Heidi McKillop, movie producer Stranded Nation, and Terry Etam, author, stopped by the podcast, and we had a blast catching up and covering the renewable mandates being thrown at Alberta.
A little inside baseball: Heidi and Terry have been friends of the ENB podcast for a long time. Both are thought leaders impacting the global markets. I have thoroughly enjoyed all of our podcasts, and I walk away knowing more about the energy issues in Canada and how they affect the international markets.
Thank you, Heidi and Terry, for stopping by. I am looking forward to our next visit.
Follow Heidi on her LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidi-mckillop-1a08a7b3/
Follow Terry on his LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidi-mckillop-1a08a7b3/
00:00 – Intro
02:20 – Advocacy for a global energy perspective, criticizing narrow views in Canada and the US.
04:02 – Heidi discusses her movie career and upcoming projects.
07:09 – Expose the deceptive labeling of “green energy” and discuss environmental challenges.
12:58 – Addressing the environmental impacts of renewables and emphasizing the need for transparency.
20:26 – Discussing financial challenges of reclamation for wind farms and lack of transparency.
25:04 – Limitations of electric vehicles, challenges in infrastructure adaptation, and grid instability concerns.
29:21 – Alberta’s efforts for autonomy, addressing issues like the Canada Pension Plan and the Sovereignty Act.
35:29 – Challenges of a potential great awakening against climate hypocrisy in Canada.
38:58 – Frustrations with Canada’s LNG projects, emphasizing missed economic opportunities.
42:20 – Expressing concerns about wasteful spending in Canada’s political landscape.
44:59 – Heidi’s outlook on what’s coming around the corner.
46:38 – Outro.
https://energynewsbeat.co/industry-insights-2/
@X podcast early release: #161 Why is Canada having an energy crisis in Alberta? We talk to two energy leaders in Canada to find out. @HeidiMckillop , movie producer Stranded Nation, and @TerryEtam , author, stopped by the podcast, and we had a blast catching up and covering… pic.twitter.com/DMT9Wk1vZT
— STUART TURLEY (@STUARTTURLEY16) December 3, 2023
Check out Terry’s book. – He even signed my copy! “Stu, you are the best podcast host in the industry” – “Grump” Terry Etam
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– Get in Contact With The Show –
Stuart Turley [00:00:03] Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Energy News Beat podcast. My name’s Stu Turley, president CEO of Sandstone Group. We’ve got an action packed podcast today with some old friends, my favorite Canadians. Now, let me set the stage here just a little bit. I’ve got two the fantastic guests, and we’re going to cover some of the most political and energy important things going on between the U.S. and Canada. First, around the corner, we have Heidi McKillop. And I mean Heidi McKillop is a industry energy movie mogul. This is I call her an absolute wonderful energy leader up in Alaska. How are you, Heidi?
Heidi McKillop [00:00:50] We’re good. How are you?
Stuart Turley [00:00:52] Oh, I’m just so thrilled I get my Heidi fix today.
Heidi McKillop [00:00:55] So I’m excited to be back and visit you.
Stuart Turley [00:00:58] And now come in around the corner. You know, we’ve always called Heidi on our previous podcast, The Snow White and the Two Dwarves and Grumpy and Terry Etam is an author and he has written a heck of a book. It’s I had to sign my own copy because Terry is such a loof author, and he’s also an author of the BOE report up there in Canada, author and industry, worldwide renowned, Grumpy. How are you?
Terry Etam [00:01:37] Pretty good. Got grumpy, as usual, I guess I have to say.
Stuart Turley [00:01:41] Oh.
Terry Etam [00:01:41] How does it change in the energy world?
Stuart Turley [00:01:44] I want to give our our listeners we’re going to have your your information in the show notes and how to buy the book. Because I am a closet Terry Etam stalker. I watch your your writings and everything else that I can get. You have terminal reach in opinions and and I’m going to get this over here because one of your are your earlier ones is your grumpiness in trying to make sure the world understands Africa deserves their own energy.
Terry Etam [00:02:20] Yeah, absolutely. That’s it’s funny. I started writing about Africa and one of my biggest supporters is an African and a lawyer that runs the African Energy Chamber. And he just he’s a huge fan as well. But a rave review of my book on LinkedIn, it’s I think that part of what drives me crazy about energy here in Canada and in the US is we were just so used to viewing it through our own lens. Like we think this has to change because this is what we see out our window and we consume too much as something. So the world has to quit using fossil fuels and it’s just all nonsense when you. Which is very obvious when you look at it from the 35,000 foot perspective. Then you see this coming out of the G20 conferences where India is making strong statements on China and Africa, and they’re saying, hey, wait a minute, what about us? So you guys have too much of everything in your you can consume too much fuel while we’re just getting started. So I think when I try and write about the energy scene, I do try and do it from a higher level rather than just the national or especially the Calgary Oilpatch centered view. I don’t think that’s really helpful to the world. People don’t understand energy at all. Then if you just hear the someone from inside the oilpatch talking about how great the oilpatch is, I don’t think that does anyone any good.
