“Natural gas is a critical energy input for greenhouse vegetable production for which there is currently no viable large-scale alternative.”

– Evan Smith, Sustainable Infrastructure Development Lead at the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers.

By Graham Chandler

“While some growers utilize biomass as a supplemental or backup heating source, its availability and costs can be prohibitive, particularly at the scale required for year-round greenhouse operations,” says Smith. However, he adds, the sector is exploring emerging alternatives such as biogas and hydrogen blending as longer term options in order to reduce its carbon footprint.

And these emerging renewable options do hold promise. Biogas is a renewable fuel produced when organic materials are broken down by bacteria in an oxygen-free environment through anerobic digestion, allowing energy to be recovered from organic waste streams. But current biogas production remains limited in scale and so cannot meet the full energy demands of greenhouse operations. Similarly, hydrogen natural gas blending holds potential to reduce fossil fuel use, but the necessary infrastructure and supply chains are still in early stages of development.

“In summer, natural gas remains the key enabling fuel that has allowed greenhouse agriculture to produce fresh vegetables year-round, including in climates where outdoor production is limited or seasonal,” continues Smith. “Access to affordable and reliable natural gas enables growers to maintain the consistent environmental conditions required for successful crop production, including precise control of temperature and humidity,” says Smith.

“During winter months, natural gas is used primarily to provide heat essential for healthy plant growth. In the summer, the controlled heat generated by natural gas systems helps dry the crop in the morning, reducing excessive humidity that would otherwise increase disease pressure and negatively affect crop health and productivity.”

So, without access to natural gas, winter greenhouse production would be at best uncompetitive, and fresh produce during colder months would need to be imported from southern growing regions says Smith–thus energy costs for greenhouse production would increase significantly in the absence of natural gas, undermining the competitiveness of Canadian-grown greenhouse vegetables in both domestic and North American markets. So continued access to affordable natural gas remains essential to maintaining food security, supporting local production, protecting investments, and enabling the sector to pursue realistic pathways in order to reduce our carbon footprint over time as workable alternative energy solutions mature.

Smith came into his position in December 2025, joining as the Sustainable Infrastructure Development Lead, assuming responsibility for key files supporting the sector’s sustainability objectives, growth, and long-term energy needs. He holds a Master of International Public Policy degree from the Balsillie School of International Affairs at Wilfrid Laurier University, where he specialized in economic relations and participated in the Global Political Economy and STEM for Resilience research clusters.

During his graduate fellowship, Evan co-authored a policy brief examining the future of critical minerals in Canada, which was submitted to Global Affairs. His previous experience includes serving as a Program and Policy Assistant at the Ontario Ministry of Transportation, where he supported the rollout of the Automated Licence Plate Renewal program and contributed to the development of fraud policy and procedures. He also led a research team at the New Brunswick Institute for Research, Data and Training examining the implementation of the National Housing Strategy in New Brunswick.

The future

Smith says he expects the Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable sector to continue growing at a rate of approximately 5% annually, a trend he feels will result in a steadily increasing energy demand across the sector. Greenhouse production is highly efficient and allows Ontario greenhouse growers to yield up to 20 times more produce per square meter compared with outdoor agriculture. As a result, the evolving energy landscape will play a central role in shaping how the sector develops and sustains year-round production.

In recent years, many greenhouse operations have adopted supplemental lighting systems to support consistent year-round production cycles. Smith reckons the continued expansion of this practice will be influenced by electricity and natural gas prices, as well as the availability and capacity of supporting infrastructure. He notes combined heat and power (CHP) systems are receiving increased attention as constraints in electricity supply limit sector growth in some regions. These systems allow growers to generate electricity on-site while capturing waste heat for greenhouse heating, thereby improving overall energy efficiency. The process is commonly referred to as co-generation, as both heat and electricity are produced from a single energy source.

Smith says Ontario is currently prioritizing investments in electricity transmission expansion over the next two decades, and similar infrastructure expansion will also be required for natural gas distribution to support greenhouse growth. He expects projects such as the Panhandle Regional Expansion Project represent necessary steps toward addressing rising energy demand in key greenhouse production regions.

In support of the sector’s continued growth and energy reliability, Robert Petro, OGVG’s Energy, Infrastructure, and Environment Coordinator, testified on behalf of the greenhouse sector before the Ontario Energy Board in support of the Panhandle Expansion. The 2024 Panhandle Expansion is a critical infrastructure project that supports the expansion and long-term viability of greenhouse production in southern Ontario through 2030.

Smith foresees energy efficiency remaining a critical component of sustainable sector growth. Over the past decade, greenhouse growers have participated in programs that support the transition from high-pressure sodium (HPS) lighting systems to more efficient LED technology. Energy curtains are also widely used to improve heating efficiency and reduce natural gas consumption. Continued access to energy-efficiency programs will be essential to enabling the greenhouse sector to expand production while responsibly managing overall energy demand.

In addition to electricity, natural gas, water and wastewater infrastructure will play a significant role in determining future sector growth, notes Smith. Many greenhouse operations already face constraints related to water availability and wastewater capacity. Investments in water, wastewater, electricity, and natural gas infrastructure is not only for greenhouse farms, but also for the municipalities in which they operate. Infrastructure expansion that supports greenhouse farms also enables broader economic development, including manufacturing, commercial activity, and housing growth, reinforcing the importance of coordinated infrastructure planning across regions.

Smith says natural gas remains a foundational input in greenhouse production of cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes—currently the most popular crops. Maintaining consistent indoor temperatures and humidity throughout the year requires a stable and reliable heating source, and natural gas is currently the only energy option capable of meeting these needs at the scale required for commercial greenhouse operations.

“Maintaining consistent indoor temperatures and humidity throughout the year requires a stable and reliable heating source, and natural gas is currently the only energy option capable of meeting these needs at the scale required for commercial greenhouse operations.”

Natural gas enables the deployment of advanced energy technologies such as the aforementioned combined heat and power (CHP) systems, too, says Smith. These systems allow growers to generate electricity on-site while capturing and reusing waste heat for greenhouse heating and climate control, significantly improving overall energy efficiency. In some cases, electricity generated through CHP can be supplied back to the grid, contributing to broader provincial electricity needs and enhancing system resilience.

Looking further ahead, Smith sees natural gas serving as a cornerstone upon which lower carbon solutions such as biogas integration and hydrogen blending can be applied to improve environmental performance. He also sees continued technological developments supporting the advancement of carbon capture solutions that recover carbon dioxide from combustion processes or directly from the air and deliver it back to crops for photosynthesis, further closing the production loop.

Until then, continued access to affordable and reliable natural gas, with appropriate cost certainty and pricing caps to protect essential food production, will remain critical to enabling the expansion of year-round greenhouse production and ensuring that Canadians continue to have access to domestically grown cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes.

Driven by an enthusiasm for energy and a desire to learn, David Morton continues his post-regulatory career working on energy reliability issues

By Graham Chandler

“I have always been interested in energy – it was one of the things that drew me to Mechanical Engineering,” says David Morton, P. Eng. ICD.D. He is currently the CEO of the Canadian Energy Reliability Council; Executive in Residence, Positive Energy, University of Ottawa; and Chair, International Confederation of Energy Regulators (ICER).

“My primary entry point to the energy industry was through the regulation of utilities,” he explains. “Utilities companies are often the sole suppliers of energy services in an area. This makes them what economists call ‘monopoly suppliers’ – whose prices are not generally subject to any market influence from a competitor. This potentially puts the customers at risk of overpaying or receiving service that is sub-optimal.”

Utility regulators are primarily ‘economic regulators’ and their role is to be a stand-in for those market forces to try to protect customers, he explains. They also must ensure that the utility collects enough revenues to provide them the opportunity to earn a fair return on the typically considerable investments they must make in utility infrastructure.

