From Straits to Stoves and Tankers to Tables: Iran, Oil and Climate Trade-Offs in a Crisis

The Iran war and the near-closure of the Strait of Hormuz have triggered a major shock to global oil and LNG markets. 

Roughly 20 million barrels of oil per day normally move through Hormuz. The IEA says nearly all of that has been disrupted.

Oil and gas prices have surged sharply; and the disruption extends well beyond oil as Qatari LNG exports have been largely severed. Asia is especially exposed, since most Gulf energy exports flow there. 

This isn’t just an oil story. It’s a “can people cook dinner” story, a reminder that geopolitics gets real once it enters the kitchen.

In this episode, David, Sara, and Ed unpack what this shock means for global energy markets, the climate, and the pace of the energy transition.

⏱️ TIMESTAMPS
00:17 — Welcome & episode overview
01:54 — How the Iran War is disrupting oil & gas markets
07:28 — 30x induction stove sales in India & accelerating tech adoption
09:38 — AI forecasts say EV sales are rising because of the war?
13:00 — The coming LNG whipsaw: glut or shortage?
16:21 — How much wilder could this get? Escalation risks
17:07 — Global recession risk from tariffs + oil shocks
17:30 — Has the Iran War accelerated peak global emissions?
19:36 — Data centers, energy demand & geopolitics in the kitchen
26:54 — What the war means for Canadian oil, gas & LNG exports
29:49 — Federal-Alberta MOU & pipeline politics
30:52 — The war's legacy: will it help or hurt the energy transition?

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Transcript

[00:00:00] Sara Hastings-Simon: Apparently the sales of induction stoves on Amazon India have gone up 30 times. I think it shows how people are reacting quickly. If you don't have the fuel to cook, you better find something else pretty fast.

[00:00:17] Ed Whittingham: Hi, I'm Ed Whittingham. And you're listening to Energy vs Climate, the show where my co-host, David Keith, Sara Hastings-Simon and I debate today's climate and energy challenges.

The Iran War and the near closure of the Strait of Hormuz have triggered a major shock to global oil and LNG markets. Roughly 20 million barrels of oil per day normally move through Hormuz. The IEA says nearly all of that has been disrupted. Prices have spiked, the effects are rippling beyond oil markets.

With Qatari LNG largely cut off. Asia is especially exposed since most golf energy exports flow there. So this isn't just an oil story, it's a can people cook dinner story, a reminder that geopolitics gets real once it enters the kitchen. On March 17th, David, Sara and I recorded a special conversation to make sense of what this shock means for global energy markets, climate, and the energy transition.

Let's get into it. David. Sara, how are you both 

[00:01:18] Sara Hastings-Simon: doing? Good. 

[00:01:20] David Keith: We're well fun to be here together. 

[00:01:22] Ed Whittingham: It is 

[00:01:22] Sara Hastings-Simon: fun. I'm, we're used to being in the same place now that we did it recently. Exactly. It's not, it's not as freaky. 

[00:01:27] Ed Whittingham: Yeah. Well, I'm sorry I can't be there with the two of you in person, but, uh, this is, this is great.

It kind of reminds me of when Sara and I were in person at a conference and David, you patched in from your EV or rental ev while on a climbing trip down to Tennessee. 

[00:01:44] David Keith: Oh, it was stolen starlink that I got by driving it. But besides some other cabin that we weren't occupying that had the starlink signal un unlocked.

[00:01:54] Ed Whittingham: That's right. But this time I'm the one who is like the odd man out, the odd EBC or out, but we're, we're making it work. So we wanted to just unpack a bit, uh, the war in Iran and we want to talk a bit about how it's disrupting markets and particularly oil and gas markets. Chat a bit about some of the knock on effects and specific to energy and global energy.

Then also talk about the knock on effects for Canadian energy, and then we thought we'd engage in some good old fashioned prognosticating on the legacy of the war. Is it gonna be good or bad ultimately for working on the climate problem and for energy transition? That's the plan. And, uh, note for the listener, we've gotta do this in like 30 minutes or less because our long suffering producer, Amit Tandon, actually has a flight to catch with his family tonight.