Stuart Turley [00:03:35] So no. Now, now, Heidi, you are the anchor. Between the three of us, here is the three amigos. You’re the only one that’s seen out of this group and your ear movie mogul about Canada. And that has been a van tastic documentary. It’s got a bazillion views out there on YouTube. How is your movie career going on and what you’re coming around the corner?
Heidi McKillop [00:04:08] It’s really interesting right now. So we’re working on a new documentary that will be published hopefully by the spring next year. So essentially we’re looking at the environmental impacts of green energy. So I think green energy has gotten a really good side white pass, we could say, from the national and also the provincial levels of having adequate reclamation and having adequate environmental impact assessments being performed because they just slid by the public eye as being green. And they’re relatively new industries compared to the oil and gas sector. So what we’re seeing is they’ve been now established for 10 or 15 years. They need repairing. They have issues with the solar panels and recycling them. There’s not a lot of format in place in terms of policy of how to deal with these companies and what their expectations are. So we’ve been hearing from ranchers and from the hutterites and from farmers and hearing from these people that have these projects in their backyard that, eh, there’s issues with them, you know, they’re not right. And I also am deeply concerned about the overarching scalability of these projects. They’re claiming to be, you know, the saviors of the planet in terms of our energy moving forward and what our grid can handle. But realistically, I mean, the problems that they present on our grid system here in Alberta are astronomical, for one. And the actual scale of energy that they’re producing is far less than what they’re claiming on in the public media. They’re saying that, you know, it’s going to be X amount of energy. You know, 40% like in Germany or whatever it is that these numbers are flying around. We look at it and we look at the data. And behind the scenes, I mean, they’re performing at very low levels, extremely low, in my opinion, in terms of solar and wind. So that’s something that is concerning me. And, you know, I don’t have all the answers, of course, because we’re in the preliminary part of researching this and talking to the ground people affected by it in their backyard. But it’s going to be really interesting to see what we come up with as, you know, a conclusion to this topic.
Stuart Turley [00:06:25] I’ll tell you, the whole energy transition ain’t a transition. You know, Terry, you know, some of the things that we’re seeing on this is that reclamation. Heidi, you bring up a fantastic point. Nobody can tell me, A, when the wind farm starts, it’s not sustainable fiscal fiscally. You got to have the tax subsidies in coal weathering Canada. Wind doesn’t always work solar. You got to get out there with a shovel and and get the solar panels on and then the grid. You’ve written about a bunch about this. What are your thoughts out there?
Terry Etam [00:07:09] The Heidi touches on a very important point. And it’s there while there’s several levels of deceptiveness. And I think it just overenthusiasm I think for people that really want a better, cleaner world when they call green energy, green energy. It’s like by default has become the good stuff because it’s green. But it’s that’s not true. I mean, there’s a whole web of industrial activity that has to go on just to bring that to me. And the second part is that this is a nuance that I catch people all the time on are not just myself, but when people talk about how renewable energy is gotten to 30% to the greater 40% or something, and they make that claim all the time, say, oh, we got to 30% already and we’re getting to 40%. They’re being very selective about what they’re reporting on. They’re talking about a very specific time of day or a very short period. And there’s no problem.
Heidi McKillop [00:08:03] It’s just it’s deception, though, you know, like the average person.
Terry Etam [00:08:06] Yeah.
Heidi McKillop [00:08:07] It does not do.
Terry Etam [00:08:08] That.
Heidi McKillop [00:08:08] Crazy.
Terry Etam [00:08:10] And the worst thing is the it’s what I call the turkey problem from Nassim Taleb. Who’s that? Who wrote The Black Swan and a bunch of other great books I highly recommend. He talks about the life of a turkey where a turkey has 365 excellent days and then one very bad day. And so on average, does the turkey have a good life? It does, But so the and where that comes into the energy equation is I see these people talk about how we are getting more and more renewables into the system. But but our power system has to be built for the worst day. It has to be able to handle the worst conditions. I don’t care if you could get it to 90% renewables if it kills everybody when the temperature goes to -30, is that the system that you want? And that’s what we’re heading for. And we see grid operators all over North America who are absolutely nonpolitical organizations, putting your hand up tentatively and saying, hey, everybody, this doesn’t work. There’s a five grid operators in the Northeast US that represent 154 million people have banded together to put out a warning saying we’re retiring natural gas and coal fired power plants way too quickly. And there’s big trouble coming because we’re introducing unreliable.
Stuart Turley [00:09:28] Sorry, sorry. Was that e r e f e. R a f.
Terry Etam [00:09:36] Well, yeah they said submitted that defer to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission I think. Right. Which oversees all energy and the grid operators. There’s a bunch of regional grid operators the ISO and you saw in just Ercot exactly the regional there’s a New England one in the Southeast one and Texas is Arton because it’s so big. And they’re they’re they’re getting frightened and they say so in a bureaucratic way. They’re very mild about it. They don’t. Right. Yeah. Like I do. But they’re and they’re not they’re subtle like I’m not. But the problem is coming and somebody has to wake up because trouble is coming. So.