“It is this need to balance economic interests that appeals to me, in addition to my general interest in energy,” says Morton. “The public interest aspects of ensuring that utilities provide safe and reliable energy, that the public is protected from any excesses of monopolistic suppliers and that utilities can earn a fair return are challenging, interesting and, when one succeeds, rewarding.” And that has driven his career.

David Morton was born in the UK and lived there until he was 9, when his family moved to Canada. “My parents had a bit of wanderlust and I ended up going to school in Thunder Bay, Winnipeg, Orlando, Florida and several places in Southern Ontario,” he says. That wanderlust has somewhat manifested itself in his career choices, too: the starting point of which was a Bachelor of Applied Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Toronto in 1977.

Prior to the energy and utility industries, he spent a lot of his early career in IT. “It began with an interest in what was often called visual computing in the late 1970s and early 1980s,” he says. “I co-founded a company to develop software to build visual simulations and models.” That was ground-breaking at the time in a world where personal computers had just been introduced, and they displayed only a limited number of characters on a ‘green screen’. “I used the software we developed to build models for various projects, including for Vancouver Airport’s terminal expansion and second runway.”

The success of that project prompted him to pursue a career in the burgeoning IT field. “I managed various IT development projects for corporate and government clients,” he recounts. “Many of these were custom-built and required a good understanding of the needs of the people who will use the system and the ability of the software to meet those needs, given the budgetary constraints of the project.”

Then, in 2010, he became aware of an opening for a part-time Commissioner at the BC Utilities Commission. He was very interested and thought, “I could integrate this into my other work. However, the work was so interesting that I ended up taking on more and more files. Then about five years later, the Chair and CEO position became available and I put my hat in the ring—and was successful. This position allowed me to apply my leadership skills to benefit all British Columbians. It has been an honour to serve as one of the longest-serving leaders of the BCUC.” “One of the considerations is the scale and scope of the energy provided by natural gas,” he says. “It currently supplies more energy than does electricity, and some of the uses that natural gas serves are very difficult to meet with electricity – cement-making, for example.”

While it is theoretically possible to replace natural gas with electricity, that’s at the very least a doubling of the amount of electricity we currently generate in Canada, says Morton. “And the backdrop for this doubling is that we may also need additional electricity if we are going to electrify our transportation network by replacing petroleum-based fuels with electricity and if we are going to electrify liquefaction of natural gas to build an LNG export sector.” All in addition to providing increasing amounts of electricity to support data centres and AI processes and meeting the increasing demand for electricity for a growing population, he adds. “Although one should never say never, given the state of technology and the energy infrastructure at this time, it is unlikely Canada will abandon gas as a resource” he says.

“I am not pro-natural gas and anti-electric,” Morton adds. “I try to bring a balanced view and ask the questions that are difficult to answer. I do think we need to keep an open mind and be aware of the challenges and limitations of any particular energy pathway. I am on the board of the Western Electricity Coordinating Council, which is responsible for compliance and enforcement of electric reliability standards in a region called the “western interconnect” – consisting of 17 US states along with parts of northern Mexico, BC and Alberta. So electricity reliability is a topic that is important to me—as is energy reliability in general.”

Morton says that the desire for balance extends to his lifestyle. “Working is important to this balance, and for it to be successful, you have to enjoy what you do. I am extremely fortunate to be able to say that I am passionate about the work I continue to do – even though I am past retirement age.”

For example, David continues to engage with his regulatory colleagues internationally as the volunteer Chair of the International Confederation of Energy Regulators (ICER).

There’s more: “I have recently initiated a new endeavour called the Canadian Energy Reliability Council (CERC),” he says. “The Council’s mission is to build new models of collaboration across the entire energy system and help reframe how policy-makers and the public think about reliability,” he says. “Energy reliability is a topic that is very important to all of us, but seems to often take a back seat to other issues that may be perceived as more pressing. I am very pleased to be able to pursue this initiative.”

Another accomplishment he notes with pride is regular participation in speaking engagements and international teaching opportunities to other regulators around the world. “I have worked with regulators and governments in Botswana, Macedonia, Zambia, Namibia, Moldova, Sri Lanka, Argentina, Bosnia, Dominica, Papua New Guinea, Brazil, Kazakhstan, and Bangladesh.”

Together with these and numerous extracurricular activities, “one of my hobbies is to try to understand history,” he says. “As the Spanish philosopher George Santayana said: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. I think in many ways we are at a crossroads, and as a society we are far too ready to discard the lessons of history.”

So that family wanderlust never really lifted its grip on David. Although in slightly different forms, it’s still there. “When not doing anything energy- or utility-related, I enjoy travelling – both locally and internationally,” he says. “I am fortunate to live in such a beautiful part of the world – I never tire of the scenery of the West Coast. I find travelling internationally opens my eyes and my mind to other cultures and other perspectives. It is also an opportunity to learn more about our shared history that binds us all together.”

Jacob Irving is a natural fit as president of the Industrial Gas Users Association 

Late last year, when the Industrial Gas Users Association (IGUA) was searching for a new president following the retirement of Shahrzad Rahbar, they hired the ideal candidate: Jacob Irving.  

Well-experienced and passionately devoted to the Canadian energy scene, Irving had successfully led some of Canada’s most prominent energy industry associations, including the Oil Sands Developers Group, the Canadian Hydropower Association, and the Energy Council of Canada.  

Originally from the Huron and Franco-Ontarian community of Penetanguishene, following graduation from the University of Ottawa, his first job was as an Information Officer with the Library of Parliament in Ottawa, where he specialized in parliamentary procedure. That led him to South Africa—apartheid had fallen, and new provincial legislatures were being created. “I started on contract with the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) to help rewrite the Standing Orders for the Western Cape Provincial Parliament,” he recalls, and was later hired to help create their first Member of Parliament Induction Program. They were valuable years, he says. They set his mind for decades, influencing his choice of career. “Working and traveling throughout southern Africa, I was struck by the many communities that went dark after the sun went down,” he recalls. “Although I was working in the field of parliamentary procedure at the time, I was constantly struck by the importance of energy.” 

So, rather than return to Ottawa, he chose Calgary to pursue energy development (and to live with his wife-to-be, who worked for TC Energy). “It was the year 2000, and Canada was hosting the World Petroleum Congress for the first time,” he says. His involvement with the Congress was “an incredible opportunity to work with the many great and different energy companies headquartered in Calgary,” he says. “I was hired by BP Canada Energy Company following that experience to assist them with government and public affairs; this marked the beginning of my energy career.”   

His exposure to energy poverty in other countries triggered an interest in learning how Canada largely avoided the same scourge. One of the first, basic lessons he noted was that if a country could make more energy than it needed, it was far more likely to enjoy the advantages of energy security. During his time in Calgary, that became self-evident. “We have the oil sands, no other country does. I used to ask my family and friends, if the oil sands deposit has to be located in any country on earth, where else other than Canada would you like to see it placed? I still ask that question.”  

And constant questioning to ensure understanding any situation helps grow a career. “From my role as Executive Director for the Oil Sands Developers Group in Fort McMurray, I was approached to become President of the Canadian Hydropower Association,” he says. “The opportunity to return to Ottawa and learn about Canada’s other great foundational energy pillar was unique and exciting—I’m always thinking about the energy advantages Canada enjoys that others simply do not. There are many. The oil sands and our hydropower strengths are unique. We are also particularly strong in natural gas and nuclear. We have escaped the trap of energy poverty quite simply because we do it all and we do it well.”    

At this point, Irving was well on his way in a brilliant career. Next came the Energy Council of Canada, where “I was fortunate to promote all forms of Canadian energy expertise domestically and internationally,” he says. “Working with Global Affairs, we delivered the positive energy messages that we consolidated through Canada’s major national energy industry associations to interested audiences abroad: the United States, Poland, the UAE, Vietnam and South Africa.” They connected numerous Canadian companies with those missions abroad and the business opportunities they created.  