Just gotta get to London then Portugal, so we're not gonna keep 'em too long, which is gonna force brevity on us, which as I've shown from this intro, is hard. 

[00:03:00] David Keith: Family schley. We can go on for hours. 

[00:03:02] Ed Whittingham: So may maybe I'll kick us off. Uh, I, I, I'll just talk about the quick reminder of how it's, the war is disrupting, uh, oil and gas markets.

And just as a, as a note on sources, I know the sources I've been looking at, you know, in addition to like most of our listeners, the Globe and the New York Times, I get specific to energy. All of the Eurasia Groups analysis. It's a DC based think tank. The cult of Ian Bremmer as some call it. But then, you know, I-E-A-E-I-A, energy information administration, news wires, um, but just so clear on my biases from, from, from those sources.

What we know prices have spiked. The shocks affecting power, transport, fuel, heating, cooking fuel, and the partial closure or the near full closure of the straits of Hormuz have triggered a big shock around the world. And a lot of oil, 20 million barrels, uh, a day of oil normally work. Uh, it moves through Hormuz and, uh, almost all of that is disrupted.

So. Many countries, and we'll get to this, are asking, are now questioning their dependency on the Gulf for their energy imports and are talking about reducing that dependence. And we're gonna see how that will play out. David, Sara, with that quick snapshot, what would you add? And then we'll get to what are these knock on effects we're seeing around the world for energy?

[00:04:31] Sara Hastings-Simon: I guess I'll just add, there's a lot of uncertainty about how this plays out. Right, and, and of course, I mean. There's the human cost to it and, and the real serious, uh, thing behind the, the war. And, um, but focusing on the energy markets for a second, um, I think we just don't know, right? Will this be a short term blip or are we in for a longer term disruption to the energy supply?

Um, you know, I, I think it's really hard to know what lays ahead that also, you know, make is gonna lead things to, to turn out differently, depending if it's one or the other. 

[00:05:06] David Keith: I've been thinking on a sort of. You know, econ technical note about what it says about elasticity of oil markets in some ways. Um, I think that the price reaction has been remarkably small, and there's reasons that you might think the market is more inelastic than it would've been decades ago.

And that's because in the old days, a lot of oil was used for heating and electricity, and some still is, but as a sort of fraction of global oil. Transport is a bigger fraction. It used to be because electricity's a, a smaller fraction. I mean, really near zero in North America, for example. Um, and so you might expect that it would be more inelastic because transportation demand is very inelastic.

People, people can, you know, see quite a big price change and not change their behavior. And so that. Might make you think that like if you really cut supply by, maybe it's more like 15%, you'd expect prices to go higher than they've gone. Um, and I think it's not quite clear why they haven't. Maybe it's more elastic than we think.

Maybe it's 'cause there has been these release of supplies from strategic reserves. Maybe it's 'cause everybody or many traders really think it will stop very quickly, um, as the world will be over very hard to judge. But I do think it's certain of interesting to contemplate how. Different. The oil market is because of the different structure of oil use than it would've been in like the, you know, famous oil shocks of the 73 or 80.

[00:06:28] Ed Whittingham: And, and it's also a reminder, this has happened in 2022 with the, the Russian invasion of Ukraine. And so it makes you think that, you know, we're, especially for Europe, for European countries, this isn't temporary. This is structural. And at a time as they're trying to wean themselves off of Russian energy imports, it might put them back on.

It's also, it's been very interesting to see. The differences between the oil and gas markets, you know, oil markets, turns out they've got buffers. We're learning all about strategic reserves and inventories, and limited bypass pipelines. Gas, there's a lot less buffer room for that gas. You know, most of the l and g from Catter cannot be rerouted around Hormuz.

And then we're seeing that in places like, uh, you know, liquified petroleum gas and the shocks happening in India. Let, let's talk about some of these knock on effects, longer term, knock on effects that we're seeing across global energy. 

[00:07:28] Sara Hastings-Simon: I mean, the one that struck me and you, you hinted at it with the stoves already, but apparently the sales of induction stoves on Amazon India have gone up 30 times, uh, since this started.