Heidi McKillop [00:10:15] Interior, I’ve got a question for you. So why is it that they’re allowed to say, for instance, that on their peak time they’re operating at 40% capacity on the grid? But when you look at the full day or say the full week or the full month, we know that that’s not even the case. They’re operating at less than 5%. That’s what I’ve been coming up with. I don’t even think that they would be able to increase it to 90% because I think the jury. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think there’s that that that actual scalability problem that they’re not even addressing it’s really all right because I didn’t realize this when I was up in Pincher Creek, Alberta. So this is kind of for backtrack. Stu It’s one of the windiest places in in Alberta. Okay. They have to stop the wind turbines from operating when it’s over 100km an hour, which happens quite a bit up in this region. So there’s that problem. So it’s not even when the wind’s not blowing, it’s when it’s blowing too hard that there’s an issue. And then there’s another problem that they built them right in the migratory path for North America where all the birds migrate through from the north to the south. So they’re having huge issues with the environmental assessment on that end. And the biologists are starting to really make a complaint about this within their organization saying, you know, listen, like we’ve got to start really thinking about this. We got to think about bats. We got to think about these predator birds. And again, there’s no proper environmental assessment that’s being placed here. And it’s like, okay, well, they’re green, they’re fine. And we’re not even talking about the coal that it requires to build the infrastructure. We’re not talking about all of the issues with the diesel generators constantly going to make sure that these are operational. I mean, it just blows my mind how green this is getting. And I just it’s it’s ironic, really, at the end of day.
Stuart Turley [00:12:06] There’s a couple of things and it just drives me nuts that they’re killing all the whales off. Yeah, the the right whales are just going nuts. Megan Lappe is a wonderful asset out there, but I just visited with Tom Kirkman. I don’t know if you know him off of LinkedIn. He is a nut. And and he was telling me that it’s, you know, I was thinking that the Eagles were hitting I’m being the dork that I am, that you guys know me. As I was thinking that these eagles are dropping along and they’re flying into the blades. It’s not. It’s the vacuum that they fly through and it explodes their lungs on the other side. I didn’t know that. And in in in Michigan, they’re killing all the bats by exploding their lungs and they’re now got a mosquito problem there. And so.
Heidi McKillop [00:12:58] Exactly. Bats are actually incredibly important to the environment. A lot of people don’t realize this is that they’re very susceptible to environmental impacts. So they have a really they don’t have a high threshold for issues like this. So what we’re seeing here in Alberta, too, is that there is an endangered mint that’s coming up through the pipe works. And people are, again, really starting to, you know, not oil and gas people. These are environmentalists and biologists are starting to understand the impacts of the pressure that it makes them. Their lungs explode from the impact of these wind turbines. So, I mean, I think it’s really sad to see that throughout this process, in this conversation, nobody wants to bring that up. And I’ve heard about this for almost eight years now about the birds in the bats. I mean, it’s been a long time. I’ve it’s only recently that I think people are starting to really understand because of the numbers declining in the regions. And they’re starting, like you said, still the mosquitoes rise, insects rise. You have higher disease rates. I mean, there’s just a lot of things that, you know, obviously come from issues like that.
Stuart Turley [00:14:07] I got about 16 things because I always get excited when I talk to you guys. But Terry, you talked about we talked on some of our earlier podcast, which went nuts, by the way. So selfishly, I love having you guys on just because they’re good numbers. So I’m just being though.
Terry Etam [00:14:22] Heidi, not.
Stuart Turley [00:14:23] Me. Oh, no.
Heidi McKillop [00:14:25] No, no. We’re a team.
Terry Etam [00:14:26] Like I got my hair done. And look, I can’t. It doesn’t feel all right.
Stuart Turley [00:14:29] All right, Terry. Now you bringing up hair for our podcast listeners. My hair colors flash. You know, that’s that’s kind of mean They’re Terry And not only are you grumpy, you’re throwing out really funny jokes.
Terry Etam [00:14:42] All right. All right.
Stuart Turley [00:14:44] So, okay, now, reclamation, let’s I want to topics here that as we go through reclamation on the wind farms, I’m only finding that they are fiscally unsustainable from day one without tax incentives. But then and they say, oh, 30 years for a wind farm, Heidi, you alluded to that they cannot be repaired past eight without their being abandoned and running off. And the farmers that you love, farmers, those are having some real problems because it takes 380 to 400,000 just to take one down. That doesn’t even include hauling the stuff off in the U.S.. And Terry, on the another one that we need to follow up on is the oil and gas out of Canada is some of the strongest regulatory, cleanest stuff in the world. And I know that we’re seeing more and more natural gas coming on. So there’s two topics that are huge.