And, importantly, it also involved engagement with First Nations. “As we have since 2000, we recognize the Canadian Energy Person of the Year,” says Irving. “During my time with the organization, I was fortunate to be part of the selection of Chief Jim Boucher and, most recently, Chief Crystal Smith for the award. Along with Volumes One and Two of our publication, Indigenous Energy Across Canada, we were able to elevate and celebrate the growing leadership of First Peoples in Canadian energy development both at home and abroad. Indigenous energy leaders joined the Energy Council of Canada’s board of directors for the first time during my tenure. It was a privilege to learn, understand and promote their perspectives.”    

With the retirement of Dr. Rahbar, IGUA was seeking a new leader—and Irving was approached. He immediately gravitated toward it. “I was fortunate to learn about the oil sands while serving as the Executive Director for the Oil Sands Developers Group and then to learn about hydropower while serving as the President of the Canadian Hydropower Association,” he says. So what next?  

“I’ve enjoyed a diverse and rewarding career in the upstream energy sector but always felt I was missing an important dimension,” is his answer. “I understand the energy producers’ perspective, but what about the customer? In this (IGUA) role, I am fortunate to approach energy from the point of view of those who consume it and thereby underwrite its actual development. I bring a great deal of experience to the position but also value how it will make me a more well-rounded energy professional. I am truly fortunate to learn, understand and serve the needs of my members.”     

With all these considerations occupying IGUA, Irving still makes time for more mind-relaxing activities. “I like to downhill ski in the wintertime and water ski in the summer time,” he says. And there’s the all-important family. “We have two university-aged daughters and two high school-aged sons,” he says. “I like to focus on helping them realize opportunities that are the same or greater than the ones I was once afforded. I feel there was a time where this was not a remarkable thing to aspire to and that it didn’t even bear mentioning. But today, I think it requires much more of a parent’s time, effort, resources, and attention. It’s a good thing I really like my kids, almost as much as I like my wife.”     

On September 26^th 2022, CAMPUT announced the appointment of a new executive director. A professional accountant with broad experience in leadership, strategic direction and stakeholder relations, Jocelyn Fraser officially assumed the position on December 1^st.

She comes well-qualified for what will be a challenging job. Following an early career in public accounting practice, “I was introduced to the regulatory and energy world through the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board,” she says. During nearly ten years there as Director of Risk and Financial Advisory Services, “I was focused primarily on utility regulation but volunteered extensively within the CAMPUT network including teaching at CAMPUT’s Energy Regulation Course.”

As stated on its website, CAMPUT’s mission is “to continuously improve energy and public utility regulation in Canada.”

Perhaps not a household name, CAMPUT and its predecessor organizations have long been an integral part of the evolving Canadian utilities regulation scene. They go back to the early 1960s, when members of the Canadian Association of Utility Commissioners met annually to discuss matters of common regulatory concern and interest.

As its purview expanded, in April 1976 that association was reorganized and CAMPUT was born. Formally established as an acronym for the Canadian Association of Members of Public Utility Tribunals, its objective was to promote the quality of public utility regulation in Canada by providing a forum for the exchange of information and views among its members. Founding members hosted annual general meetings in their respective jurisdictions.

CAMPUT continued to grow in size and prominence. In 2011 it adopted as its moniker just the acronym CAMPUT. Full membership eligibility was expanded to “any Canadian tribunal, board, commission or agency responsible for the economic regulation of one or more utilities in its province, territory or jurisdiction, as well as to any Canadian energy tribunal, board, commission or agency that makes binding decisions through adjudicative or quasi-judicial processes.”

“With Canada’s energy future facing reorganization and transition towards an affordable and sustainable net-zero future, regulators adopt an important new vision: balancing newly-defined environmental issues with traditional consumer protection responsibilities.”

And now CAMPUT continues its evolution taking on fresh challenges. With Canada’s energy future facing reorganization and transition towards an affordable and sustainable net-zero future, regulators adopt an important new vision: balancing newly-defined environmental issues with traditional consumer protection responsibilities.

At CAMPUT, Fraser knows these responsibilities will be challenging but she’s ready. “I was pulled back to the energy world by my wonderful network of peers,” she says. “But what enticed me was my passion for problem solving and the opportunity to support collaboration in this industry to help overcome barriers and focus on long term successful energy transition and security. Many years ago, I was described by a one of my peers as a ‘Triple A’ personality. I have always spun [that] as Authentic, Approachable and Adaptable.”

The CAMPUT 2023 conference in May 2023, added another couple of ‘A’s which aptly describe the challenges facing Fraser and the regulations industry in Canada. The conference themed Ambitious & Agile: New Regulatory Pathways for a Just Energy Transition. The program focus was summed up as, “The pace of the energy transition is accelerating, and along with other energy stakeholders, regulators need to be decisive and agile to respond to changing expectations…we challenge conventional wisdom regarding the role of energy regulators and explore bold and innovative ideas about how we can adapt and develop new pathways to a just energy transition.”

Clearly this demonstrates that the regulators’ role in Canada’s energy transition is not yet well-defined and there are important topics needing serious discussion. For example, accelerating innovation. “Innovation is often described as a critical component of the energy transition,” the program states. “Do regulators have a role in accelerating innovation? If so, what is it? (e.g. updating regulatory approach to incent utilities to innovate? advocating for legislative change? partnerships and collaboration? encouraging investments in innovations?).”

Another is necessary alliances to achieve net zero: While sector-specific greenhouse gas and renewables targets exist in many jurisdictions, “meeting Canada’s economy-wide net-zero goal by 2050 may require a level of cross-sector cooperation that could make strange bedfellows out of historical competitors.”

In tackling such new questions and issues, CAMPUT’s approach will need to be creative. “Our membership is a diverse collection of regulatory bodies with varying mandates, legislation, and regional opportunities,” says Fraser. “I need to listen and remain adaptable to support a diverse membership. That said, I do believe within our diversity we have experiences and solutions that can be used as a roadmap for how we can all improve. We really do have to be in this transition together.”

“The pace of the energy transition is accelerating, and along with other energy stakeholders, regulators need to be decisive and agile to respond to changing expectations…”

To better understand how Canada might reform utility legislation to accommodate the growing environmental obligations, in 2022 the Canadian Gas Association and Electricity Canada prepared a study called Net Zero: An International Review of Energy Delivery System Policy and Regulation for Canadian Energy Decision Makers.¹ The paper included a roadmap for Canada to amend and update its utility regulatory policy and legislation.

To do that, the report found, Canada needs to create a task force with a mandate to develop concrete legislative and policy reform in light of emissions reductions towards a sustainable net zero. The force would be collaborative: convening federal, provincial, and territorial policymakers and regulators alongside Indigenous and municipal governments and organizations, industry, civil society and academic leaders.

Fraser says she’s aware of the need for collaboration. She concurs with forming a joint task force to hit the bullseye. “I recognize policy at a federal level has given us broad goals, but the energy sector is primarily regulated at regional levels,” she says. “I would love to see a roadmap of where we are and where we need to be, broken down by province/territory and industry ideally with proposed solutions and targets. Breaking down where we are struggling to advance our goals could provide insight into what barriers we need to look at and guide policy makers toward targeted solutions.”

She’s poised to start. “Necessary change is difficult even when we know exactly what we are trying to fix,” she says. “CAMPUT needs to be part of an exercise that maps out an understanding of what drives the decisions of regulators, regulated utilities, unregulated investment and other market participants across our country.”

Graham Chandler spent a decade in energy corporate finance and marketing management. As a full-time freelance writer, he has specialized in energy topics for the past 20 years.

 

Julie Gaudreau, Executive Director of the International Gas Union Research Conference 2024 (IGRC2024) had the opportunity to speak with Haisla Nation Chief Councillor Crystal Smith in August 2022 about social innovation in the natural gas sector and advancing important relationships with Indigenous communities. The interview has been edited for conciseness and clarity.

