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Even with the public onside, the case for jobs, tax revenue and small-town renewal still has to be made
By Geoff Russ
Prime Minister Mark Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith arrive to announce a proposed pipeline from Alberta to the B.C. coast in Calgary on Thursday, July 02, 2026. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Todd Korol
If you keep an ear to the ground, you may hear the click-clack of emails being typed for donors.
Despite the fanfare over their agreement, Mark Carney and David Eby have neither approved nor built a pipeline from Alberta to the coast of British Columbia (B.C.). The agreement between Ottawa and B.C. says the province ‘does not seek this project’, but also recognizes federal jurisdiction and commits B.C. to ‘good-faith’ behaviour on routing and permitting if Ottawa maintains the northern tanker ban. Furthermore, Ottawa is bound to consult Indigenous communities and support environmental liability protections.
Whatever the caveats, this is a positive shift for Canada. For years, the anti-energy lobby’s central argument was not simply that a pipeline was imperfect. They went further and insisted that Canadians should be embarrassed to have one built at all.
Shifting public opinion and economic benefits
Fortunately, that argument has lost most of the ground it gained in the previous decade. Ottawa is now touting the benefits of a new pipeline that terminates in B.C. and is geared toward exporting oil to energy-hungry Asian markets. In doing so, such a pipeline would diversify our exports, thereby boosting our economic sovereignty and lifting the fortunes of rural B.C.
Resource advocates have spent years pushing back against the anti-energy lobby, but now have to challenge themselves not to give in to a sense of relief. Winning in the public square is not the same as completing a project. There are many ways in which the proposed pipeline could be scuppered, and public opinion cannot be taken for granted.
Currently, internal federal polling shows nearly 70 per cent of Canadians support expanding oil pipelines, including 64 per cent in B.C. These numbers are corroborated by Angus Reid, which found that 61 per cent of British Columbians support the expansion of natural gas pipelines and that 56 per cent support another greenfield pipeline between Alberta and the B.C. coast.
For now, those who understand and back Canadian energy have won the battle in the war of ideas. Canadians understand that our first-class resources and workers should be put to good use, making both our country and the world more secure, more affordable and more prosperous.
The activist counter-campaign machine
However, the opposition has not disappeared, not by a long shot. Even worse, it has been given a new fundraising cycle.
The Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) project was fought tooth and nail by a well-funded, well-connected machinery of activists who can legitimately claim credit for delaying the ultimately successful project, which opened in 2024. As with TMX, they will rebrand this third pipeline project as a ‘climate emergency’ and enlist a motley cast of celebrities to amplify their messaging. Expect the inboxes of corporate, government and non-profit offices—as well as banks, insurers and targeted permitting bodies—to be flooded with alarmist messaging about the ‘carbon bomb’.
During the struggle over TMX, Zurich pulled its coverage for the project, and the Canada Energy Regulator allowed Trans Mountain to keep the names of its insurers confidential because public disclosure could make insurance harder to obtain at a reasonable price.
This was not a grassroots effort but a professional pressure campaign that came close to achieving its goal: halting the expansion of feasible Canadian energy projects by scaring away the firms required to complete them.
The tangible record of resource infrastructure
Resource advocates cannot sit back and whine when these pressure campaigns find new life. Rather, those who understand that Canadian energy, especially oil and gas, is an essential and permanent asset, should study the tactics of their rivals.
The anti-TMX networks took their fight to courtrooms, bank boardrooms and social media, with seemingly endless repetition. Say what you will about their bad ideas and cynical tactics; they are not lazy.
Too many supporters of responsible development assume that jobs, tax revenue and common sense speak for themselves. As it happens, they do not, and the facts must have their champions.
TMX created almost 40,000 jobs, included provisions for Indigenous people to make up 10 per cent of its construction workforce, and awarded more than $6 billion to Indigenous businesses and partnerships. Coastal GasLink, built on a similar timeline to TMX, was essentially a sister project, creating 25,700 full-time-equivalent jobs in B.C. as it helped turn Kitimat into the leading liquefied natural gas (LNG) hub in the province. More than $1.8 billion in contracts was awarded to local and Indigenous businesses; $331 million was generated in B.C. tax revenue; and more than $13 million was invested in local communities, non-profits and sponsorships.
These dollars meant paycheques arriving in the bank accounts of blue-collar British Columbians, not apocalyptic emails invading the inboxes of corporate offices in Vancouver.
They also meant apprenticeships and long-term infrastructure development in small towns, where high-profile activists are often flown in to give a speech before leaving.
Nonetheless, public support is malleable because it is human. People have to live their daily lives, with all their joys, obligations and stresses, leaving little space to tune in to debates about climate and the economy that all too often drift into the esoteric and the abstract.
Abacus Data has found that support for pipeline expansion shrinks significantly when people are told that governments would put up the money if the private sector could not, or if B.C. opposes a pipeline, or if First Nations oppose it.
The public square is a battlefield that must be contested, and the anti-energy lobby is about to receive a shot in the arm as Ottawa and provincial governments advance plans for a pipeline. They will almost certainly raise the money to spend another decade pretending that ethically sourced Canadian energy, produced by well-paid workers, is a moral failing—rhetoric that will only drive oil buyers into the hands of dictators.
The line about Canadian oil being preferable to that of Russia or the Middle East is old by now, but it is no less true than it was a decade ago. The shocks absorbed by energy markets due to disruptions in Europe and Iran have created costs that are borne by working-class and middle-class Canadians.
However, Canadian energy is about more than just international energy markets and the price at the pump. It is also a source of jobs for workers, opportunity for entrepreneurs, revitalization for small towns and money on the table for British Columbian families. That is what hits close to home: those outcomes can be felt in real life and documented in the factual record.
The public is more ready to listen than it has been for years, and that makes this the worst possible time to relax and become complacent.
Geoff Russ is the editor-at-large of Without Diminishment. He is also a contributor to the National Post, Modern Age, and the Spectator Australia. He can be reached on X.com at @GeoffRuss3.
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