A single set of rules run will ease the red tape for oil and gas exploration companies planning new projects as well as for those who would oppose them, says the MLA for Red Deer South.
Cal Dallas, parliamentary assistant for Environment Minister Rob Renner, was one of three MLAs charged with finding a way to put the rules governing non-routine applications for drilling and extraction of oil and gas into one statute with a single set of regulations.
Working on a task force struck last March, Dallas and his colleagues, Drayton Valley MLA Diana McQueen and Evan Berger, MLA for Livingstone McLeod, have created a set of recommendations that would help the province knit together all of the rules governing oil and gas extraction.
While the Energy Resources Conservation Board is the main approving body for oil and gas applications, they must also meet regulations and policies set out by Environment and SRD.
The people named to the task force were chosen because of their connections with the three ministries involved in oil and gas.
McQueen, who chaired the committee, is parliamentary assistant for Energy Minister Ron Liepert while Berger works in the same capacity for SRD Minister Mel Knight.
Alberta has developed exceptional technology for improving the safety and efficiency of its oil and gas operations, said Dallas.
But the legislation behind it has been piecemeal with no connections across the three ministries under which those activities are governed, he said on Saturday.
“We’ve just continued to layer pieces of regulation without the consideration in terms of, does the system operate as efficiently as it could,” he said.
To help uncover and resolve those complexities, the three members of the regulatory enhancement task force have travelled up and down the province, meeting with exploration companies and other groups that have a stake in oilfield development and its impact on the areas in which it takes place, including non-government organizations, environmental interests and surface rights groups.
“I pretty well ran the wheels off my car,” said Dallas.
“One of the things that was common to all of those groups is they recognized and indicated to us that the complexity of the system is problematic, that it takes a lot of resources to stay on top of multiple applications with multiple points during an application process, where they would be required to intervene.”
Creating a single application, review and decisions process would create an environment in which all stakeholders would be able to function more efficiently, said Dallas.
The new regulations, to be introduced in the fall session, will not apply to the processing or downstream side of the industry, he said.
bkossowan@www.reddeeradvocate.com