Terry Etam [00:15:48] Yeah, well, I’ll throw something in the middle there too. Like the oil and gas industry does have an issue with abandonment as well. So but there were standards in place when a lot of things were done. A lot of wells were drilled in the 50s and 60s and 70s and the standards were a certain way and things were done according to that. And times have changed since then. And so that’s caught a lot of older assets off guard and places in a problem. So so there’s I think any big any energy system that you’re talking about, right. That is going to meet the needs of our populations is going to have a footprint of some kind. I think the biggest issue for me with the renewables is that you’re just not allowed to talk about it. It’s just like the media wants to sweep that under the rug. So they’re like the statistics that you’re talking about to put up and take down wind turbines and what is a solar if you if you’re if you really care about the environment, you can’t tell me a solar field is good for the environment. It’s it’s just it’s like round up the whole thing. It’s there’s nothing left And it talk about habitat destruction. There’s no more maximal habitat destruction than a solar field. So it’s the there’s these multiple standards. I think that that’s the problem for me anyways is that we’re charging into this stuff and it’s it’s not into this all renewable world because people have kind of painted it to be so. And there’s a lot of, a lot of vested interests now making a lot of money in this industry. I look at the green funds that are going around almost unaccountable. We’re seeing that in Canada. It’s just a nightmare. How much money is getting shoveled into absolutely ludicrous projects. And the downside? We should have learned all our lessons from that. The costs, the environmental costs of actually having an energy system. And we should be moving forward. And the oil and gas sector is moving forward. We keep implementing new legislations right when there’s a spill that the standards for everyone increase pipelines, inspections increased after the well, shipping the shipping industry and increased their standards incredibly after the Exxon Valdez, after the Enbridge spill and Michigan pipeline standards went up everywhere. So we keep ratcheting up. We’re better getting better at capturing methane and less leakage. So we keep moving the bar up. But then at the same time, this green energy, as they call it, is just going rampant. And and we’re putting these fields in without even understanding the consequences, like Heidi’s been pointing out from like from the most pure environmental sense you can talk about. We’re creating environmental problems that they don’t even understand yet and we’re ever fought on. Exactly.
Heidi McKillop [00:18:27] Exactly. And any solutions. I mean, let’s talk about some of the solutions that can happen. I mean, again, I were entrepreneurs, were industry people, were energy people. We don’t care if there’s a new energy that’s coming through. A lot of people mistake that, especially because of what Terry and I do for work. We’re saying we can allow everything to work and operate in Canada, but don’t demonize a coal mining industry that has a great reclamation plan that is going to be mined and operated here in Canada, and we’re going to displace it now to China so that we buy our solar panels from China. I mean, they’re going to have the dirtiest footprint that we can imagine. We can’t even have, you know, what’s the word for it? We’re not even allowed to look into what they’re doing on a day to day basis over there. They have no transparency. So these are major concerns. And another thing, too, with any energy company that’s coming into Alberta or see Canada, what I’m trying to propose is that each each operation that happens is that there should be a trust that is allocated to reclamation from the start of the project. So whether it’s a wind farm, whether it’s. Coal mining project has to start it’s not going to finished with reclamation, has to start with reclamation. So does the company that decides to have mismanagement and go bankrupt at the last minute after they’ve extracted or utilize their resources to their benefit, whether it’s a subsidy or the coal, then they have something that’s in place from the government standpoint that can be allocated to the reclamation that won’t go to taxpayers and it won’t go to the land owners. It will be fairly reclaimed and put back to its original form. To me, that’s a great idea because it really puts the pressure off of the average state person. And the oil and gas industry should have done that years ago as well. It should have been the trust that carried through. So we didn’t see the, you know, these legal things that happened to the industry that causes huge reclamation crisis.
Stuart Turley [00:20:26] I’m going to ask because I agree with you on that. And Terry, you brought up a great point on that. But what’s happening is the cost per return on on energy created. And when you sit back and kind of take a look, Heidi, the. The wind farms. If we put in the reclamation up front, the consumers are going to have to pay for that upfront. And then the regulatory stuff in the U.S. and I don’t know about Canada and that would be a good question for you guys, is the regulatory stuff in Canada? I mean, in the U.S., is there not allowing for the increases that the wind farms are wanting in order just to even make the maintenance available? How are they going to get the increases to get the reclamation done at the end of the cycle when they’re way unprofitable? So how do they get that done in the front when they can’t even get it far enough?
Terry Etam [00:21:38] Does that. Yeah, yeah, it doesn’t work. And I think the issue is they would just have to I know what you’re talking about when when utilities, utilities and infrastructure companies in general, they love to spend money because they just roll it into the rate base they call it. So they earn a return on capital. So if the regulator allows them a 15% return on capital, well, if you put $1 billion in, then you get $150 million return on your capital. And if you put 2 billion and you get twice that. So it’s a good thing. So as long as they can borrow it cheap enough, they love putting money in. So regulators are saying, well, you can’t put that into the rate base and charge everyone on it so they won’t do it. But but that should be just part of the capital cost of a project. Just like Heidi said, for oil and gas. It should be one when a company goes out and drills a well, I think Montana actually does this. They say you’re required to post a bond when you drill a well, that it’s Montana or North Dakota that will will be placed into reserve for the eventual abandonment of that. Well, and it’s actually kind of painless when you do it that way because that money grows over time. So if you put aside 50 or $100,000 in 20 years, that will grow to something substantial that any kind of interest well, wouldn’t have a 2% interest rate, but it will today. But that money does grow over time with inflation roughly. And so then it’ll be a sight more sizable than it sounds like at the old front. There are at the outset. I mean, so there are ways to do it. But but I think you’re right about the oil and gas sector. They just don’t bear it. I mean, the wind and solar sector, they don’t make any sense without the subsidies. And then if you have to pile an additional cost on them, they’re just even further from it. Or you’ve seen these big power companies walking away from offshore wind. That’s this happening more and more now because it just doesn’t make sense.