So. Um, you know, that, that's just one step, but I think it shows how people are reacting quickly. As you said, if you don't have, um, then the fuel to cook, you better find something else pretty fast. Um, so there's definitely, you know, reminds me a little of the, the rush in heat pumps. Um, when you, when you referenced it, you know, the, the star of the Ukraine war, I think probably even faster in some ways, right?

Like it's. Uh, it's even easier maybe to electrify your cooking, um, than it is to install a heat pump or like, you know, easier for the, the consumer to get out and do that. Um, and I think that just. You know, continued examples of disruption to supply or dramatic increases to prices when alternatives are more and more available for, uh, non fossil fuel imports.

Like I have to think that that's going to. Lead to a, a longer term knock on effect of accelerating, you know, adoption of these technologies. But also I think fundamentally like really changing the way people think about security and energy and security of supply. Right. And I think we have. I think we have like a very short term memory when it comes to a lot of things on energy.

Like I've, I'm old enough that I've lived through the cycle of like, natural gas is like $10 and it will never be cheap again. And then natural gas is $2 and it will never be expensive again. Um, and I think that the. You know, having one, like with the one disruption maybe to the, uh, Europe's natural gas supply people were sort of willing to see as like a one-off.

But you start to get a few in quick succession and I think you really start to get people reminded of, frankly, the fact that like fossil fuel reliability relies on this like geopolitical world order and, and things that, you know, seem to be increasingly unreliable. 

[00:09:38] David Keith: Well, that's, uh, Sara's trumpeting her age, but I'm old enough that I dimly remember when we traveled into the US in the early seventies and there was this period where you could only fill up when your license plate was even, or odd, even, or odd license plate numbers as they were rationing.

So I, at least my memory goes back that far. Uh, but on a more up-to-date note, uh, actually a, a month or two ago for some other purpose, um, I asked. Gemini AI for this kind of careful structured thing where I ask to forecast EV global sales, EVs and hybrids is a fraction of, uh, all vehicle sales globally.

Asset to forecast that for 2027 and do a high low case and gimme references and so on. At that point, uh, it said, uh, low case was 30%, high case was 38, and the point estimate was 34 for, for a fraction of global EV sales in 2027. So quite near term, or it's not gonna be far wrong. So I went back to that same Gemini thread, just, uh, for this podcast and said, how would you expect to be different now given the war?

And the answer is, it doesn't. I mean, I don't know Gemini's doing this through its wisdom or lack thereof, but its answer is that it adjusts its point estimate up about. Two points and adjust its upper estimate about four points. But I think the point is it's real. Uh, there is evidence that, um, searches for EVs.

Um, online buying figures obviously don't react that fast, but searches online have gone up very fast. So I do expect, because EVs were close, this may actually in increase sales measurably. 

[00:11:07] Ed Whittingham: I've got an example through my family and personal life because some listeners might know that I'm married to a Japanese woman and I've spent lots of time in Japan.

Uh, of course we were very affected by, uh, Fukushima in 2011. You know, Japan is. The only country to have experienced, uh, an atom bomb attack, of course, the only country in the world, but it also had a reactor mount down. But what we've discovered is anti-nuclear public opinion goes or, uh, significantly softens if the alternative is LNG at war prices.

And by that. Japan is one of the biggest importers of LNG buys. Most of that from the Gulf and officials are now considering emergency measures to accelerate the return of not just some, but nearly all of its operable nuclear power stations. So. This isn't coming out of nowhere. To be clear, it's not just a consequence of the war, but it really is officials looking at, wow, how can we bring these back online quickly?

And this is, you know, utilities would be, uh, you know, forced, not forced to, this. Utilities would have to restart their units. It would've been, that had been mothballed some of them for, you know, 15 years and since Fukushima. You don't mothball nuclear plants for 15 years and just dust them off, like patio furniture.

It requires a lot more effort than that, but it's happening. And this comes down to its dependence on, on the Middle East and particularly on l and g. So that is really something to see the Japanese public opinion really starting to shift as a consequence of these high LNG prices. You know, it's.

