NDP leader’s green pandering could return B.C. to dark ages – by Claudia Cattaneo (National Post – April 24, 2013)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

With only three weeks to go to the British Columbia provincial election, the anti-resource development stance of the favoured candidate, NDP leader Adrian Dix, is looking scary.

With only three weeks to go to the British Columbia provincial election, the anti-resource development stance of the favoured candidate, NDP leader Adrian Dix, is looking scary.

In fact, it’s looking so anti-Canadian and, in particular, so damaging to Alberta’s interests that Mr. Dix, if elected, can kiss off any constructive relationship with his provincial neighbors.

Pandering to the anti-fossil fuels movement, which seems to have hijacked the election, Mr. Dix on Monday effectively declared his opposition to Kinder Morgan’s plan to expand its TransMountain pipeline from Alberta to Burnaby, B.C.

Already opposed to Enbridge Inc.’s Northern Gateway pipeline plan, Mr. Dix’s TransMountain flip-flop would bar growth in oil sands exports from the West Coast, effectively killing plans for a new market for Canadian oil in Asia. The damage to Canada’s economy would be immense.

“We do not expect Vancouver to become a major oil export port, as appears to be suggested in what Kinder Morgan is suggesting to the province,” Mr. Dix said in Kamloops, where he announced his environmental agenda. “I don’t see that transformation as being the right approach for our economy or our port.”

There is a third, earlier-stage pipeline plan proposed by B.C. newspaper publisher David Black that would be connected to a heavy oil refinery in Kitimat. It will be just as challenging getting that one past the tree huggers, who on Monday quickly praised Mr. Dix’s move against Alberta oil sands’ expansion.

It doesn’t end there. Mr. Dix would replace the environmental review process recently streamlined by the federal government with made-in-B.C. reviews (translation: don’t bother applying for permits); expand the carbon tax to oil and gas emissions; and maintain a moratorium on offshore drilling, oil exploration and tanker traffic.

For the rest of this column, click here: http://business.financialpost.com/2013/04/23/ndp-adrian-dix-energy/