We are, sadly, starting to think that headline could run atop stories on almost any subject. It certainly can on climate. Consider this bizarre story about Canada’s Natural Resources Minister, who was formerly an advisor to now-Prime Minister Carney when the latter headed the Bank of Canada after both having worked at Goldman Sachs, discussing the supposed opportunities created for Canada by the Iranian war: “‘I will tell you I have sat with multiple ministers from other countries who have been here and said, “Wow, Canada’s got its act together, Canada understands the moment, Canada is building for the moment,”‘ said Hodgson. ‘We see the money.’” You do? Is the money in the room with you now Mr. Hodgson? Because the rest of us don’t see it. Nor the pipelines, or the increase in production. We can’t even offset domestic price rises with more supply to domestic markets. And we certainly don’t see the imaginary green hydrogen Prime Minister Trudeau offered Europeans in place of actual LNG. But we do see the wagging tongues and pretentious posturing.

What, you may ask, does Hodgson even think he’s talking about? Well, he’s talking about talk about sending signals about signalling. In remarks to the yearly conference of the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada, in Toronto, he gushed:

“This is an opportunity for us. This is an opportunity for us to make very clear to all of our allies, if you are looking for a stable and safe and reliable, values-based producer of energy and critical minerals, a producer that will not use that energy or critical minerals for economic coercion, Canada is the place to invest. That is what we are hearing loud and clear.”

Hearing or saying? From foreigners or Canadians? And what actual capacity does Canada have to increase production? Not of words. Of energy and energy exports. Oh heh heh well that is you see…

Or do they? Tapping into Canada’s vast political reserves of unnatural gas, Hodgson proceeded to babble windily in a press release (of which the following is the complete substantive text, if substantive isn’t too kind a word):

“As a major energy producer and exporter, Canada is well positioned to help support energy stability during a period of heightened volatility in global energy markets, linked to military actions in the Middle East and disruption in the Strait of Hormuz. The current situation reinforces the fact that our allies are looking for stable, reliable energy suppliers in an increasingly uncertain world. That means doubling down on what Canada can do to enhance energy security at home and abroad. The Government of Canada has been working since day one to secure Canada as an energy superpower. Through our work to fast-track projects via the Major Projects Office, the Canada-Alberta MOU and other financial tools and regulatory streamlining, we are moving to increase and diversify export capacity, enhance domestic energy security and support our allies across the world. Canada supports and will participate in multilateral action on global energy security. We are working urgently with Canadian industry to assess the possible pace and scale of Canadian action and will have more to share in the coming days. We are conscious of the significant affordability impacts that energy market fluctuations are having on Canadians at the pumps, and contributions to a more stable market should help alleviate price increases.”

It makes one wonder, truly wonder, whether he knows the Major Projects Office has not approved any projects, fast-tracked or otherwise, the Prime Minister has already backtracked out of Canada-Alberta MOU and far from streamlining taxes and regulations his government is expanding them. There’s nothing practical we can do, thanks to a decade of his own party’s anti-energy policies.

As a Globe & Mail piece put it:

“Prime Minister Mark Carney pledged last year to make Canada an energy superpower, and he has worked to reshape Ottawa’s relationship with the oil sector through an energy agreement with Alberta that included conditions for a new pipeline to the West Coast.”

Exactly. Not a new pipeline. Just conditions for one. Mind you a Global News story declared that:

“Canada to release additional 140K barrels of oil per day starting in April”.

Since the world uses about 102 million barrels a day and we’re the fourth-largest global producer despite everything, adding 0.14 percent to world supply doesn’t look like much to show. But there’s even less here than meets the eye:

“The Natural Resources Minister’s office told Global News the increase in Canada oil is not a part of any emergency production. Instead, the additional barrels will come from already planned increases to production from Alberta’s oil sands.”

So we amble into lack of action, announcing with much fanfare that we will do something we were going to do anyway, because we can’t do anything else. Including, and let us make this absolutely clear, suddenly boosting our production of alternative-energy power.

Here we must also sneer a sneer for Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney who was off to India to say the usual clichés when the Iran war started, and told a business crowd that his actual poke-Trump-in-the-eye Davos speech was such a huge hit because “‘The reaction to that speech was, everyone’s thinking the same thing,’ he said to applause.” Ah yes. So easy to get an A when you grade your own work. But he’s the same Prime Minister Carney who spent a career pushing to shut down fossil fuels, then as Prime Minister pivoted on the tip of his tongue to making Canada an energy superpower and signing a piece of paper with the Alberta government about higher carbon taxes soon for more pipelines never. And when the war erupted, Canada could not ramp up either production or exports. Just rhetoric.

A columnist, unexpectedly in the Toronto Star, wrote that:

“Canada needs to be one of the world’s most reliable suppliers of energy, food and critical minerals — a status that is within our grasp.”

But then, instead of the usual Davos bumf, David Olive immediately continued:

“To achieve it requires that we build a second Alberta-B.C. crude oil pipeline paired with the expanded Trans Mountain Pipeline. It requires doubling the capacity of the LNG Canada liquified natural gas facility on the B.C. coast and hastening production from about half a dozen additional B.C. LNG plants in various stages of approvals and construction. It requires that we build a transportation corridor across Western Canada to transport Prairie grains, meat, and oil and gas to a new superport at Churchill in northeastern Manitoba, creating an ‘Arctic Gateway’ to world markets. And it requires not only an increase in Canadian uranium production, but new facilities to enrich the uranium.”

Oh. Just that? But he’s right. And doesn’t write a word about wind, solar, green hydrogen or even hydro power. Nor is it clear how a government that mistakes words for deeds could do any of this stuff, or one that remains committed to Net Zero could attempt most of it.