A new analysis has concluded that Canada’s oil sands will have to cut production by up to 1.3 million barrels per day to meet the federal government’s 2030 emission targets, just as the International Energy Agency (IEA) reports a surge in clean energy investment and a faster-than-expected rise in key low-carbon technologies.
The study by U.S. data firm S&P Global says the production cut would reduce fossil industry employment by 5,400 to 9,500 jobs, the Globe and Mail reports. Those numbers echo a Clean Energy Canada study earlier this year that showed Canada losing 1.5 million fossil industry jobs but gaining 2.2 million clean energy positions by 2050, including a net gain of 95,000 in Alberta.
The S&P study finds that the Alberta oil sands can feasibly reduce its climate pollution by 15 million tonnes per year by the end of this decade, the Globe says, leaving a gap of 29 megatonnes to hit the federal target of reducing oil and gas sector emissions 42% below 2019 levels by 2030. “Plugging that gap would put at risk 800,000 to 1.3 million barrels of forecast production a day,” the Globe says.
Left to its own devices, S&P forecasts the industry would increase oil sands production by 34%, or a million barrels per day, between 2019 and 2040.
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