Heidi McKillop [00:23:30] Exactly. There’s going to be a crisis and it will be such a huge environmental impact. I mean, this is ironic that, again, a lot of people in the green energy movement have zero accountability, too. I mean, if you really care about the environment, I mean, don’t you want to know what the full lifecycle of these projects are, how you’re going to clean them, how they’re fabricated? I think that would be the first thing I would ask. And yet there is there’s nothing there’s no.
Terry Etam [00:23:56] That’s the most. Yeah, that’s most mind boggling part is that should be the very first question they ask is what is the environmental footprint of this? And it’s that you just don’t even hear that. You’ll see sometimes you’ll see someone pose the question. I have a 15 year old car that that emits a bunch of emissions. Is it better off for the environment if I drive it for another 20 years or if I buy a new vehicle? If I buy an electric vehicle, then it’s a valid question. And I would think that you’re far better off to keep driving that old clunker, even if it’s spewing some emissions rather than building a whole new vehicle like it’s add up to do those comparisons. But but that’s the sort of thing you’re not allowed to talk about or you’re branded as a denier. Some Oh, yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:24:41] So that’s like you guys sitting down at the pub on the outside that we had talked about in the past on our thing. You guys throwing rocks at the EVs as they go rolling by. I mean, I got a complaint from the restaurant where you were hitting him with some of your dinner rolls.
Heidi McKillop [00:24:59] Perfect.
Terry Etam [00:25:01] Or just dinner rolls? It could get much worse.
Stuart Turley [00:25:04] Yeah, but they were dinning the side of the Tesla because it’s made out of plastic.
Heidi McKillop [00:25:09] You know what.
Terry Etam [00:25:10] You know, it’s. There’s. There’s a place for these. And I don’t mean to dismiss them entirely and all of these things. That’s the frustrating part. All of these things have a place in place in in urban areas or temperate climates like Seattle or Vancouver. Maybe an Ivy makes perfect sense where it never gets cold and it never overheats. And you’re just you’re mostly urban driving. You can charge it. And now it doesn’t in those places because they all live in apartment buildings. But that’s another story. But you can at least make the case that or for delivery trucks, maybe it makes perfect sense to run around the. City or even solar. I wrote an article a couple of weeks ago. There’s a company in Saudi Arabia, a company called Acwa Power, and their desalinated water using solar power, which which is just the best use for solar, I can imagine, because it’s you can you can operate for part of the day. Doesn’t have to operate the whole day. Right. When the sun shining, they’re making fresh water and they make hundreds of thousands of gallons. And it’s it’s a lot of water they’re making. And what what a great use for solar power. Agreed. Put it in some desert area where you’re minimizing the harm to any environment like some in in California.
Stuart Turley [00:26:23] It’s in in the solar. I saw that in Israel in Gaza, the only stations that are working are the solar water and fresh drinking water. There you go. Get out of the air. And that’s providing drinking water for the Gazans because it’s solar and it’s working off of the air and it’s providing it. That is a perfect solution. It’s a.
Terry Etam [00:26:47] Perfect solution. Yeah. That’s interesting. Water, too. You could.
Heidi McKillop [00:26:50] You could. What a big difference that is. Like, that’s an entrepreneur way of looking at a problem, though, and saying, how can we solve it to the best of our capability within these parameters? I think that needs to be the new framework moving forward. And but if you’re trying to fit somebody into a mold or a product into mold like solar and say it’s going to take over, our entire electricity grid here in Canada is absolutely false. I mean, it’s I can’t see it happening maybe in 50 years. Maybe there’s something that will shock me that will come into the industry. That will be something we can reflect back on. But as of right now, that is not going to happen by 2030.
Terry Etam [00:27:27] I know. And that’s just that’s not just our opinion. I was I had coffee with a friend on the weekend whose wife is the president of a utility here in Alberta. And he said it keeps her awake at night trying to deal with all of this, the grid instability that’s coming. It’s it’s it’s not a joke, but they’re there. The PR war doesn’t allow them to be very active on that front. Like to to point out the fact that a residential street can handle very few electric vehicles without blowing the fuze, so to speak, whatever the equivalent is. But they simply it’s true. They just can’t handle them.
Heidi McKillop [00:28:04] Yeah.
Terry Etam [00:28:05] They’re not built for that. So how do you rewire a city to handle these massive voltages? Some guy wrote to me he’s a very greenish kind of guy and he wanted to get a heat pump put on his house. So right now he has 100 at his house, is wired for 100 amps of power. So he hired an engineering firm to to redesign his house to put in a heat pump. And he said, since you’re out here doing all this work, I want to get wired for an electric vehicle. So the firm told them, okay, if you want to heat pump, you need another hundred amps that all your doubling at 200 aps. And if you want an electric vehicle outlet, the fast charge, you need another 100 apps. Now it’s 300 apps. And so the engineering firm went to the utility and said, We’d like to wire this guy’s house for 300 apps. And they said, No, you can’t do that. So, like, they just won’t do it. You can’t get permission to do it. So so here’s somebody trying to do what we’re deemed to supposed to be doing.
