Last updated 2025.10.16

Canada's Projects in the National Interest - Econogics commentary

This began in August 2025 in the wake of the International Court of Justice's (ICJ) Advisory Notification on the liability of states (countries) for damages caused by their GHG emissions. Note: NOT the liability of the corporations generating those emissions for profit; the liability of the COUNTRIES where the emissions originated.

This mean the costs will be incurred by taxpayers, not the corporations that received payments while producing the harmful emissions. This legal conclusion arrived at the same time as Canadian media were reporting Canadian fossil fuel companies were actively lobbying the federal government in closed door meetings to be at the front of the line for special consideration when the national projects management team had not even been announced to the public.

When Canadian government resources (i.e. taxpayer funds) are the linchpin for any such undertakings, it is my opinion that ANY discussions should be open to all qualified contributors, and that the rules of engagement should be fair, transparent and truly in the NATIONAL interest, and not just a subset with privileged access. That led to me writing suggestions for an evaluation checklist which took into account the long-term national interest in light of the ICJ Advisory Notification, and requiring an explicit definition of what would be accepted as being in the national interest, that is, in the interest of Canadians broadly in the near term and taking into account the likely long-term consequences. I also offered up some sample projects that would really be in the national interest, but would likely not have a private sector proponent.

Start here: link to the first document:
Evaluation_of_Canadian_national_interest_projects_per_ICJ_Advisory_Opinion (PDF 16 pages)

Cover letter for the document above (PDF 2 pages)

My intention in the months to come is to address some of the national projects which will be announced, and also write up some topics that are unlikely to be taken up the Major Projects Office, but perhaps should be. Unfortunately, given the apparent state of the conversation the federal government is having with fossil fuel lobbyists and ignoring civil society and its own citizens, it is necessary to sweep some trash off the table to make room for rational discussion.

Clearing Some 'National Interest' Trash

My List of Worthy Projects in the National Interest for Canada (2025)

** denotes this project content is not in place yet.

Data Sovereignty and Security (includes data centres and powering them, AI takes 20 times the power and water in the same footprint)

Summary and ** link

National High Speed Broadband

Summary and ** link

Strategic National Commodities Reserves

Summary and ** link If you have additional categories of resources which are strategic and shuld be included here, let me know

Anthropogenic Methane Capture, Utilization, Storage (and destruction) (AMCUS)

Summary (no document link for this topic - if you want to discuss it, get in touch with me.)

This project will be a far more effective way to reduce the global warming potential of current greenhouse gas emissions than any CCUS fantasy currently being proposed, and won't require additional research on effective means of doing long-term CO2 sequestration, err, I mean storage. Implementation sites will generally be near populated areas, so will improve air quality near many Canadians. AMCUS relies on existing technology, has a ready, profitable market in place, and would turn a profit.

There's even a federal government incentive to do this. (So far, don't be surprised if it's killed as an 'austerity measure' in the fall 2025 budget.)

A demonstration project in Ottawa (Trail Road Landfill site) is highly successful producing green electricity fed to the Ontario electrical grid, earning revenue for the City of Ottawa.

And for some reason, lots of garbage trucks run on fossil methane ('clean'), so they could fill up with anthropogenic methane at old dump sites.

Capturing anthropogenic methane leaks and burning the gas provides a factor 100 improvement in GWP on the 10-year time frame. It could even reduce municipal operating costs by using 'free' methane instead of pipeline fossil methane from the U.S. Using that fuel productively (e.g. to power a truck) would reduce GHG emissions even further by displacing use of other fossil hydrocarbon fuels such as gasoline or diesel.

We have the methane satellites now (e.g. GHGSat), and airborne methane sensing and ground level methane detectors to locate more anthrogenic methane sources.

In the unlikely event that the demand for low-cost anthropogenic methane should exceed the supply, we can produce more anthropogenic methane using crop waste and algal bloom biomass biodigestion and composting to make soil amendment (fertilizer plus) without extracting more hydrocarbons) link to marine biomass paper. See my White Paper

National Grid (only RE from here on)

Summary and ** link

Housing

Housing affordability has been a hot topic in Canada for pretty much a decade now, muted a bit by COVID-19, but back in the headlines again now. It's big and complicated, and impacted by general state of the economy, population growth, speculative land development practices and new home sales weighting high margin cosmetics over basic, robust construction practice.

RESTCo has done considerable research and work on creating energy efficient, healthy, affordable, robust housing which is designed to be adaptable to climate change consequences like permafrost melt, sea level rise and shoreline erosion, so why not start there for an overview?

Food Sovereignty

Summary and ** link

Plastic Pollution Reduction and Removal

Plastic pollution is a serious and growing issue in terms of human health and environmental impact. For a grounding on the subject, I recommend RESTCo's web pages on the topic.
link

Energy Sovereignty

If Canada needs one fossil fuel pipeline - and it probably doesn't - it would be for western natural gas to get to Ontario, routed north of the Great Lakes. Almost all of Ontario's natural gas comes from the United States. With the current U.S. regime in power, if they felt that this fossil methane supply was a pressure point for Ontario, they will undoubtedly threaten to turn it off, just as Ontario Premier Doug Ford threatened to cut off electricity transmission from Ontario to the U.S.

This is largely an Ontario problem. Quebec and points east make almost no use of U.S. natural gas.

Canada from Manitoba west and primarily along the southern population ribbon is pretty well served in terms of fossil fuels reserves, refining and distribution of refined products.

Central and Atlantic Canada aren't heavily endowed with land-based petroleum resources, and coal is generally too expensive to be competitive. There is refining capacity in Quebec and New Brunswick, which process imported crude oil.

Summary and ** link

Domestic Supply Lines (and really eliminating provincial trade barriers)

The best solution for long, fragile supply lines - like getting commodities to the Canadian Arctic - is to eliminate those supply lines by producing what is needed locally. For food supplies, see the piece on Food Sovereignty. For energy, shift away from refined fossil fuels like diesel, heating oil and gasoline to renewably-generated electricity backed up with local energy storage (pumped, battery, others), which greatly reduces the cost to communities and residents for electricity from diesel generators and fueling vehicles. (Yes, electric vehicles work in the cold; no fuel lines to freeze up.)

** link

Establish an inventory of National Natural Assets including forests, peat lands and wet lands

Summary and ** link

Guaranteed Basic Income (GBI)

Summary and ** link

(likely more to come, but it's a start)
Note, I am not a proponent for any of the above possible projects, merely an advocate.
The documents linked above are not formal proposals, just outlines of why they are appropriate, contextual conditions and key elements of how they might be implemented.
If you would like to discuss any of them further, get in touch.

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