Fukushima is one thing, but keeping the lights on in Tokyo is another. 

[00:13:00] David Keith: I can imagine a real LNG whipsaw in the next couple years because. Pre this war, people had been forecasting a big LNG glut in Asia, kind of about 3, 4, 5 years out. When there's all these, um, new sources of supply, new local factor stations coming online, and demand wasn't growing so fast, now people are expecting the prices would really go low.

I think you're gonna see that even more. That is because of what's happening now, there'll be people, you know, demand elasticity, demand will go down a bit, but those new LNG sources will still come on, and then you're gonna see prices really be quite low. 

[00:13:32] Ed Whittingham: I also think back to the conversation we had with Ja und you're contact David we had back in October of last year, who was with an independent Indian Think tank.

Think tank, uh, called cstep. I forget what the acronym stands for, but you know, we talked about. India and how it produces electricity. Some of the reporting I've seen suggests that India now has this choice. 'cause once again, it's affected just like Japan by these LNG prices. It's also affected by LPG shortages and now it's looking at how do we get new LNG supplies.

Do we electrify like China? But in the interim, are we just going to have to burn a lot more coal to get by? And it seems like India, you know, David, you're closer to it than I am through your conversations around sunlight, reflection, but. Diverse pursuing a mix of these approaches where, yes, we bring, we burn coal for longer.

Yes, we invest in getting LNG from Mozambique and Tanzania. That comes with a decade long delay. And yes, we also use Chinese technology to electrify. Which then creates a whole different level of dependency on another foreign power. So these, these are difficult choices to make. And, you know, I wonder what Jai would say about them.

[00:14:58] Sara Hastings-Simon: I don't know if it's like specifically answering your question, ed, but I answer another question. I behave like a politician. Uh, and say that I think that we're, we're sort of seeing. We're seeing that there is a, there's a lot of stability in these markets, but then there's also a lot of instability or inability to react quickly.

Right. And like you're saying, it's like there's things that you can try to do, like restart these old nuclear plants or make kind of decisions about, about where to go and around the edges. A lot of that I think is going to happen. And I was just double checking that I hadn't read that wrong, but I mean, you, you have oil flowing through, uh, a pipeline in Santa Barbara, California, um, for the first time and, you know, over 10 years since it was, I think, shut down supposedly permanently after a spill.

Um, so it's a little bit of a, like all hands on deck approach in the short term because there's only so many levers that can get pulled. Um, but then. It, it influences, you know, this longer term like David, like you were saying, that you're, you're gonna see exacerbation of the, of the supply gluts and others.

It's a little bit of a preview too, of just how challenging transition is in terms of when you have shocks to these systems. Um, they're not as resilient quite as much as we like, think they are. 

[00:16:21] David Keith: It's a, a little wild to think about how wild this could still get. I mean. The war is hideous and uncertain, and I think there's a.

Very wide range of possible outcomes, you know, including much more remove if Iran successfully targets some oil infrastructure that is much slower to rebuild than some of the Saudi loading terminal or that pipeline that runs, um, across Saudi Arabia. Which is part of the reason that Saudi's able to export.

Now, if some of those assets are hit or if, um, the Americans destroy the Iranian facilities at Car Island, then you're gonna see this like long-term world where for years, many millions of barrels and they'll be off the market. And I think that's a different world 

[00:17:07] Ed Whittingham: for sure. And then, um, it starts to affect things further down in the economy, like our build out of data centers to, to power ai.

[00:17:17] Sara Hastings-Simon: And, and just the economy overall, right? I think it was, uh, my colleague Blake Schaeffer, who was like, you know, if you, if you wanted to have a recipe for starting a global recession, you would like impose a bunch of tariff tariffs and then have an oil price shock. 

[00:17:30] David Keith: So, listeners of this podcast will have heard me talk about the ish coming emissions peak many times.

And obviously we don't know what's gonna happen, but, uh, so far I would judge that Trump's presidency has. Significantly accelerated the global all-time carbon emission peak, both by the trade policy and not by this. 

