If Saskatchewan is to get off fossil-fuel generation of electricity, it will take time and reason … and less political posturing.
Whether coincidental or politically constructed, federal Liberal government climate change policies have been a constant distraction for this Saskatchewan Party government.
Constant distraction is perhaps the only element of the above upon which Premier Scott Moe’s friends and enemies can agree.
The warring factions are instead rooted in one of two positions. Either:
— Moe and his government are fighting to save Saskatchewan’s resource-based economy, which the federal Liberals do not understand and make surprisingly little effort to understand; or:
Sadly, two things can be true at the same time.
Even sadder, neither side seems interested in any reasoned, compromise solution — at least, not when there are still political points to be scored.
Consider the latest skirmish in which the provincial government declared it will not adhere to the Clean Electricity Regulations, placing “the onus on the federal government to prove CER’s constitutionality.”
“This report offers irrefutable, independent evidence that these federal regulations will have a substantial impact on the cost of electricity in Saskatchewan and, as a consequence, our economy and way of life,” Justice Minister Bronwyn Eyre proclaimed.
“The results of this report are wildly out of sync with all the benefits we know come with building out a cleaner grid,” Guilbeault’s statement read.
He’s likely right … although he’s hardly one to talk. Notwithstanding Eyre’s hyperbolic irrefutability, there’s lot coming out of Guilbeault and the feds that’s similarly refutable.
The problem with the tribunal is that it’s mandated to exclusively explore the impact of federal policies on Saskatchewan. But in doing so, it’s pretty spot on in its concerns that massive “regional differences between provinces, including power sources, population, climate and geography were not taken into account when the federal government developed the CER.”
In short, Trudeau, Guilbeault and the rest of the federal Liberal government have chosen to be oblivious to the reality that flat, sparse Saskatchewan is different when it comes to electrical generation.
We get that here. We are trying.
Infuriatingly, if Guilbeault simply excluded natural gas plants (accounting for 40 per cent of Saskatchewan’s electricity) from the 2035 phaseout, we wouldn’t be having this debate.
We face massive conversion costs, either way, but we can make it happen.
Both sides simply need to park the petty politics and cooperate on affordable alternatives to fossil-fuel electricity. But who would want that?
Why would either bother when they can stick to intransigent politics that’s gotten us nowhere?
Mandryk is the political columnist for the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
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