Stuart Turley [00:29:01] Right?
Terry Etam [00:29:02] And and their utilities are saying, you’re not going to do it. We just won’t let you because.
Heidi McKillop [00:29:06] He was in a he was the the heat pump for Atlantic Canada. So it was free.
Stuart Turley [00:29:11] Right?
Terry Etam [00:29:11] Yeah. Yeah. That’s what we do in Canada. We we hand out free heat pumps, our wonderful government, but.
Heidi McKillop [00:29:17] Only only in certain regions of.
Terry Etam [00:29:19] Growth. Yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:29:21] Now, speaking of knuckleheads in the Canadian political, because Alberta pays so much money back to the federal coffers. Exactly Back to the way the government, you know, is set up. Is there any way to reclaim what the government is taking from the Albertans, giving it there and then giving all that money to the wind? That doesn’t work. And again, it’s not a anti-wind this is an anti energy project that doesn’t work. Is there any way to get that money back?
Terry Etam [00:29:58] Heidi, I’ll let you talk about it. Heidi is pretty connected in the political world.
Heidi McKillop [00:30:03] Well, I mean, I think there are some interesting things that Alberta is doing that Daniel Smith, our premier, has been really tackling. So one of them is actually going after the Canada pension plan. So they’re trying to make well, there was a referendum that was being put in place because because of our high standard of living here and our incomes and what people contribute to the CPP is that it’s it’s disproportionately hired Alberta, of course. I mean, Albertans just pay out to everything in Canada. So what she’s proposing is this would be one way of trying to get a little bit more independence to keep more of that wealth here in Alberta. And that’s just a win win, in my opinion. I know that there’s a lot of different opinions on this, but that’s kind of the overarching idea of it. But another one is, are you involved?
Stuart Turley [00:30:55] Sorry, Heidi. Are you involved helping her write this? Is that what you’re.
Heidi McKillop [00:31:00] No, I don’t. But I have, you know, work with Danielle Smith in the past, so I have a little bit more of a connection to what the platform is that she’s doing. And, you know, I’ve had quite a few friends now that work in in is deputy or.
Stuart Turley [00:31:16] I was fortunate to have her and you on another podcast and talk about that because we could get the word out for her and and help out So reach out to her. Let’s get her on and talk about it.
Heidi McKillop [00:31:31] That would be really it. She would be a perfect person to chat with all about this, because what she’s also doing with the Sovereignty Act and that was a really interesting piece of legislation that she was proposing is we’re we need to have more of that independence here in Alberta. And we have we have the right to say what we want to do with our resources here. It’s not under a federal jurisdiction. So she’s really defining in the courts what is provincial and what is a federal issue. And she’s run a couple of times based on this, and she’s had a lot of success by going through the court system. This is not a public opinion. This is what our Constitution says. And we have a leader who does not here to the Constitution. He doesn’t really care about the Canadian Constitution, and he’s trying to make his own rules up as he goes based on what the greater Toronto area believes, what his followers in Quebec believes, and really is just disregarding anybody that is in contrary to him. And that’s not the way the democracy works. You know, we all operate and have to function as a unit. And even if we disagree, we have this idea that we’re supposed to play nicely with each other. You know, we should have this in trade. We should be able to have free commerce. We should be able to write proposed projects if they’re done properly. Yeah. So it’ll be really it’s quite a battle that she’s up against, but we’re very lucky to have her as a leader.
Stuart Turley [00:32:57] Now, guys, I would love to put my chowder head up against your chatter head and erase yet another chapter ahead, because I think our chapter head is even dumber than your chapter head because he doesn’t even know where he’s at. And in fact, when he’s walking down the aisle, I think he’s got up. The Secret Service is behind him with a package of adult depends because they got a cleaning up on aisle five.
Heidi McKillop [00:33:22] Oh, dear.
Stuart Turley [00:33:24] I’m sorry for I just went off on a rant.
Heidi McKillop [00:33:28] But I think they’re both the same because what they both are is they are sorry to say this in a non-offensive way, but they are puppets to their people that they’re in behind the scenes. You know, Justin Trudeau isn’t just Justin Trudeau. He is representing this large group of people that are behind him that are only caring about their needs. And we’re seeing this time and time again in a lot of these issues that are coming up and we’re like, where is this coming from? And it feels like left field, but there’s really a lot of intent behind the scenes. And same with Joe Biden. Right? You know, he’s got a lot of people that put him in that position that are taking full advantage of that, that authority. And that’s really what it’s about and what’s what. Our democracies are becoming very dysfunctional with sort of thinking about the greater good of the citizens they’re thinking about and individual leaders. And that’s benefiting from the federal money that is being put in place. Right.