[00:17:46] Sara Hastings-Simon: Yeah, and I think that the gasoline prices, you know, again, sort of trying to a little bit compare and contrast to, to what was going on with natural gas.

I think gasoline prices are even more salient for people. You know, like we know over and over again, people will do sort of seemingly and rational things of like waiting in line in Costco for hours just to get, you know, save a few cents off gasoline and it's just. This, this big number that like sits on the street corner that you see and you drive by.

And I think we can't underestimate how much of an impact that has on people's decisions in terms of, like, like you're saying, David, do they, do they go for an ev, do they start looking at exploring, you know, micro mobility options to reduce some of their driving? Um, it's, it's really like very in your face for people.

[00:18:34] David Keith: And, and there are these two effects at once. So on the one hand you've got the. Fuel prices going up, which obviously all USL tips people towards EVs or, or induction stoves. But the other hand, if there's a recession, people are shorter of money. And that tips into not making big capital investments and think, actually that's one thing that, that my AI did a nice job of pointing out.

This kind of saw off in fact that it's really forces going both directions. That's not obvious what happens the EV market because, uh, if people are, you know. It's just repeat. People have significantly less money or worried about losing their jobs. They're less likely to make a big capital investment.

[00:19:06] Sara Hastings-Simon: Yeah, that's an interesting point. And it plays out differently, right? If you're talking about, say, north America or where you're doing replacements for infrastructure, so you know, or capital, I mean your vehicle or you're stove. Um, it plays out differently if you're talking about emerging markets where people are maybe getting their first vehicle.

Yeah. Uh, where, you know, that delay maybe delays enough that there's even more EV options out there. So yeah, there's a lot of, anyway, there. Yeah, there's a lot of interesting dynamics in there. 

[00:19:36] Ed Whittingham: Yeah. Yeah, and that's what I was saying with India, you know, geopolitics, it's a whole new level. When it enters the kitchen, generally it's not gonna enter the kitchen In the same way with us and the, the buffered and protected west about food prices, it really then when you start looking for cooking fuel and there's a shortage there, then it starts to hit home.

It'll be interesting to see these other signposts along the way, like what will Germany do? Will Germany double down on renewables plus storage? Will it delay its own exit from coal power generation? Will it reconsider nuclear power? I think the UK will be interesting. Is it going to drill for more oil and gas than it would've otherwise?

And to your point, David, I I, you know, in all seriousness, I'd like to see what's gonna happen to data centers. You know, they use a large volume of energy. They're, uh, really exposed to market volatility, high energy prices, push up opex and CapEx, and potentially it's going to delay data center construction starts, starts.

If we start to see that, then we're really starting to realize this war has very, very far reaching ripples. 

[00:20:50] David Keith: That's where it's really different than the world. When I first was learning energy stuff, I was learning about cross price elasticities between oil and gas. When oil and gas were both competing against each other in power plants and even some power plants could switch on the fly.

But now, certainly in North America market, there's virtually no oil except for a few tiny peakers data centers really see the gas price. They don't see the oil price. 

[00:21:12] Ed Whittingham: Can we agree that? One impact that we're going to see that like there's one commonality across all these impacts we're talking to or how go governments may respond.

And that is trying to reduce Middle East supply, uh, dependency on Middle East oil in supplying global markets and much as the way that. Russia's role has been diminished since 2022. Even if some European countries think, well, we need to get back on Russian oil in the short term that's gonna happen, we're gonna see a structural change from already three weeks of war.

If the war stops tomorrow, Trump declares victory. He says there's some unconditional surrender, which there isn't. But anyways, everything, all the fighting stops tomorrow. Have we not gone far enough to push that kind of structural reconfiguration? 

[00:22:02] Sara Hastings-Simon: I am doubtful just because of the price argument, right?

Like I think that memories are short enough and like the dynamics of this war is different, whereas like. There's, I think some, you know, global consensus or at least part global consensus of like, we should really stop doing business with Russia. I don't think that you get necessarily the same kind of thing coming out of this war completely.

And like the Middle Eastern oil is, is just so cheap that like, I think. Barring, you know, something else happening. I imagine that it can get back in. Yeah. Um, I'll, I'll put forward another like, sort of theory of the way to think about like different governments reacting is it also depends a lot like on, on what happens.