Julie Gaudreau (Julie): I’m very happy to have you here today, so thank you. Just to give you a bit of the context, last June we had the second IGRC2024 webinar on the topic of energy and social innovation in which Chris Sankey and Karen Ogen-Toews participated, and you were not able to participate because of last-minute schedule changes. So we appreciate the time now to pick up on the theme of the webinar.

When we talk about innovation, usually people think that it’s only about technology, but we believe it’s really more than that. We believe that innovation is really about doing things in new and transformative ways. There are exciting developments in the natural gas space that represent real social innovation and I believe that advance reconciliation with indigenous communities. So, I will start with my first question to you. What do you think social innovation means, and what does it mean for Indigenous People in respect to natural gas development and use in Canada?

Chief Councillor Crystal Smith (Chief Councillor): Social innovation is essentially taking into context the people aspect; taking into account the human in all the decisions that we’re making. It is having that thought process as you move through any type of engagement, conversation or decision-making process: that each decision makes [an] impact on people [at each] level.

And I think, as we move towards this new conversation around ESG (environment, social and governance), that the social aspect definitely has to be taken into consideration. I’m very fortunate to be in in the middle of the construction of a huge project and I am seeing first-hand the social impact that it’s having in our community. And it is a story that needs to be told, it needs to be recognized.

We’re not just changing and having an impact on people’s lives of today. I truly believe that what we’re creating in our community [and] the way that we’ve taken our people along for this journey, is something that’s going to be generationally positive: there are going to be huge positive impacts for many generations because we’re creating role models in a way. Opportunities that we see with LNG Canada, and with Coastal GasLink – and this is just one way the energy project is a very dynamic opportunity – have many different ripple effects that we’re seeing as we take into consideration the impact of people coming into our territory.

We’re going to need more doctors. We’re going to need more teachers. We’re going to need more nurses. This is a huge impact in everybody’s lives when it comes to our Haisla membership in the region, and the province.

Julie: So right now, you’re building the foundation, as you say, you’re creating something. Then hopefully the next generation will pick up from there and then continue the next phase, so it continues to grow and look to the future?

Chief Councillor: Most definitely. I mean, the reason why we supported these projects was that we were getting tired of managing poverty. We were tired of not having solutions as to how to save our language and save our culture for future generations and that was the main driver behind us participating so actively – and in some people’s view, very aggressively – to get these projects become successful.

I’ve got an identical twin sister, and we grew up with my grandmother who would speak our language. We were only given the opportunity to learn our language up until grade seven, so we were 13. She is now the language teacher in our community school and to hear her speak our language brings back those memories of listening to my grandmother speak it. And to think that I never thought that anyone close in my generation would have ever had that opportunity, and now my sister’s learning it. She’s speaking it, and she’s thriving. I can see her confidence level in herself grow as she learns her identity as a Haisla woman.

Julie: It’s interesting because – just to close the loop on that – the language is the way to transmit the culture. So, in Quebec – because right now I’m in Quebec, in Montreal, and we’ve been fighting for a long time to preserve the French language because originally, as you say, this is a way to transmit the culture and the history [and] you can be better equipped for the next phase of the future.

Chief Councillor: Yes. Growing up, that’s all I constantly heard from adults that would be having conversations about our youth in our community, whether it was in a school district or leaders in our community. If you don’t know who you are, or where your roots are, who you are as a person, as your culture it makes it more difficult to leave and to have that confidence to be able to excel in any aspect of life.

Now I’m seeing that – and to hear that, to have that conversation around me as a young child and see [it] as a youth – to now, being in my forties and seeing that reality come to fruition in our people is absolutely overwhelming emotionally. It’s what drives my passion to continue doing what I do. My twin sister is a very prime example of why I will continue to support this industry and to push for more success and to advocate for First Nations, not only in this province and on behalf of Haisla, but First Nations across this country to experience what we’re experiencing.

Julie: Can you speak a little bit more about the projects that you’re involved in?

Chief Councillor: I think for the most part other communities in our region definitely see the positive impacts [of the projects]. I’m fortunate that I get to go for tours of LNG Canada and Coastal GasLink and I see so many other First Nations’ joint ventures participating in the economy. Before, there was so much dissension created in between our nations because of territorial boundaries and land claims – not only fighting over territories, but fighting over money too – to help our communities. There was never an opportunity where we could look to be welcoming other nations to share the wealth. We now have that, and we can see those nations with their joint ventures participating in our economy – [the] revenues generated from those JVs go back to the community; not only that, the employment opportunity here is huge as well.

When I grew up in with my grandparents, I had my two uncles living with us. I had my mom, my dad, my grandparents and my twin sister. That was one household. If you provided an opportunity for my dad or one of my uncles, to thrive in an industry and excel, you were impacting so many people – a whole household. You also then create role models: I’m looking at my dad or my uncle thinking, ‘hey, I have this opportunity and I can do it if they’re doing it.’ So, the impacts that we’re able to see are far reaching. It’s not just First Nations people benefiting. It’s this country that’s benefiting from this project. And that needs to be celebrated.

Julie: I believe that you’re not only a role model for your community, but you are a role model for all Canadians. It’s really important to find ways to come together, so we can develop in a responsible way, because if we don’t come together, then investment will go elsewhere. Do you see that as a threat?

Chief Councillor: Like I said, this project just doesn’t benefit Haisla. Yes it is in Haisla territory. But we’re sharing that wealth, sharing that opportunity, and coming together with other nations and we’re able to solve more issues coming together in a positive manner. When you talk about the social aspect of what this project’s been able to do, I can tell you one key point: it’s brought nations back together again. I co-chair an alliance called the Northern First Nations Alliance, and that generated from a conversation between myself and the previous chief counselor, Clifford White of Gitxaala. I had a proposal to work together and train our people together. I had proposed we pool our resources together and provide that training opportunity for each of our nations together, where we would be sharing human resources, and the monetary aspect of having our people trained. That conversation grew to include all social aspects, not just training employment. If we want to bring our people home from urban areas such as Vancouver or Prince George, we need housing because there’s not enough housing in our communities to be able to bring them home. So we started talking about where we can work together to provide affordable housing, and it grew. Not only are we able to have employment opportunities and training opportunities, now we’re able to invest in our people because there is revenue generated for our communities. If we want to do a housing initiative here for the first time, we’re able to offer up some of the capital cost because of the revenues generated to our communities. We’re in front of government officials where we’re standing together saying “we need to provide solutions for our people on the ground – tangible, real results” and that’s what we’re able to do. The opportunities of what we can achieve together are endless. It’s so inspiring, sitting at tables with like-minded leaders where we’re able to put past differences, egos aside, so that we can make an impact on our people, and we can end homelessness and we can start looking at mental health and addiction issues. It’s amazing.

Julie: You mentioned something earlier that leads me to my next question. There are many, many great stories. How do we get the stories out so people know more and more about that?

Chief Councillor: It’s reaching those people that these projects actually affect – and it’s displaying their stories. In one podcast, I interviewed one of our members about her story. She’s a single mom, she’s very young and she had suffered through addiction issues. My grandson is the same age as her daughter, and we were helping as much as we could but she needed more help. LabCorp, who was our partner, provided her a training opportunity, and another one of our members advocated for her and served as a support system for her. Our single mom had been making posts on Facebook saying, ‘I’m really depressed. I need clothes for my baby. I need formula for my baby. I can’t provide Pampers.” And with help she went from social media posts about her being depressed and the fact that she can’t provide for her child, to her being featured in a video with medical care, saying that she’s got an income and medical insurance. And not only that, but now she’s a role model for her daughter.

It’s [about] displaying success stories like this – showing the impacts of what these big project opportunities represent.

Here is another. We were able to build a youth center for the first time ever in our community. For many years, we’ve heard our leaders and ourselves included, saying our youth is our future and let’s go start investing in them. And now we finally have a facility for youth, where we can provide endless programming and opportunity for them. These are huge impacts in our community.

