Alberta’s shortage of tradespeople is a lot more likely to hurt future oilsands investment than the currently high-flying loonie.
Bankers are getting twitchy because oil is priced in U.S. dollars, while companies that build new oilsands plants rely on Canadian credit lines. But not even economists with 500-watt crystal balls can predict how much the loonie will be worth against the stalwart American buck in 10 years.
There is plenty that the province can do, however, to make sure there’s a healthy complement of skilled workers for the oilsands. It’s called investing in education.
At least 8,600 new jobs will have to be filled in the oilsands sector over the next decade, at the same time an increasing number of aging workers are retiring, the Petroleum Human Resources Council of Canada said in a report last week.
But is Premier Ralph Klein – who seems to leave his captain’s uniform hanging in the locker whenever it comes to education – listening?
His government should take some of its millions of dollars in oil and gas royalties and spend it on strategically designed trades programs at schools such as NAIT and SAIT, and work with the federal government (a difficult concept for this provincial government to grasp) to increase access for aboriginal people to trades schools. It would help cut the 75- to 90-per-cent unemployment rate that sadly and needlessly exists on most reserves.
The oil and gas industry also needs to be a strong partner in education. If companies want to keep shareholders rolling in revenue, they should boost investment now in programs that train people how to be heavy equipment operators and mechanics, process operators and power engineers.
FORT MCMONEY
The province and the industry also have to pump more money into Fort McMurray for things such as infrastructure, affordable housing, social services and policing.
Even a job that pays a hundred grand a year doesn’t look as enticing if you have to survive out of a suitcase in a tinbox trailer, in a town where a 1,500-sq.-ft. house sells for $350,000 and crime rates are more than double the national average.
The oilsands are a world-class hydrocarbons deposit. Government and industry must ensure that Fort McMurray – population nearing 50,000 and predicted to swell to 70,000 by 2010 – is a first-class city. It should be a community that not only attracts workers, but retains them, so they can make a contribution that goes beyond their next shift at Suncor or Syncrude.
KUDOS TO KVISLE
Congrats to Hal Kvisle, president and CEO of TransCanada Corp., who has been elected the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America’s 2004 chairman.
Kvisle (pronounced ‘quiz-lee’) is the first Canadian elected as the industry association’s chairman, a reflection of the importance of Canada in meeting the natural gas demands of North America – read: the United States.
RBC Capital Markets, which surveyed some 400 oil and gas executives and investors at its recent conference in Houston, found that 92 per cent of respondents said foreign sources of natural gas will increasingly supply the U.S. within five years.
Nearly one-third of them cited Canada, which currently exports about 10 billion cubic feet a day of gas to the U.S., as the leading source of future supplies.
That’s good news for Kvisle, a University of Alberta civil engineering graduate, and for TransCanada, the continent’s biggest gas distributor with 15 per cent of North America’s market.
B&C SETS UP SHOP
Alberta’s famous oilwell firefighters and blowout control specialists have some competition setting up shop in their backyard.
Boots & Coots International Well Control, Inc. has incorporated Boots & Coots Canada Ltd., headquartered in Calgary. The move supports the introduction earlier this year of the Houston-based firm’s WELLSURE® product, a package that combines risk management, prevention and response services with control-of-well insurance underwritten by Lloyd’s of London and managed by the international alliance Global Special Risks.
But don’t think a little competition is going to scare home-grown, Calgary-based Safety Boss Inc. Spearheaded by Mike Miller, the Safety Boss team capped 180 raging wells in just 200 days in Kuwait after the 1991 Gulf War. That performance bested legendary well-tamer Red Adair as well as Boots & Coots, and it earned Miller the Order of Canada and the Star of Kuwait.
ENERGY SENSE
Now here’s an energy-deregulation policy that makes a lot of sense, and kudos to the provincial government for doing it.
Alberta municipalities will have access to $100 million in interest-free loans to enhance energy efficiency, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and replace conventional energy sources with renewable or alternative sources. The ME First! Municipal Energy Efficiency Assistance Program is billed as the first of its kind in Canada.
The loans, provided through the Alberta Capital Finance Authority, include: $35,000 for populations of 1,000 or less; $35 per capita for populations of between 1,000 and 10,000; and $20 million each for Calgary and Edmonton. An additional $10 million will be available for special innovative projects. The loans must be repaid within five years.
Initial application deadlines are December 1, 2003, and June 1, 2004. More information is available at www.climatechangecentral.com
Alberta Energy Minister Murray Smith’s department will wastefully dole out about $100 million in natural gas rebates this winter. Smith would do well to take a few lessons from his colleague, Municipal Affairs Minister Guy Boutilier, on how to get the biggest bang for the buck in enhancing energy efficiency and the environment.
