The oil industry loves the Alberta government.
Ed Stelmach is the best premier oil money can buy, without a doubt.
The premier has come up with a package worth millions to benefit oil companies, i.e. two per cent biofuels for diesel units and five per cent ethanol for gasoline units.
If the government had put this amount of money toward the generation of clean power — wind, water or coal gasification — then this would prevents tons of pollutants from going into our atmosphere.
In five years, a high percentage of the automobile industry will be electric, fuel cell or hybrid. This will consume a lot more electricity than Alberta now produces, but Alberta has the capability to produce hundreds more megawatts as Alberta sits on hundreds of years of coal power.
With carbon capture, and the new technology in combustion engines, the air we breathe now and in the future will have a lot less pollutants.
Can Stelmach see beyond the oil industry and what the future could hold with alternate clean power, and with some assistance at a fraction of the monies going to the oil industry?
Dave France
Stettler