Canadian regulations offer importers, exporters new opportunities
✍ Scribed by Willet, Robert E.
- Book ID
- 102219710
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 2008
- Weight
- 225 KB
- Volume
- 6
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0743-5665
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
A number of years ago, the U.S. Pacific Northwest, which relied on Canada for natural gas, was left high and dry when the Canadian government, anticipating a shortage, decided not to allow companies that produced gas in Canada to export it. This cutback is but one example of the policy changes that the Canadian government has made over the years that occasionally and unexpectedly decreased the amount of gas U.S. users could import. Consequently, the U.S. market for Canadian gas was held back because the long-term regulatory outlook was considered uncertairr-much like the situation in the United States as a whole, where the market for gas was held back because the long-term supply was considered uncertain.
A New World
But the situation has changed. Last year the Free Trade Agreement, a treaty between the United States and Canada, was passed, and it appears that Canada must regulate more consistently. Confirming this effect, Cal C. Buchanan, manager of natural gas for the Canadian Petroleum Association, of Calgary. Alberta, said: '"The Free Trade Agreement just sort of made it much more certain that [a given agreement] was going to stay in place. The FTA has validated what was really happening under deregulation and cross-border trade anyway."
Factors in the U.S. environment will also benefit Canada. Canada benefits because the U.S. customer no longer perceives that gas is a fuel oflimited life span, and with U.S. and Canadian pipeline capacity expanding, Canada will be able to ship its gas to new U.S. markets. Thus, with its huge reserves-enough that one financial analyst termed Can-