I'll separate out the long term and the short term, but I think the short term solutions. Depend very much on what the people or person in power, you know, believes in and wants to see happen. Because basically you have a suite of different things that you can do. You know, you could really try to promote efficiency and reduction in vehicle mile traveled, or you could try to pump a bunch more oil and.

It. I, I think it, the, the response, and, you know, I'll, I'll admit I'm guilty to this as well too, but like, the response to, to a crisis is everybody like uses it to double down on their like favorite, you know, thing that needs to happen. So in the short term, I think that's how it plays out In the longer term, I think there is, um, a way that this, you know, accelerates a transition away from, from, uh, oil for transportation.

You know, David, your, your numbers. The EV percentage a couple years out ends up, uh, up only a few percent. But as I was reminded recently, doing some, you know, modeling and looking at, at different models for forward-looking EV projections, those few percent in the early years can make a big difference. You know, when you go out another 10 years and I had sort of almost, almost like discovered that anew.

And, and I think that's also really important to remember that like. Even if we don't see in a couple years, like totally different mix of vehicles on our street, it can still mean that in 10, 15 years, the mix that we see ends up being very different than what it would've been without these kind of seemingly small adjustments in the near term.

[00:24:20] David Keith: Totally agreed. I mean, you. You know, if you take 10 or 20% bite out of just light duty vehicle fuel use, that's a real reshaping of the well market. That means almost certainly the oil peak has passed and, um, you know, you're integrating up the ev stock into the rest of the stock, and it doesn't take that, the, those early numbers and the integral over time matter a lot for oil use.

[00:24:42] Ed Whittingham: So, you know, never let a good crisis go to waste. Uh, Sara, are you gonna use this to get the City of Calgary to double down on bike lanes? 

[00:24:51] Sara Hastings-Simon: Oh, man. Um, yeah. Well, I, I guess I'll, I'll respond to that by saying it's sort of a. It's an interesting reminder of course, that like energy systems are more than just the fuel and just the technology.

I do think that like it matters what, what you have on hand and what can be deployed and all these kinds of things. Interestingly, maybe I'm just not listening to the right places. Like I haven't been hearing so much of a call for like, oh, see, this is why we need to expand Canadian oil production. Maybe I, maybe I'm just like walled myself off from that part of the, you know, discourse and it's, 

[00:25:28] Ed Whittingham: you listen to the wrong media, Sara.

[00:25:31] Sara Hastings-Simon: Yeah. Apparent. Apparently. 

[00:25:33] David Keith: Can we say 

[00:25:33] Ed Whittingham: bubble? Yeah. 

[00:25:37] Sara Hastings-Simon: But pro probably. I think that's, that's probably fair. Uh, for, for my own sanity. Yeah, I mean, I, I guess I, sure, I would love to, to answer your question, I would love to see, you know, the City of Calgary grow its bike lanes, but, um, I think another thing that we need to take from this is like, it's another reminder how like, wholly unprepared we are for the volatility that I think is certainly coming through this, you know, if you wanna call it mid transition, like, uh, like Mike.

Collaborator, Emily Gruber and I do, or, but just this idea of, you know, when you start to see contractions and certain supplies and all these kinds of things in our energy system models, we tend to pass through these in this very smooth way where, you know, the model just adjusts and the, the stock adjusts and things happen nicely and orderly.

And this is just yet another reminder that this is not going to be orderly and. One of the things that I think governments and policymakers need to do is prepare for the disorder and prepare to be able to respond to that disorder. Because if you're trying to respond at the last minute, you know you get the least good solutions and you do the least good job of, you know, protecting and supporting those who are can least afford to deal with these kind of price swings.

[00:26:54] Ed Whittingham: It would be good to spend just, uh, a couple minutes on the implications for Canadian oil and gas because if, uh, if you're not in Sara's bubble, you might hear some arguments that, yeah, this is very good for Canada, and if you're a Japanese official or a Chinese or Korean official and you're seeing these shocks and wanting to diversify.

