Friday, January 16, 2009

Alberta Shock Doctrine is under way!

“As in the Klein days we have to come to terms with the 38.00 barrel of oil” says Stelmach.

In Klein’s days, Alberta would have collected 25% US $ in royalty.
Thanks to Stelmach we collect only 19% in Canadian Funds.
This is a full 50% reduction in our take on royalty, thanks to Stelmach and Knight!
The figures; today’s exchange at .80 cents.
Under Stelmach:
38.00 US oil pays Alberta at 19% or 5.78 Canadian.
Under Klein:
38.00 US oil pays Alberta at 25% or 9.50 US which is 11.88 Canadian.
And as I said earlier, you as citizens of this province are going to be asked to make up the difference.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Alberta-The lowest royalty for oil in the world!

Multi Billions more given up to the oil companies!

In the latest rush of resource give away, the Conservatives have hit a new low!
They revamped the royalty system on December 16 as follows:

Oil companies will not have to pay their pre-payout of 1% as was the original deal. Instead they pay the 1% on the payout portion until after oil reaches 55.00 per barrel!
And:
The original deal was for 25% to be paid as oil royalty from the time the project was paid for. Under the new deal the 25% will not come in effect until oil again reaches 55.00 per barrel.

This means the royalty being collected now is at 19% and all the royalty posturing is nothing more than lies.

To put the icing on the cake, the tar sands refined crude oil is selling at a discount of near 30% when it is being sold at the price of regular crude.
The bottom lines is this Government has now cut itself off cash flow and will try to make that up off the residences in this province.

There is only 1 cure for this, get rid of this bunch of crooks!

Alberta provides the cheapest oil there is to the US.

“At the same time, the development of these things (tar sands) is pretty important, in our judgment, to North American energy security." Says Obama.

It is time to take a closer look at the tar sands crude output.

Tar sands output is a crude oil that has been heavily refined before going to market as crude. There is none of the sulfur or other impurities in the crude. These have been taken out.

Essentially it is clean, ready to be used. This means the refineries in the US who are intent on doing the final cracking in the US are going to be able to collect big bucks back on Carbon reductions.

Very little needs to be done to the Alberta Crude so, they can claim operational improvements in reducing their carbon foot print. Estimates from industry have put a value of the Alberta Tar Sands oil as being underpriced by as much as 30% because of the state of distillation of the product.

If you add the underpriced base oil to the short shift we got when the Conservatives put the oil to Canadian dollars for figuring out royalty you can see where we are paying the oil companies to take the resource away from Alberta.

Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Alberta Oil News is no news at all!

The Calgary Harold is the most biased, most useless rag in the province if you are looking for information.

Two Examples today:
One misleading quote: “That might work in normal times, but industry leaders are deeply pessimistic these breaks will encourage much new activity in today's bleak conditions.”

They make no effort to explain exploration is down to zero around the world right now. Instead, they would have you believe it has something to do with the new Energy plan. Also note that the Alberta Government doesn’t release these BS enlightenments in papers that allow public opinion.

And another one:

Knight, however, argued Alberta isn't in "any danger"of collecting less royalties under the new system as opposed to the old one.
The controversial royalty plan, which took effect Jan. 1, was announced in the fall of 2007 after a government-appointed expert committee said Albertans weren't receiving "their fair share" of energy development.

In this article they pan the Canadian Dollar royalty like it has been in there forever! Such crap!
The royalty was switched from US to Canadian last September away from the public eye when exchange between the US and Canadian dollars was at par.

How in Knights wildest dreams can he expect a point for point change in royalty percentage to make up for the direct 20% loss in exchange? He can’t! It is still another lie.

They have mismanaged this economy drastically. That exchange slight of hands costs Albertans 8 to 12 billions of dollars per year! Think of that when they start laying off and cutting programs.

Saturday, January 03, 2009

Alberta to release the SHOCK DOCTRINE!

This is the perfect financial climate for the Conservatives who want to push their right wing privatization agenda more than they want anything else. Cut Services, Destabilize, under fund. This has been the legacy of this Government. When the programs are ruined the answer is clear; privatize it!

Changing the royalty regime on all of Alberta’s petrochemical resource to Canadian Dollars from US dollars, the standards all other in the petroleum trade business follow has ensured them this province will be short 6 to 8 billion dollars a year in revenue and, they have no intention of pulling that money back.

Taking hugely deficient royalty percentages ensured another shortage of revenue. For years now we have only been collecting 19% royalty on the tar sands. The “new deal, good for everyone” moves that percentage back to 25%, where it was to start with. The 1% taken on product until the plant is paid for by Albertans is an icon in itself!

For comparison the US, BC and Saskatchewan all take funds in US dollars This is an immediate loss of 20% Their start up percentage is 2%, not 1 as is Alberta. Another 1% loss.

BC and Saskatchewan both take 34% royalty on Tier 3 oil (producing). This is a long way from the 19% and 25% Alberta is taking. A further loss of 9%

In total we are loosing a minimum of 30% of the revenue that rightly belongs to this province!

There is no guarantee the new rates will come into effect. Mel Knights ongoing lies are tantamount in considering his recent comments that “nothing is written in stone” and “we may put off the increases”
So, the stage is set!
Enter now, THE SHOCK DOCTRINE.

In a few short months (perhaps, weeks) Stelmach-Liepert-Knight-Evans-Snelgrove will begin the process of telling (think – warning and leaky press releases) Albertans the following:
Dear Albertans, because of lower than expected revenues...
Less of X
Less of Y
Less of Z
Then:
Pay as you go A
Pay as you go B
Pay as you go C
And, we're holding off on the previously announced initiatives... long list but, a peek did come in Stelmach’s New Year’s speech on CFRN. When asked about the pharmacare package for seniors he said “that will take place probably in 2010 (think here after the next election) and we will be telling you who pays and, who doesn’t.
EVERYTHING will be blamed on the GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS.

The attitude and direction of Stelmach will be, I / we have no choice.
Behind the veil of the GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS, the Stelmach government will take the opportunity to implement M-O-R-E privatization, including the sell-off of more public works and the rural hospitals.
By definition the basis for the Shock Doctrine is to take Full Private Sector Advantage of public disaster (s) be they mother nature (Tsunami - Hurricane) OR mismanaged economic as is about to happen.
Nobody in Alberta can tell me that should oil slip to $25 a drum (until April) the government won't fire-sale everything to their buddies!

38 years of Tory rule, including billions and billions of non-renewable dollars passing through this province and we have NOTHING MORE THAN ANY OTHER CANADIAN PROVINCE TO SHOW FOR IT.

The Tories have run our province into the ground. Unfortunately, too many idiots got their rocks off because a handful of guys got rich in the process. Yes, a handful of folks did get rich, but that didn't translate into a flourishing prosperous society.

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