Canada's Energy: International Apects; The Report of a Working Group of the CIIA

H. Burkhardt was Director of the Energy Centre, Ryerson Polytechnical School, Toronto.

The working group responsible for the content of this booklet was formed by the Canadian Institute of International Affairs. The 23 members of the group are leading representatives of the oil and gas industry, the mining industry, the steel industry, the Canadian banks, the consulting profession, and Canadian academia.

The topic “Canada’s Energy: International Aspects” should more appropriately be: “Canada’s Primary Energy Resources: International Aspects.” The content covers the magnitude of oil, gas, coal, and uranium resources; the mining, transportation, and marketing of these commodities; and the technological, financial, economic, and political aspects of the primary energy resource industry. Nothing is said about other international aspects of Canada’s energy problems, such as the importation of efficient energy utilization technologies from the Scandinavian countries or the disposal of energy wastes, which raises international questions for both the fossil and the nuclear energy resource.

The first part of the report is a summary analysis, a consensus document of the group as a whole. It includes six recommendations on security and stability of investment, financial return, exports, industrial benefits, foreign investment, and Canadianization. The collective summary is followed by fifteen background studies for which individual members are responsible.

The reader of this booklet will get an indicator of the feelings and an insight into the current think-ing of the Canadian energy resource industry. The report offers information on the state and on trends as seen by the representatives of this branch of our economy.

Apart from correcting minor spelling errors, the Canadian Institute of International Affairs would

be well advised to offer a crash course on SI Units of measurement to its future working groups. This might protect the readers of its working group reports from the frustrating experience of having to relate square miles to square kilometers and to acres, and to relate tcf’s, mmbtu’s, mtce’s, kCal’s and barrels of oil to each other and to the international unit of energy, which is not mentioned in this energy report.