It is time for a more pragmatic approach to energy transition. But that will require all politicians to get a grip
There are polar vortexes.
And then there are polarizing vortexes.
Alberta was just sucked violently into the latter.
The province may be out of the physical deep freeze – and our electricity grid breathing a sigh of relief – but we’re still shivering violently from the experience.
Because that’s what polarizing vortexes do: they push people to the edges and extremes. And there are folks who love nothing more than to stir a good vortex of discontent. They keep it alive by stoking pseudo-apocalyptic tensions and creating visions of faux dystopias. Fear is their stock in trade, and ignorance their weaponry.
The recent deep freeze brought out the best of many Albertans; unfortunately, it also brought out the worst in some. And that doesn’t bode well for a province preparing for the real rigours of energy transition and transformation.
Energy dynamics in Alberta are so polarized and pushed to the extremes that smart money wouldn’t put odds on the province’s hope for success in anything that resembles constructive transition success.
Looming large among post-freeze polarization outputs: a stunning volume of vitriol, much of it ill-informed and completely disconnected from energy science and realities. That phenomenon can be linked directly to the state of energy politics in Canada, wherein ideological extremes at the right and left push ordinary Canadians away from the practical matters of energy civics and energy civility.
Ideological isolationism, bluntly speaking, has paralyzed us.
Post four electricity grid alerts and one emergency warning came the predictable navel-gazing, analysis, and........