Council of Canadians energy campaigner Andrea Harden-Donahue highlights that the Canwest News Service recently reported that, “Western premiers and U.S. governors on Sunday hailed their push to develop a cross-border Western Energy Corridor that will be the largest on the planet and one that develops both non-renewable and clean-energy options.”
You can read her rabble.ca article on the proposed Western Energy Corridor and a recent Energy Council meeting in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan at http://rabble.ca/news/2009/06/separating-truth-greenwashing-wests-energy-export-boom.
Andrea writes, “The Western Energy Corridor is another example of the export-oriented free market approach that has dominated federal and provincial energy policies since former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney declared Canada ‘open for business’ in 1984. Under NAFTA, market forces drive Canada-U.S. energy trade with NAFTA limiting the ability of the Canadian government intervene except in extraordinary circumstances. Instead of developing a Canadian Energy Strategy, the Canadian government is allowing free trade agreements and big business to set the energy agenda with serious social and environmental consequences.”
“The Western Energy Corridor is part of a pattern across Canada that includes such examples as B.C. ‘run of the river’ private power gold rush (recently referred to as ‘ruin of the river’ projects in an op-ed by Maude Barlow), the tar sands and the proposed Atlantic Gateway Project. It is important to continue to monitor these developments and challenge the energy integration agenda by demanding a Canadian Energy Strategy based on the principles of energy security and ecological sustainability.”
