A climate connection to Alberta wildfires? Smith says most in province caused by humans

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith won’t say whether Canada’s historic wildfire season is connected to climate change or not.

Speaking with CTV National News Chief News Anchor and Senior Editor Omar Sachedina, Smith did not directly answer a question on whether she believes a connection exists between the country’s wildfires and climate change.

“All I know is in my province we have 650 fires and 500 of them were human caused, so we have to make sure that when people know that when it’s dry out there and we get into forest fire season, that they’re being a lot more careful because anytime you end up with an ignition that happens, it can have devastating consequences,” Smith said.

“And so, that’s what I would hope that we can educate the public on, on that front as well.”

While the wildfire situation in Alberta has improved over the past month, provincial officials have warned that it is still early in the season.

Meanwhile, Smith has openly criticized the federal government on its climate policies.

In the interview, Smith also talks about wanting to work on a “realistic” plan with the federal government when it comes to emissions reductions, saying the current Liberal target of 2035 is “just not achievable.” The premier also outlines what role she sees renewable energy playing, despite her province’s recent pause.

Here is a full transcript of the interview. It has been edited for length and clarity.

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Omar Sachedina: Premier Smith, thank you so much for joining us today. You’ve been very vocal about your opposition to Ottawa’s clean energy regulations, even going so far as calling them unconstitutional. If you feel so strongly, why not immediately invoke the Sovereignty Act, which your government passed, and take the feds to court?

Danielle Smith: “Well, look, I’ve been trying to work with the federal government to align their aspirations with what we think is realistic. We put forward our emissions reduction and energy development plan, which talks about being carbon neutral by 2050.

“When I talk to everybody in the electricity business, they think that that’s achievable. But, trying to achieve these targets by 2035, I’m hearing numbers in the order of $200 to $400 billion that it would cost us here and it doesn’t address our issues of reliability. So, we have to operate in the real world, and in the real world, we need a realistic plan. That’s what I want to work with the federal government on.”

Sachedina: One of the major sticking points is the timeline, which you just talked about. The federal government’s timeline is 2035. Your government’s timeline is 2050. You used the word ‘diplomacy’ in the news conference today and oftentimes compromise is a part of diplomacy. Is there a date between 2035 and 2050 that you’re open to, and if so, what is it?

Smith: “Well, the first thing I would say is, that we have to have the generators, they’re going to be the ones who have to implement it on the ground. And there are some like Capital Power that has been very open that they think they can achieve that target by 2045.

“There’s a lot of ways that we can get there, we can build interties between B.C. and Manitoba to bring in more hydroelectricity from those provinces. We can wait and see the rollout on small modular nuclear, which I understand is going to be happening in Ontario by the end of this decade. We can also look at how we might be able to build out geothermal and also perfect carbon capture, utilization and storage.

“Those are the things that we’re talking about doing, but you can’t cram that all in to a 12-year timeline. There’s approval processes that take place, there’s making sure the technology works, there’s a regulatory approval process, there’s the actual construction time and that’s why we think 2050 is the more realistic target. And we can get there, but we just have to get there in the time frame that makes sense.”

Sachedina: So, I mean, you just mentioned 2045, if the feds came back with that timeline, would you sign on to that?

Smith: “Well, I want to make sure — that’s only one company that I had mentioned — we have several big power players in our province and I want to make sure that we are in alignment with all of them because, look, they’ve already gone through being blindsided with the previous government, the NDP government doing an early phaseout of coal. That cost our province billions of dollars to do and we’re still paying it off for the stranded assets; we’ll be paying it off until 2030.

“They thought they were doing the responsible thing switching to natural gas, which is a lower emitting fuel, and now all of a sudden the federal government’s coming along and blindsiding them again. We know that as these companies make their investments over a period of time and as projects come to the end of their natural life, there’s sort of a reasonable time frame that you can expect that kind of capital turnover, and that’s what we’re hearing. We’re hearing that 2050 is more reasonable and 2035 is just not achievable.”

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks to media at the Council of the Federation Canadian premiers meeting at The Fort Garry Hotel in Winnipeg, July 11, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods

Sachedina: Your government recently put a moratorium on new renewable energy projects. Do you even believe in renewable energy, that it can be economically viable?

Smith: “Well, there is a role for wind and solar to play, what they do really well is bring prices down when the wind is blowing and the sun is shining and we have a high electricity need. What they don’t do well is provide baseload power. If you look at the provinces that are very close to achieving the targets — Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and Manitoba — they rely on baseload power from hydroelectric or nuclear.