Julie: It’s interesting because as the Executive Director of the International Gas Research Conference that will be held in Banff in May 2024 – a global conference on gas innovation – I’m thinking, is there a way that we could use that platform to showcase the benefit of projects like that and to really show all the social innovation and maybe have some people sharing stories like this? But, what can government do to support social innovation in your communities?

Chief Councillor: I cannot say. I also sit on the First Nations Climate Initiative where we’re talking about global warming and contributing to other areas… it’s supporting that balance and taking into consideration all aspects of everything. I mean, LNG Canada is a huge example of how government, industry and Indigenous communities came together to provide the success that’s been established. If there is a precedent set within that process, it’s to allow that conversation to continue in regards to how we become more a part of having the same goals and objectives. We’re listening to First Nations communities such as ours, as we go through the process, as we went, literally, from bystanders of watching the economy develop in our territory to a situation now where we’re owners. It’s not for my profile. I have 1900 people who I speak on behalf of. It isn’t a perfect process. Do they all support the work that we’re doing? No, but the majority of them do. And when I’m in Ottawa and I’m away from my family, I think about my grandsons and the impact that me getting out in front of people and knocking down my own personal fears of doing what I’m doing.

I was so terrified when LNG Canada announced their positive final investment decision and I was going to make a speech in front of the Prime Minister and the Premier. There had been at least 100 cameras around and I was terrified. I was so scared. [But] a text message to me said, “Allow your people to speak through you.” And I’ve always held that saying and that belief in my heart – that I speak on behalf of a large group of people and whether they support me personally, I’m doing this to improve the quality of lives and the opportunity that they have. And not only [for] today, but for future generations. The success that I see right now because of LNG Canada – I can’t put into words what it’s doing for our community. It’s a step in the direction that every First Nation in this country, in this world, would want. We’re driving this project; we’ve got a great partner in Pembina [Pipeline] that are the experts when it comes to the facility build, but we are owners. We are building it to our values and holding it and keeping our principles at the board level and driving that through. So, the precedent has been set. We’ve proven to the world that Canada can provide the cleanest LNG energy to the rest of the world, and we need to continue to push in that direction. Again, the First Nations participation is huge. The way that we’ve been able to find our success and find balance in our territory, is worth noting. Every First Nation has that ability and the opportunity to do that. All levels of government and First Nations want that success.

Julie: Is there a way that government [can]better support Indigenous ownership and engagement in resource projects?

Chief Councillor: Absolutely. What we’re running into right now is the financial aspect. Being an owner in a major project, we’re like every other proponent, every other private sector company. We’re having to raise the capital. We’re having to do our part within this project, and every province is different when we take into consideration that ability to financially participate. It’s [about] creating conversations and avenues for us to allow that active participation – policies and regulations and all of that need to come together to allow that success. 

Julie: How does natural gas fit with [the] climate [conversation] and caring for the environment? What is your perspective on that?

Chief Councillor: I’m sure that technologies are being built across the world in order to mitigate impacts and help our climate. It’s a transitioning field. We recognize that it’s a part of the solution [even though] there are people that don’t agree with that statement. What is the solution? We’re not going to have the ability to have electric cars and all of these ambitious goals in a timely manner. Meanwhile, countries like in Asia and other parts of the world are still burning coal, and we still have First Nations communities here in this province still burning diesel to power their communities. What are we doing about those? Right. They are the dirtiest energies to be utilizing. I recognize that with LNG there are people that don’t believe that it’s a solution now, and we would be able to have a tremendous impact if we were able to get especially B.C. gas to other countries in order to help reduce their emissions and hit their targets.

Julie: It’s interesting because at the beginning of the interview, you were talking about how the focus should be on the human being. It doesn’t mean that you don’t care about the environment, but you need to be there to serve the people, and then you take care of the land. I was reading a paper this morning and it was about how gas can help and alleviate poverty in Africa. They were talking about the importance of having reliable and affordable electric power, because when you have that power, then you can end poverty – you can have industries, you can study, you can have many, many things. We need to use the energy to get out of poverty. That goes to the same point that the human being should be at the center of every policy doesn’t it?

Chief Councillor: It’s not that we don’t care about our environment – we do, that’s part of our culture. I grew up with my grandparents and unfortunately didn’t get along with my grandparents, but they taught me the basics [including] to never take more than you need and to always leave areas as when you arrived. That’s when my sister and I realized that my grandparents were teaching us the law. It was so inspiring. And this wasn’t just being taught in our home, it was being taught in in all of my friends’ and all of my extended families’ homes. That’s who we are. And, to the story that’s not been told in regards to the LNG Canada project, people think that when you go into communities with First Nations, with indigenous communities, you’re engaging leadership, you’re engaging Chief Councillors. That was far from our process. We have so many cultural knowledge holders in our territory that are far more expert than myself – when it comes to any type of impact in our territory, LNG Canada engaged those people, they engaged our community, they engaged our cultural knowledge holders in the processes in which they applied for, for permits. And they didn’t go in front of any regulatory body without the support of our safety first. That approach in taking into consideration what was acceptable in our territory at a certain time was huge. That was a part of their success and that was because we had our say in how it was developed.

Julie: A lot of the work in your community has been about building new approaches, and consensus. Do you have any advice to help Canada get beyond the polarization of energy issues?

Chief Councillor: I think the world has seen, and our First Nations communities have seen, what the lack of engagement can do to a project. I mean, there was one that was proposed specifically for our territory that wasn’t successful, and essentially it was about the approach and the inclusion of communities. It isn’t an easy experience. Just like any other proponent, we’re having hard discussions. We’re engaging our community members, and the stakeholders in our region, and it’s [difficult] but it’s about having that opportunity to express concerns – and they’re not minor concerns. Essentially, every First Nations community wants to protect whatever they have as a cultural value in their land. Our cultural value matters – our people will do anything to be able to bring that and revitalize that staple in our territory. So, it’s about having those hard conversations, building relationships with First Nations communities and learning about what the land means to us and taking that as a part of the process and implementing it into discussions.

I think the one last thing that I would say as a part of that is, while this is all about external conversations in regards to engaging with other levels of government, I have 1900 people that I am speaking on behalf of. Those are the most important people in my role, for me personally. If I don’t have their support in the mandate, then I would not be in front of you today. I think that would be my message to other leaders – have the mandate from your people, have their support – and it’s not an easy process, it’s the most difficult one to go through. But that is so vitally important.

Julie Gaudreau is the Executive Director of the International Gas Research Conference 2024 (IGRC2024) at the Canadian Gas Association (CGA). In this role, Mrs. Gaudreau oversees the creation, the development and the strategic positioning of the global conference as well as the engagement with the various stakeholders of the gas value chain, including key gas consumers and the gas technology innovation sub-sector and Indigenous leaders. She is a graduate of the Faculty of Law of Laval University and was admitted to the Quebec Bar in 1997. After articling with a private law firm specializing in criminal, civil and matrimonial law, Mrs. Gaudreau held positions in sales, marketing and human resources in a consultation firm. Subsequently, she held a senior advisor position in the Office of the Prime Minister of Canada in Ottawa, where she was responsible for stakeholder relations. During this time, she had the opportunity to be part of the War Room team for the 2011 Federal Election. After leaving politics, she joined CN, one of North America’s leading railroads, where she served as Senior Counsel – Strategic Advice to the Executive Vice-President, Corporate Services.

1. Thank you for taking the time with us today. First, we want to congratulate you on your new role as Chair of the Canadian Gas Association’s Board of Directors. It marks another step in a significant career in the sector. What originally drew you to the energy industry?

I grew up in Northern Alberta and my dad worked in oilfield services. In fact, my first job was working for my dad so I have a long history with the energy sector.

2. What advice would you give young people who are interested in entering the energy industry today?

It’s an exciting and dynamic time to be a part of the energy industry. A career in energy is an opportunity to make a real difference in the quality of people’s lives — energy heats homes, transports goods and generates economic growth.