Terry Etam [00:34:22] There’s a good example of that. And of course, you follow Canadian politics. But Heidi mentioned it earlier that Trudeau Trudeau’s party is a powerhouse in Atlantic Canada. There they get they win a lot of seats there, and it helps him stay in power. And his popularity has been falling there because of the carbon tax, because people are really realizing it now that people ignore something for years until it hits their pocketbook and they see what is this? And now they’re angry. And so he he he caved on his carbon tax. He broke his. Most sacred principles of of the climate emergency staff by granting a waiver to Atlantic Canadians to exempt home heating oil from from the carbon tax. And that just absolutely blew up in his face. But that’s what Heidi saying. He’s he’s. He will sacrifice pretty much anything, even his most deeply held principles for more votes. And it’s just, you know, everybody across the spectrum is even disgusted by that. I think just like the shameless display of it, it’s it was appalling to everyone.
Stuart Turley [00:35:29] Do you see a great awakening happening? I called for this last year when I was interviewing several folks and I said 2023 is going to be a great awakening. And it’s a little slow, kind of like me from Texas and we’re a little slow. But I think that the Great Awakening is happening around the world. People are tired of paying for high electricity. Is the great awakening against the climate hypocrisy coming to Canada?
Heidi McKillop [00:36:00] Well, we don’t know if it’s going to be enough or not. I think that’s the problem, is that we have still a disproportionate amount of people in the urban centers that are so pro at this idea of this woke culture. And that’s the most disturbing part about it, is it’s not energy. It’s everything. You know, everyone gets lumped into whatever category. You’re conservative. You’re for all of these issues. And if you’re this, you’re for these issues. And we’re seeing that divide obviously happened in Canada over the last few years quite extensively, that it’s caused a lot of friction between families and between provinces. And and I don’t know how to repair that. I mean, certainly the federal government that it’s currently sitting there. I mean, they have to go I think they have cause more harm in this country than I think most people have seen in its longevity of and since Canada has been Canada, I mean, very long.
Terry Etam [00:36:57] But you’re well, we’ve baked in a generational problem here like you have young people of today Are are this sounds facetious, but it’s absolutely not. They’re terrified of the weather and they’ve been led to believe that you can change it, You can fix the weather. All you have to do is curb these emissions. And and if you don’t, we’re all doomed. So there you go, kids. You chew on that on all. Why are you such neurotic little weirdos? Well, I wonder why so and.
Stuart Turley [00:37:25] That’s my grumpy coming out. You go, grumpy. Go grumpy. Go, girl.
Heidi McKillop [00:37:30] But Gerry is making such a good point on this because I you know, I’m a recent mom and, you know, most young people, if you interview them and there’s a huge proportion of Canadian kids that don’t want to have children because they’re scared that the world is going to end, they actually say in these polls what we’re doing out here, that they don’t want to have future because it’s going to end any way in 15, 20 years. That’s that’s how how frightening Justin Trudeau’s rhetoric has become in the NDP’s rhetoric over this. Instead of providing solutions, instead of saying, we’re going to reward good behavior, we’re going to reward everybody that puts a huge foot forward in privacy, frustration and a full lifecycle of decarbonizing an industry, right? Utilizing things more efficiently. I mean, these are all great ideas and empower entrepreneurs. They just they don’t care. Like Terry said, they want that vote. They want to be in there. They want to have that woke culture. And we’re heading straight towards that bottom. And personally, I feel really sad to say that even with the inflation crisis going on in Canada, we haven’t even come close to hitting that bottom because people are digging their heels in more and more to that party and saying, you know, it doesn’t matter like we’re here for it. We’re here for that change. We want to see the climate go back and we want to see the entire industry. We like gas and other different hydrocarbon industries completely gone to the candidates.
Stuart Turley [00:38:58] So Perry on the on the it seems with the LNG just going nuts around the world, Canada had the opportunity for the pipeline to finish out and then create the LNG export facility on the West Coast, I believe British, British Columbia, if I remember right. How’s that going? Because that is huge. I mean, my chowder heads scuse me in the countries chatter and I didn’t vote for this knucklehead. They won when he cut out the. Keystone pipeline. We yeah, yeah, we needed we needed that that great Canadian oil rather than buying it from Iran, which we do believe it or not.
Terry Etam [00:39:45] That it it’s so it’s sort of jumping but yeah it’s it’s moving ahead but I think the frustration so the there’s a pipeline called coastal gaslink which will carry the gas for. Alberta and Northeast. Northwest. Northeast British Columbia to the coast. And that’s constructed. But we’re waiting for the LNG terminal to be constructed. But that’s one out of 18 that were proposed. And the the the consequences of this are. Again, if you look from the high level perspective to us, a year ago, Europe was heading into an energy crisis and now part of that was the Russian invasion. But they’re out of natural gas. Europe is a wealthy western. Europe is very wealthy. They outbid everyone for LNG cargoes. So you had poor Pakistan and Bangladesh and countries like that sitting out their checkbook out saying we want LNG cargoes and Europe just took them all. And so what are those countries doing now? They’re building coal fired power plants. So that’s their solution. They’re saying we need fuel and we’re going to get fuel and we don’t care what it is. And you can talk all you want about your mantras, about net zero, whatever you want, but we need power and we’re going to get it. Now, if Canada had been on the ball, we would be supplying that LNG. We could have had a terminal ready 15 years ago. If there was any political will, it’s that we’ve got a Prime Minister who says there’s no economic case at all for LNG. Then the rest of the world is just in stunned disbelief to hear that. I was just doing some research on that. There’s like nearly 300 LNG terminals, the import terminals being built around the world and nearly 200 export trains being built around the world. That’s the demand for natural gas globally. And if it doesn’t get met with natural gas, well, people are waiting for nuclear. They would love nuclear. But that’s such a long term thing and there’s so much resistance. You have green groups that are fighting nuclear power, which is absolute proof that they they don’t they’re not sincere about the environment.
