “Pipeline brings economic bliss to Bemidji” about the Alberta Clipper pipeline project highlighted the significant economic impacts associated with US-Canadian energy development:
The influx of workers building the new Alberta Clipper oil pipeline across northern Minnesota has meant a shortage of rental housing in the Bemidji area.
Some homeowners are renting rooms to pipeline workers and a local hotel that’s been closed for several years may reopen as construction activity ramps up.
Bemidji Area Chamber of Commerce President Lori Paris says that despite the housing struggles, construction of the pipeline has pumped up the local economy and benefited the hospitality industry.
Enbridge Energy says some 3,000 employees will eventually be working on the $8 billion pipeline expansion.
Prime Minister Harper’s commonsense commitment toward working with the US government on energy security is commendable. And according to a Toronto Sun column today, he also understands that Canada’s oil sands are “a key engine of [the] economy.”
Will leaders here in Washington come to realize that blocking Canadian energy supplies from reaching American consumers, as well discouraging the development of oil shale and other non-conventional energy forms here at a home, through a low-carbon fuel standard (LCFS) would weaken our energy security, threaten jobs and potentially force prices at the pump to spike?
Be a part of the fight for affordable energy. Contact your representative and tell them not to turn our backs on North American energy.
[...] Due to its high taxes and heavy-handed regulations, Californians already pay some of the highest prices for their energy in the nation. And it’s about to get even worse, thanks to the state’s upcoming implementation (assuming it can find someone to figure out how to implement it) of a low carbon fuel standard (LCFS) – a policy that discriminates against certain affordable and reliable North American energy supplies from reaching its market. Under such a plan, consistent with its design, California must have to increase its oil imports from afar. [...]
[...] the Alberta Clipper pipeline, which will help deliver affordable, reliable, stable and much-needed Canadian energy supplies to American [...]