“A career in energy is an opportunity to make a real difference in the quality of people’s lives…”

Natural gas provides millions of Canadians with the most affordable and reliable energy choice right now and we’re working hard to integrate energy systems and green our grids, driving toward a lower-carbon future. Given our size and reach, gas utilities are uniquely positioned to lead the transition. For example, right now at Enbridge Gas, we have many low-carbon fuel programs such as hydrogen and renewable natural gas, alternative heating technologies, like geothermal and solar, and conservation programs that lower emissions in buildings and industrial sectors.

For young people interested in real-world answers to our most pressing challenges, like balancing the need for affordable energy to fuel economic growth while addressing climate change, the energy industry is the place to be.

3. Enbridge Gas has worked closely with the Province of Ontario to expand the natural gas system into rural and small communities. At a time when many municipalities are talking about gas bans, what kind of response have you received from these communities and how do you see this expansion benefiting these municipalities?

Access to reliable, affordable natural gas is essential to Ontario’s rural and northern communities. Natural gas lowers energy bills for families, creates new opportunities for Ontarians, and helps businesses become more competitive, grow, and create jobs. Natural gas also has a lower carbon footprint than alternatives like wood, heating oil, and propane.

Through the first phase of the Ontario government’s Natural Gas Expansion Program, Enbridge Gas successfully completed seven new community expansion projects. The response in these communities has been incredible, and we are on track to meet our customer attachment goal over the 10-year forecast period.

Interest in the second phase of the program was robust, and the Ontario government recently announced $234 million in funding to support gas connections in 43 rural, northern and Indigenous communities, through 28 projects. We plan to begin construction this year, with all projects expected to be underway by the end of 2025. We look forward to working together with the province and local municipalities to continue to bring natural gas to more Ontario homes and businesses.

4. Enbridge has been actively advancing its work related to renewable natural gas (RNG) and hydrogen development. What role do you see these gaseous fuels playing in the near and long term?

The three largest contributors to GHG emissions are transportation, building heat and industry. Collectively, these account for over 80 per cent of total emissions.¹ Hydrogen and RNG can be a cost-effective means to decarbonize these areas today, and we are scaling up production and injection over time.

Transportation

Transportation generates the single largest amount of GHG emissions in Ontario. Electrification of light passenger vehicles will play a critical role in decarbonizing the transportation sector. Electrification of heavy transportation, however, is prohibitive at this time due to battery size and recharging requirements. This sector can be decarbonized cost effectively today using compressed natural gas, which delivers up to 20 per cent GHG reduction and up to 40 per cent in fuel savings, compared to gasoline or diesel. Using renewable natural gas, you can achieve zero emissions, a solution which many Ontario municipalities are using today, including Toronto and Hamilton. In the longer term, hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles are another option for zero-emission vehicles.

Building heat

The second largest source of GHG emissions in Ontario is building heat. Today, natural gas heats about 75 per cent of Ontario homes. To replace this with electricity would take a 200–300 per cent increase in our current electricity system, which would take time to build out, and would be a significant cost.

Scaling up hydrogen and RNG production is an effective way to decarbonize building heat at a lower cost than electricity,² while preserving energy system resiliency.

Enbridge is advancing RNG and hydrogen on a number of fronts. Through our voluntary RNG program, OptUp, customers can choose to support the transition to low-carbon energy through a small monthly contribution to help offset the increased costs of acquiring carbon-neutral renewable natural gas. In Markham, we are piloting hydrogen blending at our Power-to-Gas facility, which is capable of producing 1,000 kilograms a day, enough energy to fuel 100 fuel cell cars driving 1,000 km a day. The success of these programs will support Enbridge in pursuing additional and larger-scale hydrogen blending activities enabling Canada to further reduce its already low carbon footprint on a large scale.

Over the longer term, as costs for hydrogen and RNG continue to decline with innovation and deployment, we will continue to increase the percentage of RNG and H2 in the gas supply. We will also continue our aggressive conservation programs and the adoption of other low-carbon technologies such as geothermal, solar PV, natural gas heat pumps and hybrid heating systems, offering multiple pathways to achieving net-zero emissions from building heat.

Industry

Industry is the third-largest contributor of GHG emissions in Ontario. Hydrogen is an effective solution for energy-intensive activities, like steel and concrete production.

Canada is starting to accelerate our ability to use hydrogen. In the near term, Enbridge and others are completing pilot projects and infrastructure development that will allow us to scale this resource to its maximum potential by 2050.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is also a proven technology, available now, that offers a significant pathway to achieve GHG reductions for hard-to-decarbonize industries. Canada is a world leader in CCS with longstanding projects in western Canada. Here in Ontario, the geology of southwestern Ontario is suitable for carbon storage, and Enbridge has a long history of safe and reliable underground natural gas storage.

5. The public policy discourse from elected officials is often not friendly to natural gas right now — the Ontario gas expansion program being an exception. But as that Ontario program makes clear, customers very much appreciate all we offer — affordability, reliability, and environmental performance. How do you think the industry can better convey the customer acceptance reality to our political decisionmakers?

We must tell our story and bring perspective to the energy transition discussion.

The bottom line is, our energy systems are interdependent and an integrated pathway offers a more realistic,³ lower cost and lower risk path to emission reductions. Electrification alone is not enough to get us there.

Today, natural gas accounts for roughly 30 per cent of the energy used in Ontario, and almost three and a half times as much peak energy as electricity. Replacing this with electricity, while ensuring the redundancy and reliability required during peak load will be extremely challenging. In addition, electricity cannot be stored at scale, needing on-demand backup both now and as renewable power expands, and it is not suitable for many energy intense industrial applications.

Enbridge has been actively reaching out to decisionmakers, municipalities, regulators and other stakeholders to demonstrate how energy systems must work together to drive the transition to a low-carbon future. And we’re sharing information on how we’re supporting the transition through innovative energy solutions and collaboration with governments and partners that reduce environmental impacts while keeping energy affordable and reliable.

“Enbridge has been actively reaching out to decisionmakers, municipalities, regulators and other stakeholders to demonstrate how energy systems must work together to drive the transition to a low-carbon future.”

6. CGA recently won the bid to host the global gas innovation conference known as IGRC2024, to be in your home province of Alberta, in Banff, in May of that year. Globally, natural gas use is growing at a remarkable pace — and many around the world want access to Canadian gas, and to our expertise in managing it. What do you think the Canadian industry should do to make the event a particularly valuable one?

I am excited that Canada will be able to highlight to the world all the great programs and initiatives we have that are driving lower carbon solutions. The event will be a success with the dialogue that we will generate with key decisionmakers — working together is critical to meeting the global target of net zero by 2050.

 

You assumed position as Executive Director of the Canadian Association of Members of Public Utility Tribunals (CAMPUT) in 2018.  Tell me a bit about your work before CAMPUT.

My entire career has been involved with energy and regulation. I have worked for governments, oil and  gas companies, utilities and public interest groups. I’ve really seen the sector from every angle and it is endlessly fascinating.

I became the Executive Director of CAMPUT in 2018, but I was not new to CAMPUT. From 2004 to 2014, I was at the Ontario Energy Board as a Member, Vice-Chair, and Interim Chair and CEO. During that time, I served as CAMPUT Chair, so I was very familiar with the work CAMPUT does to promote excellence in regulation. I am excited to support that mission now as Executive Director.

You have an interesting perspective representing provincial and territorial regulators. What is the one thing all regions have in common? And what is the biggest difference?

CAMPUT has a small and diverse membership, but all our members are facing issues around climate change policy, disruption from new technologies and changing customer expectations, as well as concerns about affordability.

What varies among CAMPUT members is how they can respond to these issues. Some members have broad decision-making powers, including rate setting, rules and licensing.  Others are limited to making recommendations to government. The membership also varies widely in terms of resources. Some CAMPUT members have hundreds of staff, while others have only a handful. CAMPUT supports its members by sharing information, best practices, and resources.

“We are seeing the potential for new technologies to fundamentally change the structure of the sector.”

