Brian Jean
Alberta is blessed when it comes to people and resources.
Our province has been built and sustained by hard working risk takers and innovators. And these special people have been able to put to productive use some of the world’s greatest resources. Alberta has a practically limitless amount of natural gas. We have huge reserves of heavy oil, and unconventional resources in the Montney and Duvernay. The oilsands are a world class resource that we are only starting to fully appreciate. Add to that our unparalleled geology, which has given us more than enough pore space to store all the CO2 we can reasonably hope to capture.
But we have another blessing that helps our people productively exploit our resources: our world class regulatory environment and the regulators who enforce it. Going back to the discovery of gas at Turner Valley and oil at Leduc we have developed a system that made certain the resource was responsibly developed and that the lives and property of Albertans were protected. All of that was done while making certain that Alberta continued to have clean land, clean air and clean water.
A strong predictable regulatory environment is a competitive advantage over jurisdictions that have more uncertainty. Alberta’s regulatory rules are a distinct advantage for Alberta while we pursue CCUS and transitional resources from subsurface brines, like lithium.
While no regulator or regulatory environment is perfect, I can tell you that Alberta’s system led by the hard-working folks at the AER, is globally appreciated. When I meet ministerial counterparts from other countries, they routinely ask about how we have developed our system. Whenever Alberta hosts an international conference or meeting you can be certain that other countries’ regulatory agencies will be visiting the AER to learn how they do what they do.
When I speak to American officials, they are always jealous of how much we in Alberta know about our industry. The AER knows the location of every well drilled in Alberta, heck we have the cores from almost every hole we have made. All across the US regulators have to engage in creative exercises to look for old oil and gas wells that they need to find, if they have any hope of ever properly decommissioning them.
All of this exists because of the AER’s benefiting from Alberta’s long history of highly technical, highly committed regulatory workforces. For so many of the staff at the AER, their work isn’t a job, it’s a calling. They believe that Alberta’s energy industry should be best and most responsibly developed and they work hard every day to make it so.
Now the AER isn’t perfect and we will make sure to help it strive for continuous improvement. The AER is everyday challenged to do more by the government. Industry demonstrates it recognizes the talent at the AER, as they frequently recruit from its ranks.
As Energy Minister, I am proud to play some role in managing the AER and I am committed to doing government’s part to help the AER become even better.
Brian Jean is the Minister of Energy and Minerals for Alberta.
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