OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is taking his government’s balancing act between the economy and the environment on a western Canadian road show this week.
However, the precariousness of his position between environmental groups, who want no more fossil fuel development, and the oil industry, which is a big driver of the Canadian economy, will be highlighted on the trip.
Several hundred Trans Mountain pipeline protesters plan to give him a less-than-warm welcome at his Vancouver hotel Thursday night.
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Then on Friday, Trudeau is to visit Alberta’s oil sands to tour a Suncor facility, a company whose CEO complained two months ago that Canada’s regulatory regime and uncompetitive tax structure would keep his company from investing any further in this country.
The pipeline was approved by the Trudeau government in 2016 but protesters say it will raise the risk of oil spills in the Burrard Inlet and can’t be completed if the government is to meet its climate change commitments to cut Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions another 200 million tonnes a year by 2030.
WATCH: Pro and anti-Trans Mountain pipeline protesters clash in Calgary
Furor over the pipeline has ramped up in recent weeks, with around 200 people arrested near Kinder Morgan’s Burnaby, B.C. marine terminal in the last month; Trudeau faced protesters at a town hall in Nanaimo in February and their ranks have grown in the days since.