The Canadian Gas Association is interested in how you see the natural gas discussion evolving and what is on the horizon for the industry? 

The conversation around natural gas is really interesting. Deregulation and increased competition in the sector resulted in an integrated North American market that has served customers well in terms of security and affordability. However, the situation is changing for natural gas. We are assessing the implications of climate change on the future of all fossil fuels.

The natural gas sector has been effective in communicating some of the issues around wide-scale de-carbonization, in terms of cost and reduced diversity. And we see the sector taking the challenge seriously as it seeks to decarbonize its operations through technologies like renewable natural gas.

There are going to be tough issues around our response to the climate challenge and its long-term implications for the natural gas sector. Depending on government policy, regulators may have to wrestle with issues like depreciation and stranded assets in new ways.

As Canada looks to deliver on both affordable energy and environmental objectives, tell me how your members balance this challenging set of public policy priorities in their work.

Affordability and climate change are both front of mind for customers and politicians – and regulators, too.

The time-frame is a challenge – for customers and politicians, affordability is often an immediate concern – they are focused on where prices are right now. Regulators work to protect the interests of both current and future customers. Regulators want to drive efficiency through incentives and rigorous evaluations, while also incenting appropriate investments for the future.

We are seeing upward pressure on electricity rates from replacing aging infrastructure and adding new infrastructure to accommodate new resources. We are also seeing the potential for new technologies to fundamentally change the structure of the sector. Each regulator will address the issues within the context of their jurisdiction. Two regulators, the Alberta Utilities Commission and the Ontario Energy Board, are examining the implications of the changing sector on how utilities should be regulated. These processes can bring forth the best ideas and evidence to inform decision-making.

Energy regulation plays a fundamental but often ‘out of sight’ role in Canada.  Do we need to do more to raise the profile of energy regulatory matters and if so, do you have any priority areas of focus?

We often discuss this amongst the membership. Should regulators be more “high profile”?

Regulators don’t want to be household names, but they need to maintain a reputation for thoughtful decision-making, open and transparent processes, and effective stakeholder engagement. Regulators want to be trusted long-term institutions which operate separately from political decision-making.

To achieve that level of trust, regulators work to enhance confidence in the regulatory process and decision-making. CAMPUT and its members are pursuing a number of initiatives, including:

Writing decisions in plain language, discussing decisions in ways that make them more easily understood by a broader audience, and enhancing public engagement with the regulatory process.

Collaborating with academics, thinktanks, and other organizations working on key issues. I’m thinking of Positive Energy at the University of Ottawa, the Energy Regulators’ Dialogue with the Public Policy Forum, the work of QUEST, and others.

Retaining the hallmarks of good regulatory process – openness, transparency, evidence-based decision-making – while exploring new and innovative processes like “sandboxes”.

Tell our readers something about you they may not know – a hobby, upcoming vacation, interest outside of energy regulation?

One of the best things I did last year was join a book club. I’ve always loved to read, but somehow never joined a book club. This month we’re reading The Overstory, by Richard Powers. It is a fascinating story about trees and people. I find myself looking at my backyard maples in a whole new way. The book won the Pulitzer Prize in 2019 – and I highly recommend it.

Cynthia Chaplin is Executive Director of CAMPUT, the association of Canada’s provincial, federal, and territorial energy and utility regulators. She has more than 30 years of experience as an energy economist, consultant, and regulator in Canada and the UK. Most recently, Cynthia served as Member, Vice-Chair, and Chair & CEO (interim) of the Ontario Energy Board (2004-2014), where she presided over complex multi-party oral hearings and policy consultations. She has also held senior positions with British Petroleum, Amoco and the United Kingdom’s gas regulator (Ofgas). Cynthia holds undergraduate and master’s degrees in economics from the University of Toronto and the ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors.

Not really. That’s the worse thing that can happen to a woman, says Brochu, President and Chief Executive Officer of Énergir (formerly Gaz Métro).  “It used to be acceptable, it used to work, but it doesn’t work anymore. The idea is not to become a man – or for a man to become a woman – but to welcome and be yourself and not be afraid of bringing your own colour to a rainbow that requires the diversity of colours.”

Diversity, specifically gender diversity at the executive and board level, is a trending business topic that has been decades in the making. While women have not always been represented on executive boards, analysts – and stakeholders – now recognize diversity of thought, perspective and opinion at a decision-making level is critical for performance and innovation.

The Canadian Gas Association’s Board of Directors stands out as an example of gender diversity in a male-dominated industry. Five of the 10 directors are women, including Brochu, and Board Chair Leigh Ann Shoji-Lee, President of Pacific Northern Gas Ltd.

Shoji-Lee doesn’t see herself as a trailblazer, despite having been the first female vice president of operations and engineering at Union Gas and Senior Vice President of Field Operations for BC Hydro. For the mechanical engineer, leadership is more about what she can do to help the organizations and the people they serve than her gender.

“I do think that women have a different perspective on issues,” the Chatham, Ontario native says. “I don’t want to be stereotypical, but women tend to be more collaborative, have better listening skills, definitely have different experiences. And it’s more about bringing the different experiences, ideas and perspectives to the table. And having more women at the table will bring that.”

Getting there continues to be a challenge

Although there has been movement to support gender diversity on boards, through policies or guidelines, the actual number of women in leadership positions in Canadian corporations has scarcely increased in the last decade. Two-thirds of publicly traded Canadian companies have at least one woman on their boards, but females occupy only 15 per cent of all board seats, according to a September 2018 report by Canadian securities regulators. This is up marginally from 11 per cent in 2014.

And intent has proven not enough to make a change: while companies that adopted targets for the representation of women on their boards have more than doubled, that spike represents a mere 16 per cent of publicly traded companies in Canada. But say “quota” and many cringe.

Although the numbers show progress – companies targeting women on their boards had on average 24 per cent female directors, compared to 13 per cent among companies without targets – nobody wants to be promoted based on policy rather than ability – or be perceived as such. Shoji-Lee recalls finding out Union Gas had specifically targeted women candidates for her first position, an uncomfortable realization she reconciled with as giving her the opportunity to be at the table. “But I had to display that I deserved to stay there. So I worked hard to prove that I earned the right to stay there,” she says.

At TC Energy Corporation (formerly TransCanada), 27 per cent of the leadership at all levels and 25 per cent of the board are women. “We’re moving in the right direction, and we’re seeing the numbers respond by asking the right questions and doing the right things,” says CGA board member Tracy Robinson, Executive Vice-President and President, Canadian Natural Gas Pipelines, TC Energy Corporation.

The numbers are slow to come around, without a doubt, but we are seeing more diversity, she says. “The benefit of a discussion on quotas is that it opens the discussion of ‘what would it take?’ If we imagine a world of 50 per cent, what are we doing to get these candidates ready?

Purposeful Support

Robinson sees investing in capabilities through a variety of experiences, exposure, and education as well as some specific mentoring for women and members of visible minority groups as necessary to take us to the next level. “It doesn’t always happen organically, that change, it is something that we all need to be purposeful about, in creating the right candidates and allowing people from all backgrounds to put themselves in a position to succeed.”

A focus on development also battles an often-used argument against instituting policies that maintains there aren’t enough qualified women and having quotas would negatively affect an organization. To meet the challenge, a group of highly qualified women once put together a profile package, promoting their skills to CEOs and boards across Canada saying “we are out here,” recalls Jay Grewal, President and CEO of Manitoba Hydro. “I would ask the question “do men have to do that?”

Grewal was surprised about the media attention her gender received when she took over leadership of the Crown corporation in January. With more and more women taking on executive roles in corporations across the country, she didn’t expect being the first female CEO of the provincial utility to take the spotlight over her abilities.

“In all roles, it’s been demonstrated that a diversity of perspective, along with different individual frameworks for how you think through issues and problems is always helpful. And if that helps a board arrive at better decisions, better solutions, better support for management, absolutely that is how a board should be staffed,” she says.

