BY
Published in The Financial Post
November 26, 2025
We can get Canada’s energy to global markets in an ecologically responsible way, but collaboration is essential
Every so often in Canadian public life, you come across a conversation that gives you a bit of hope. For me, hearing that Alberta’s Premier Danielle Smith and Michael Sabia, the Clerk of the Privy Council, have been talking seriously about energy infrastructure did exactly that. I’ve spent enough years in government to know that when a premier and the country’s top public servant sit down together, it usually means both sides recognize that the issue in front of them matters to the entire country, not just one province.
The talks between Smith and Sabia signal that the federal government recognizes the nation cannot reach its full economic potential and become an energy superpower, as Prime Minister Mark Carney hopes, without Alberta and the West. Figuring out how Alberta’s energy can make its way to the British Columbia coast is exactly that kind of national question.
I expect the conversation will soon turn to including B.C.’s Premier, David Eby. No discussion about getting our resources to tidewater can succeed without British Columbia at the table.
Eby has legitimate concerns about the environment, coastal protection and the expectations of the people he represents. Alberta has equally legitimate concerns about market access and economic opportunity. Ottawa needs both provinces to succeed. If Smith, Sabia and Eby can find a way to build some common ground, Canada has a real chance to move past years of gridlock and finally craft a practical, modern framework to get our energy to global markets in a safe, responsible and genuinely collaborative way.
For Eby, a key point will be the 2019 Oil Tanker Moratorium Act, which prohibits large crude oil carriers along the northern coast of British Columbia. The original intention of the Act may have been ecological protection but the effect has been to shut the door on opportunity before it ever had the chance to open.
Ecological protection matters. It always will. But is a full-scale crude-tanker ban on the northwest coast really the answer when other tanker routes operate safely across Canada?
The idea of oil tankers as looming environmental threats is stuck in the era of Sony Walkmans and VHS tapes. The facts tell a different story.
Modern tankers are double hulled, sharply reducing spill risk. Navigation systems today are far more advanced than anything available in the 1980s. International safety rules are strict and enforceable. Canada requires ships to be guided by licensed marine pilots and has among the highest safety standards anywhere. And since double hulls became mandatory, global spills from tankers have fallen by more than 90 per cent. Most importantly, the northern British Columbia route has never had tanker traffic, meaning Canada could design the safest, most environmentally protected shipping corridor in the world, built from the ground up.
If Norway can move tankers safely through fjords, if Japan can operate in some of the busiest waterways on Earth, if Alaska balances ecological protection with responsible shipping and if Eastern Canadian ports manage tankers every day, then Canada’s West Coast, with its governance standards, technical capacity and Indigenous partnership potential, can certainly do so. The question is not whether we can protect the North Coast of British Columbia. Of course we can. The question is whether we are willing to build the framework that lets us do it safely, responsibly and collaboratively.
How about a northwestern safe navigation corridor? It fits squarely within Canada’s history. Our greatest achievements came from co-operation and compromise. The transcontinental railway was fiercely debated. The St. Lawrence Seaway took years of negotiation. Every major project that shaped this country required provinces, Ottawa, communities and industry to find solutions that worked for everyone.
Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, the Yukon and Indigenous governments can work together on a framework that protects the northwestern coast with best-in-class environmental safeguards, respects Indigenous rights and leadership, diversifies export markets beyond a single customer, accelerates investment in liquefied natural gas (LNG), hydrogen, biofuels, critical minerals and Canadian crude while creating a lasting economic opportunity across Western and Northern Canada.
A safe, well regulated, Indigenous-led northwestern safe shipping corridor through ports such as Prince Rupert would shorten routes to Asia, reduce emissions, support climate goals by displacing higher-emission suppliers, strengthen Canada’s role as a democratic energy partner and demonstrate that we are serious about our place in global supply chains.
The tanker moratorium was designed to address a hypothetical risk. A blanket ban is excessive and economically damaging. Our challenge today is to seize a genuine opportunity. Canada can protect the northwestern coast of B.C. and implement a safe northwestern shipping corridor. Canada can honour Indigenous leadership and strengthen national prosperity, reconcile provincial interests and advance national goals.
Our geography is vast and our ports are busy, but they can and should be more competitive. None of Canada’s ports rank among the world’s 50 busiest, even though more than 80 per cent of global trade moves by sea. For a trading nation, that is not simply a statistic, it is a warning. We now have the dream. The next step is to modernize our approach, remove the regulatory constraints holding us back and start getting it done.
Gary Mar is President and CEO of the Canada West Foundation