“And so that’s what we’ve got to be mindful of, is that the only way we’ve been able to succeed in bringing on so much wind and solar in our province is we have natural gas peaker plants that are able to turn on and off when the wind is blowing and the sun is shining. And if we end up seeing that interfered with, that’s what I’m worried about. We’ve got to figure out a way to make sure that those things work in sync and we have to make sure that we have more baseload power being brought on our grid, otherwise we’re going to have major problems with reliability.”

Sachedina: We are having these discussions of course at a time when there are critical conversations happening on climate change not only in your province, but across the country and around the world. We have seen an unprecedented wildfire season across this country. As you’re watching what’s going on, specifically with regards to wildfires, do you believe that there’s a connection between climate change and the wildfires?

Smith: “Well, look everybody is on target on 2050, that was decided a couple of years ago at COP26, and so all of the industrialized provinces are moving in that direction for exactly that reason. Everybody knows that we need to reduce emissions. But I’m also watching that China is a billion-plus population, they don’t have a target until 2060. India, as I understand it, doesn’t have a target until 2070.

“We can play a role in our country in exporting our technology and exporting our clean LNG so that we can help the rest of the world decarbonize — that to me would be a far more effective way of dealing with this global emissions problem, rather than trying to compress all of this into a 12-year unrealistic time frame, and in fact, probably interfere with our ability to develop the technology that we can export abroad. So I think that we owe it to the rest of the world to make sure that we’re working with them, so that everybody has an opportunity to lower their emissions in the 2050 timeframe.”

Sachedina: The question though more generally was about the wildfires and climate change in Canada, you know, which obviously is related to a lot of what you’ve talked about today and over the past few days. Do you believe that there is a connection between our unprecedented wildfire season and climate change?

Smith: “All I know is in my province we have 650 fires and 500 of them were human caused, so we have to make sure that when people know that when it’s dry out there and we get into forest fire season, that they’re being a lot more careful because anytime you end up with an ignition that happens, it can have devastating consequences. And so, that’s what I would hope that we can educate the public on, on that front as well.”

Sachedina: So do you think that a connection is possible between climate change and the wildfires we’ve been seeing?

Smith: “Look, I already told you, we are quite happy working towards a 2050 target. There’s a reason there’s that 2050 target. Everybody’s concerned about the environment. Everybody’s concerned about emissions. And we’re also very concerned about making sure that we’re prepared in the event that we have a spark lit because of wildfire season.

“Wildfire season happens every single year, it’s going to continue happening every single year, and we have to make sure that we’re managing and mitigating and making sure that we educate the public about the role that they play in causing those fires. And then, also on a separate stream, working on a 2050 emissions reduction target.”

Sachedina: Danielle Smith, is there anything else you’d like to add that I haven’t asked you?

Smith: “You know, I’m looking forward to working with our partners across the country because I have to tell you, Saskatchewan is in the same boat we are. Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, they also have a very high level of hydrocarbon fuels on their grid, they’re going to be in the same trouble as well. If you’re looking even at Quebec, Quebec’s grid is constrained, they’ve talked publicly about the fact that they’re kind of at the limit of their electricity production.

“And so we need to work together to make sure that people understand that this isn’t just an Alberta problem, this is going to be an everybody problem. If we’re going to double electricity between now and 2050, we have to figure out how to do it sustainably so that we can have reliability and affordability at the heart of it.”

Sachedina: When’s the last time you talked to the prime minister on the regulations? Have you talked to him recently?

Smith: “Well, I’ve talked to him during — he was very good to work with during the wildfires and offered his support and I think we worked very well collaboratively in May — and then I had a chance to see him when he was out here for Stampede.

“But I told him the same message, (which) is that we can certainly work together on a 2050 target with all of the things that I think he cares about and I care about — making sure we’ve got better transmission interties with hydroelectric, small modular nuclear carbon, capture utilization and storage, hydrogen. I think if we can work together on the things that we agree with, we’ll be able to get there.

“But I’m not going to pretend that a 2035 target is achievable. I told him that pretty clearly, and we’re going to continue telling him that, but if we can get aligned around 2050, then I think we’ll be able to get somewhere.”

Sachedina: Premier Smith, I really appreciate your time, thank you so much.

Smith: “My pleasure, talk to you again.”

With files from CTV News’ Senior Digital Parliamentary Reporter Rachel Aiello