The former CEO of Northwest Territories Power Corporation who has held executive roles with organizations like CIBC World Markets, BC Hydro and Accenture Inc., believes direction from the top will support more women entering non-traditional roles through mentorship and sponsorship. “The reality is we don’t have enough women in leading core, big operational groups – generation, transmission, distribution,” Grewal notes. “Unfortunately, women are still predominantly represented in the support areas – HR, finance, legal. As women are more broadly represented in all parts of the business it may potentially increase the number of women on boards.”

Policies and Mentorship

CGA Board member Malini Giridhar, Vice-President, Business Development and Regulatory, Enbridge Gas Inc., can remember when there was only one woman on the executive team at Enbridge Gas – just four years ago. Today, she notes that half are women as a result of shifting how leadership competencies are seen – thought leadership, execution, people and personal leadership – as well as focusing on diversity and inclusion.

“Polices are important because without policies you have no way of calling out unconscious bias. And we all have unconscious biases,” Giridhar says. The concerted process Enbridge Gas undertook has helped elevate a broader group of candidates for leadership development and ultimately leadership roles, she says – with a proviso.

“Just because we have more women at the executive level of leadership doesn’t mean we have reached our final stage because at other levels of leadership we still see a very skewed representation. We are by no means done.

“Mentorship and sponsorship are critical for women to get exposure and opportunities.”

“But what is encouraging is that we’ve done a number of things that has allowed us to look at diversity more broadly. Just valuing diversity and recognizing that leadership at senior levels is about how you engage and deliver to large, complex teams helps the case.”

Mentorship and sponsorship are critical for women to get exposure and opportunities, although many leaders point out sponsorship – where a leader actively speaks positively about someone – can take you further. “That having someone who broadly supports and advocates for you and who takes that leap of faith to say “You maynot have the experience to do this, but I believe you have the capability and the potential, so what do we need to do to support you in taking this on, are you interested. That’s huge,” says Grewal.

Succeeding

Today’s business environment is not a meritocracy, a difficult awakening for women joining the workforce after having worked hard and excelled academically. To succeed, women have to participate, get themselves noticed, take advantage of every opportunity that comes their way, veterans advise.

“What I say the most is ground yourself in who you really are, listen to those inner voices and grab every opportunity that walks by you,” Robinson says. “The best experiences in my career have been the ones I didn’t expect to happen. Over your career, find ways to build a portfolio of unique experiences and put yourself fully into every single one of them. And it will happen.”

For Brochu, having a confident mental stance is important as many women need to believe more in their competencies and better pitch themselves when applying for job opportunities. “My belief is that women need to know themselves to be able to make changes in their business and enterprise and to change society. But it starts with them. Have a confident mental posture, know when it’s time to play to not to lose and when it’s time to play to win, and do more of the latter and less of the former.”

In the early 1960s, Alberta farmers were clamoring for a lower cost energy option. Natural gas was arriving in waves at Alberta’s cities and towns, but even though the pipelines were often going by their fields the farmers were being left out in the cold. It was considered too expensive to serve remote farms, and there was a better business case to be made to ship the gas to California.

So, the founders of the Meota Gas Cooperative did what prairie farmers do best – they took their future into their own hands. Literally through their own muscle power, they created a small natural gas distribution operation that was owned and run cooperatively for its members. The idea flourished, and by 1964, there were enough natural gas co-ops in southwestern Alberta to warrant an umbrella organization, the Federation of Alberta Gas Co-ops Ltd., to represent them to gas producers, regulators and governments.

 

Advocate for Rural Consumers

The Federation was the first such organization in Canada and now is the largest rural gas distributor in the world.  For almost 60 years, it has represented the views of its members to municipal, provincial and federal governments, helping enhance the lives of approximately 400,000 rural Albertans through natural gas distribution.

Currently, the Federation serves 52 rural gas co-ops, 16 town and villages, five counties and seven First Nations communities across the length and breadth of Alberta. It is a not-for-profit organization, run by an eight-member Board of regionally-elected directors. With 100,000 kilometers of member-owned pipeline in the ground, its role as an advocate has increased to include providing centralized services such as data collection, operations and maintenance audits, easement submissions, training, station meter inspections, and negotiating fair insurance plans for the rural co-ops.

“The Federation is a lobbying body to the government, ensuring that we communicate and advocate for our membership, provincially and federally,” says Executive Director Tom Kee. “We want to make sure that rural amenities and services are the same as urban communities, have competitive rates, and we want to be in the same conversations as investor-owned utilities to deliver services.”

Government Support is Key

Kee acknowledges the largely farmer-run co-ops and the Federation may not have thrived without the substantial support of the provincial government. The provincial 1973 Rural Gas Program supported the gasification of rural Alberta, helping cover the costs of building distribution systems in sparsely populated regions considered non-commercial by both pipeline companies and large utilities.

In 2013, the Federation took over a large portion of the Rural Gas Program, including disbursing grants, providing easement services for co-ops, and ensuring control over the quality of pipelines entering the gas co-op system. While each rural utility is self-sufficient as a company with qualified staff to operate, maintain and build their systems, the Federation provides support through additional training and, increasingly, technology. It also has been developing a geographic information system (GIS) that will link to all the individual co-op systems.

“It has grown from being an umbrella organization helping the co-ops get more opportunities to becoming a one-stop shop in regards to GIS, engineering, health and safety, and measurement,” Kee says.

Exclusive Franchise

Although the number of family farms across the nation has dropped over the past 50 years, there has been no drop in the Federation’s membership. It’s co-ops are provincially mandated to provide natural gas services to new residential, commercial and industrial concerns that come on stream inside their rural franchise areas – which in Alberta means covering about 200,000 square kilometers.

This vast service area led to another exclusive service: the Federation is one of the few organizations in Canada allowed to go out to meter stations in the field to recertify and reseal electronic correctors in service. “The reason is we have 700 stations that are all out in the middle of nowhere, so the ability for us to shut down the meters for a couple of months to take them to a shop isn’t really feasible,” says Kee.

Challenges

With the numbers to back them, the rural co-ops started their own brokerage company, Gas Alberta, to buy natural gas and compete with the other investor-owned utilities. The co-op board or council sets the gas rates, but currently their biggest challenge is maintaining their systems.

Aging natural gas infrastructure and shifting regions of production have seen transmission pipelines that are deemed non-economical be decommissioned, and areas outside of new supply basins struggling to find alternative sources to tap into. Natural gas production also has become more focused in the northwest of the province as reserves in the south decline, but corresponding distribution systems to northeastern communities haven’t kept up.

The costs of building new systems can be prohibitive to the member-owned co-ops, which generally have sparse and small populations. “This has been a real concern for our gas co-ops because sometimes when they have to move their tie-ins along with any pipeline upgrading or rerouting costs, the cost may be in the millions,” says Kee. “It puts Alberta communities at risk of losing their natural gas service.”

Kee noted pipeline giant TransCanada is proposing to construct new transmission lines, expected to be in service in approximately 2021-22.

Vision for the Future

The Federation continues to grow and support its member-owned utilities by representing them to governments, providing new services and up-to-date training so co-ops can remain viable in the evolving natural gas distribution market. Approximately 14 gas co-ops also are shareholders in Corridor Communications Inc., a broadband wireless internet service to rural areas. Others have expanded into heating, installing furnace and hot water tanks.

“The co-ops are always looking at broadening services. We’re not trying to confine ourselves to distribution of gas – we look at other issues, like how to install fibre optic cable while we are installing pipelines,” Kee says.

Participating on committees in the Canadian Gas Association has helped the organization keep up with trends and learn from other members, he notes. And in the past year, the Federation has increased its involvement with the CGA so it can become more involved with other utilities, something that already has resulted in stronger communication with other Alberta utilities.

“That’s what we want to see,” he says. “We want to be all working together as one, and that’s where we see the benefit of being part of the CGA.”

Dina O’Meara has been covering Canadian energy issues for almost 20 years.