The Fossil Fuel Industry’s “Magic Sauce”

Many stories about the oil and gas industry in the United States focus on the Permian Basin or the Gulf Coast. This week instead, we’re taking you to the Pacific Northwest. Nick Cunningham dove deep into the fierce opposition that has stopped 70 percent of fossil fuel projects in the region in the past decade. If all had gone forward, the Pacific Northwest would have added more than 2 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide annually. That is roughly equivalent to 30 percent of the United States’s greenhouse gas emissions or nearly three times the emissions of Canada, the world’s tenth largest emitter.

But the oil and gas industry isn’t giving up — it’s just changing its tactics. One approach it’s taking, as Nick explained, is to expand along existing pipelines rather than build new ones, and try to push through multiple smaller projects rather than one larger project.

And Geoff Dembicki revealed a third strategy that's in play in British Columbia: make First Nations the public face of support for new fossil fuel infrastructure. At a recent "Beyond Net-Zero" conference sponsored by pipeline builders like Enbridge and Coastal GasLink one attendee described Indigenous support as "the magic sauce" that makes those projects easier to finance and build. And while it's true that some First Nations do support fossil fuel projects, "those interests are in the minority," a source told Geoff. "Most large scale resource projects do not have the support of First Nations."

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Thanks,
Brendan DeMelle