Supply of your energy products, then Australia, Canada, and even the US start to look pretty good. And if you're the premier of Alberta, which, uh, you know, we once wanted to have as a co-host on this show, but fortunately that never came to be. If you're the premier of Alberta, you're saying a few things.

One, has this ever reversed our budget fortunes? Isn't this great? 'cause I had this huge hole in my budget from the low price of oil. Now we're gonna have high prices for a sustained period of time. You know, times are good again. And yes, we should double down on the oil and gas economy and sort of, this is a proof point because over the long term there will be a structural shift and people are gonna want our great Canadian energy products.

[00:28:00] David Keith: There was a thoughtful, I thought, op-ed in the Globe and Mail by, I'm afraid I forgot the name of the gentleman who wrote it, uh, arguing that, that the Canada kind of lost out of the last real LNG boom. We just have obviously the first facility coming online just recently and arguing that now is Candace time with a major project to focus on getting another LNG export, uh, facility moving really fast.

And um, I see that argument. I think it might carry some weight. 

[00:28:27] Ed Whittingham: The only thing though is what you, what you said, David, getting another LNG facility moving really fast is oxymoronic. They, they, they don't move fast. And that's why if you're looking at India and they think got l and g Mozambique or Tanzania, that's a 10 year project minimum.

[00:28:44] Sara Hastings-Simon: And I'll just say only if it's, you know, private dollars that are going in because there is, I mean there, there's no doubt that there is, like, you know, whether you call it windfall profits or whatever it is, there's opportunities to make money in the near term if, but. To the point you made earlier, David.

I think there's a, the longer run view for LNG becomes more questionable in terms of a supply glut. And so I think we need to be thoughtful about making sure that this is not a, you know, privatize the profits, socialize, the loss kind of move for Canada. I'll put it this way, I would be very surprised if we see, you know, the response to this being anybody trying to, you know, develop some major new capacity because it's just the, the timelines, um.

Are just hard to match up. 

[00:29:29] David Keith: I think this is where the, the, the assumptions diver on depending on what happens in the war. So if the war ends sometime soon with Trump declaring unconditional surrender, uh uh, but nothing really hap nothing more happening than has already happened, than I absolutely agree with you.

In some world where there really is some real destruction of capacity, then it might be different. 

[00:29:49] Ed Whittingham: The on April 1st. Coincidentally, April Fool's Day, we're gonna get the results of the negotiations of the Federal Alberta MOU. That includes a bunch of things in there, including a new pipeline. A senior official in Ottawa told me that they're on track, that they actually could get something out by April 1st.

We'll see if this is too much of a distraction, and then we'll see if a private operator comes forward with a pipeline proposal. I think I'm like you, Sara, at this point. It would be. Over my dead body that I would agree to any public money going into a new pipeline, but we shall see. So very last question.

I know we're running out of Amit's time. He's probably, you know, putting on his Safari shirt and getting his bags in the front hallway as we speak, the legacy of the war. Is this going to be good or bad for. Climate. The climate, working on the climate problem making progress and energy transition. David, you've kind of already weighed in.

You think that this will help to accelerate global emissions peak? 

[00:30:52] David Keith: Yeah, I think that's likely, but I think the war is terrible. I think it further weakens the US' stature and ability in the kind of complicated contest with China. I think it. Is a disaster for the region, unless magically it produces some better regime in Iran, which would be great.

Have lots of Iranian mentors and, and friends. But it seems like an unlikely outcome, so it seems like a disaster. 

[00:31:18] Sara Hastings-Simon: Yeah, I mean, certainly also say in the near term, there's a lot of negative climate impacts of war, right? You have a lot of. Fossil fuel combustion and a lot of contribution to emissions. So that, you know, is a clear, is a clear negative.

I think the, yeah, I, I think like we were talking about before, there is a world where it does accelerate this push away from dependency on fossil fuels, whether that's, um. Kind of moving away from existing dependency or more unwillingness to, uh, lock into fossil fuels as a, as a new source for places that are, you know, looking to, to get more energy.