Heidi McKillop [00:41:41] They fight everything. I mean.
Stuart Turley [00:41:43] My.
Terry Etam [00:41:43] View is that, yeah, it’s like Heidi said, they have a they have an agenda and it doesn’t matter what topic it’s in. They put you in one bucket that it’s it’s it’s gender. It’s race, it’s.
Heidi McKillop [00:41:55] The.
Terry Etam [00:41:56] Middle East, it’s oil and gas. It’s like if you believe one thing, you’re evil across the entire spectrum. You’re not allowed to have cross ideas. Yeah, I mean, but the average person does like 90% of the population is sensible and they believe.
Stuart Turley [00:42:12] These.
Terry Etam [00:42:12] Things are right across the spectrum. But but the the way we’re built in the media frenzy, they don’t like that that doesn’t get them views.
Stuart Turley [00:42:20] So we got we got about five more minutes guys but this got my Heidi and Terry fix that I’ve missed for so long and I’d love to have you guys back in the near future as opposed to years from now. And if you ever have anything that you want out, please let me know because I want to get your story out.
Terry Etam [00:42:43] But I think Danielle and Heidi would be a fantastic episode. Mm hmm.
Stuart Turley [00:42:48] Yes, I think you guys are industry leaders. And and I would like to have a race between who’s the the race to the bottom with the chowder head at the helm because your chowder head was getting in a fight with India, and then ours is going out and starting wars. I don’t know.
Terry Etam [00:43:09] Yeah. Or is this just dumb versus dumb and aggressive?
Stuart Turley [00:43:19] Terry, is that podcast. All right with that? Terry, what’s your last word? What’s going on around the corner?
Terry Etam [00:43:30] I don’t know. I’m fearful. Like Heidi says, we’re just have to wait it out and hope that the damage isn’t too great. Like Canada and the U.S., we’re being we’re being placed in an incredible financial hole with all of this waste that’s going on, shoveling. I think Canada’s up to like $50 billion in subsidies to build battery electric vehicle battery plants in Canada. Now that the government watchdog has said you way understated how much this is going to cost the federal government and we’re building these white elephants. Now, China is just going to dominate battery processing because, like Heidi said, they don’t care about their the consequences of it. We’re building all of these factories for billions of dollars, and they’re probably not even going to get used because we won’t be able to compete with other parts of the world. And the government just signed a check the other day, $450 million to develop green hydrogen to ship to Germany from Newfoundland, which makes there’s not a person alive other than a politician that thinks that makes any sense. It just is the most irrational scheme you could imagine. And there they are, like grinning idiots writing checks for it.
Stuart Turley [00:44:36] So I got one, Terry. I got one that’s just even worse than that, that the Biden administration was looking at getting chickens raised in the U.S., shipped to China to be processed as food and then shipped back. I am not kidding. I’ll see your idiot in rage. Okay. Sorry. And Heidi, [00:44:59]what do you see coming around the corner, Heidi? [1.9s]
Heidi McKillop [00:45:02] Well, I mean, I think that’s, you know, has been the basis of my company and my films for quite a long time now, has been just like the average Joe person going on camera and trying to really find a voice for the ranchers, the farmers, you know, the people that live in the rural parts of Canada, because they, to me have a lot more common sense than the urban the urban centers do. There seems to be this complete disregard for the country way of life, and that is something that I’m really passionate about moving forward is that they have a direct understanding of these energy forms because it’s in their backyard. It’s not, you know, somewhere else. It’s literally right there on their acreages. So I learned a lot through them, and I’ve learned a lot by asking them questions. And, you know, I’m really thankful to have a job where I’m able to be in close contact with these individuals. So, you know, I’m excited about this new film and I hope it does well. I hope it’s controversial and gets people talking because obviously we want controversy because that’s really how we get conversations floating.
Stuart Turley [00:46:06] I think that’s fab. And congratulations on being a new mom.
Heidi McKillop [00:46:09] Oh, thank you.
Stuart Turley [00:46:11] It is so cool.
Heidi McKillop [00:46:13] It’s pretty amazing.
Stuart Turley [00:46:15] Oh, that is. And I got my Canadian my best buddy Canadians in. Terry, your book, The End of Fossil Fuel Insanity, is a good read and especially when you sign it. As to my favorite podcast host, who is an amazing man.
Terry Etam [00:46:33] Yeah, that’s what I wrote, I think. Yeah.
Stuart Turley [00:46:35] Yeah, I think. I think it was.
Terry Etam [00:46:38] Something like that.
Stuart Turley [00:46:40] With that. Thank you. This has been the Energy News Beat podcast with Stu Darley. Thanks for listening. And we will have our my favorite Canadians back again soon.
