Article by Rebel News staff.

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They're calling it Pacific Link: a million barrels of oil a day from Bruderheim, Alberta to Delta, British Columbia, equally owned by the Ottawa and Alberta governments.

On The Ezra Levant Show, Ezra went through the fine print of Premier Danielle Smith and Prime Minister Mark Carney's announcement.

The only private partner, Pembina, took 10% and put in writing that it has "no at-risk development capital," he began. 

"The one company that knows how to build pipelines, it's keeping its wallet in its pocket," Ezra said. The Associated Press pegs the cost at $25 billion to $31 billion. Alberta says $35 billion to $40 billion.

Meanwhile, no route has been mapped and No shippers have signed. The project's conditions won't even be written until September 1, 2027, and first oil might come in 2032.

"It's not a pipeline. There are no shovels in the ground," Ezra said. "This is a press release, or maybe even a campaign ad against the referendum," with the announcement coming just over two weeks before Albertans vote on October 19.

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner made the same point: a year and a half into Carney's tenure, "two signing ceremonies, countless media stories, and no pipelines built."

Ezra laid out three obstacles.

First, the courts. Ottawa consulted more than 130 Indigenous communities, and most said they weren't prepared to endorse the project. The Coastal First Nations lobby has vowed to fight it. The Federal Court of Appeal killed Trans Mountain's approval in 2018, and a B.C. judge recently granted Aboriginal title over land in Richmond, right next door to the Delta terminal.

"Would you put $40 into it?" Ezra asked.

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Second, the tanker ban. Bill C-48 is still the law, and the Carney-Smith agreement only promises "an appropriate adjustment if needed."

Third, the deal-killer. The pipeline and the Pathways carbon capture project are "mutually dependent," he noted. No carbon capture, no pipeline. Pathways carries a price tag of $16.5 billion or more, on top of an industrial carbon price floor of $130 a tonne.

"No other oil producing country does this to itself," Ezra said — and Asian buyers don't care. "Do you think a refinery in Shandong checks whether the barrel came with a carbon credit? Of course not."

In his speech, Carney called Pacific Link a "once-in-a-generation opportunity." Ezra asked why, pointing to previous projects like Northern Gateway, Energy East and Keystone XL, which were all private proposals that needed no government money, and all were killed under the Liberals or by the Americans under Obama and Biden without objection from Ottawa.

"There's nothing magic about this moment," Ezra said.

Premier Smith called it a monumental day, and Ezra said he hopes she's right. But he sees no deal here, just an announcement timed to the vote.

"I think the number one fact about this pipeline isn't about the pipeline," he said. "It's about the referendum."