So I think net net on that, on that piece of the transition, I think, you know, the, the price spikes and all these things. Do send a cautionary tale that could accelerate it. But, but like David said, I think that's, you know, it's not a, certainly not a reason to be cheering for it or anything. 

[00:32:13] Ed Whittingham: Sure. And, and let me put my cards on the table.

I think the war. While I understand the aim, I'm no fan of the, uh, Iranian regime. I think they sow chaos and kill their own people and all sorts of terrible things. And, uh, if they ever got ahold of a nuclear weapon, it's an existential risk to Israel. But it's being prosecuted, certainly on the US side by incompetent and corrupt people and very poorly prosecuted when it comes to climate in the near term.

I think government's gonna do everything they can. They're gonna prioritize supply keeping prices down. Industrial resilience, climate gets harder politically. 'cause I can tell you, having just been to Ottawa, it's. Harder to compete for attention with with this going on. Although I was at an event where we had a Canadian general, it was on carbon removal, attend the whole event, even if that was the day when he had to weigh in on where Canadian troops are in the Middle East.

But he said, this is a priority for us. Decarbonizing, our National safety and security fleet is a priority. I was pleasantly surprised to hear that over the, the medium term. Sure. It reinforces that dependence on traded fossil fuels gives you reoccurring exposure to wars and choke points and price shocks, and hopefully it, you know, puts wind in the sails of domestically produced low carbon power.

And then in the end, that looks less like climate idealism and more like just good national resilience. 

[00:33:44] Sara Hastings-Simon: This is all happening in the backdrop of, I think, a very much changing conversation from the oil industry. Right. And I saw really interesting reporting from Clean Creatives this morning, which is a group of PR professionals, um, that are sort of looking at how the oil ads to today have really shifted from being about climate, uh, to being about, um.

Just like the world being safe and stable. So I think there's this wholesale move. I found that interesting 'cause I think I see that happening certainly within Canada, and I hadn't realized it was a, you know, more global phenomenon too. So, um, the, the tides have definitely turned on the, on the energy interest, energy industries engagement in the, in the climate discussion.

[00:34:28] Ed Whittingham: Yeah, yeah. On, on kind of a pop cultural note before I, you know, watch my hockey highlights on TSNI click, I have to watch an ad. There's one called Protect Ontario, and they list all these things the Ford government is doing to protect Ontario. It's implied threats from the US and one is we're building new nuclear power plants.

I don't think we would've seen that as a soundbite, you know, just a few years ago and. It's evidence of a shifting, a shifting mood. Okay. David, any last thoughts from you? 

[00:34:59] David Keith: I'm all good. I'll, I'll, I'll lead with something that's stuck in my head from John Stewart's, uh, Monday session, which is that, um, these wars are God's opportunity to teach Americans geography.

And I think it's a really sad but real truth. 

[00:35:14] Ed Whittingham: Yes. Uh oh shit. I'm trying to think of an Onion headline. It was something like Trump trying to get the president of Hormuz on the line. You know, like 

[00:35:25] Sara Hastings-Simon: when the onion becomes indistinguishable from the actual news, you know, like. We've lost the plot. 

[00:35:31] Ed Whittingham: Oh, I look forward.

I, I must admit, like every day at whatever's three or 3:30 PM when that daily Onion, uh, uh, newsletter comes in, uh, yeah, it helps me to make sense, more sense of what's happening in the world than sometimes in New York Times. Uh, thanks to you both, sir. I couldn't be there with you. And, uh, yeah. Travel safely, Amit.

Thanks for listening to Energy vs Climate. The show is created by David Keith, Sara Hastings Simon and me, Ed Whittingham, and produced by Amit Tandon with help from Michael Edmonds. Our title in show Music is The Windup by Brian Lips. This season of Energy vs Climate is produced with the support of the North Family Foundation, the Consecon Foundation, the Trottier Family Foundation, and you our generous listeners. Sign up for updates and exclusive webinar access at energyvsclimate.com and review and rate us on your favorite podcast platform.

We'll be back with a special Climate Book Reviews and review with Roger Thompson as always, and author John Vallient, he of the bestselling book, Fire Weather.

See you then.