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Jan. 22, 2025
Wall Street investment firms are betting on LNG projects in Canada as part of the “Unleashing American Energy” strategy, unveiled this week by President Donald Trump.
“We will drill, baby drill,” Trump declared to a standing ovation at his inauguration ceremony, signaling the MAGA movement’s plan to flood world markets with North American oil and gas.
Demand for LNG is already shrinking in places like Japan and Europe. So Wall Street is moving fast to lock in financing for new gas infrastructure before the bubble bursts.
To make LNG terminals profitable, project backers are demanding subsidies from Canadian taxpayers, including publicly funded electricity from BC Hydro to power gas liquefaction.
The American billionaires behind Ksi Lisims LNG and the Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline are counting on politicians in the “51st state” to go along with Trump’s plan.
But as energy bills rise for households – and the true costs of the LNG boom become clear – Canadians may not want Trump’s corporate allies controlling even more of our economy.
The Coastal GasLink pipeline was snapped up in 2019 by Wall Street giant KKR, where ex-U.S. general and CIA Director David Petraeus is a partner. But there’s an even bigger player in B.C.
Blackstone Inc. is the world’s largest “alternative asset manager,” controlling $1 trillion worth of assets and companies in nearly every sector of the economy. Last week Blackstone revealed its stake in Western LNG, the shell company promoting Ksi Lisims and the PRGT pipeline.
Blackstone is infamous for buying up foreclosed homes after the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis. Now the world’s biggest corporate landlord, it collects ever-increasing rents from hundreds of thousands of tenants, including families in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.
Blackstone was also an early promoter of LNG, investing in two Kinder Morgan projects and Cheniere’s mega-terminal in Louisiana, built by U.S. engineering giant Bechtel. Western LNG’s skeleton crew includes a former Cheniere executive and a former Bechtel vice-president.
Blackstone’s CEO is Republican mega-donor Steve Schwarzman, who poured $39 million into the 2024 race in support of Trump’s agenda. A close advisor to the president since 2016, Schwarzman is betting big on a continent-wide expansion of LNG exports.
Other PRGT investors include the Jefferies Group, run by billionaire CEO Rich Handler, and Apollo Global Management. Apollo’s CEO Marc Rowan was short-listed by Trump for the position of Treasury Secretary, while its board chair Jay Clayton is nominated as the new U.S. Attorney for Manhattan.
Blackstone’s first wave of LNG investments were all on the Gulf Coast. Now gas companies want to supply power stations across the Pacific Ocean. But Washington State, Oregon and California have rejected all LNG proposals so far.
One option is to sail tankers from the Gulf through the Panama Canal. But low water levels have forced restrictions on huge LNG carriers. Trump vows to seize the canal, but Panama is resisting.
Another option is LNG export terminals on the west coast of Mexico, like Sempra’s Energia Costa Azul project. Sempra Infrastructure, which is partly owned by KKR, has also proposed the Salina Cruz LNG terminal as an alternative to the Panama Canal.
But the real prize is British Columbia – home to vast deposits of methane gas and low royalty rates. Last year fracking companies (many with significant American ownership) extracted $5.8 billion worth of gas in B.C. They paid just 12 per cent of that back to the public.
The B.C. government collects twice as much revenue from gambling as it does from natural gas. And it offers LNG projects corporate tax breaks, carbon tax exemptions, discount electricity and free RCMP protection. The sharks on Wall Street know an easy meal when they see one.
Now Blackstone and Bechtel have reunited to advance the Ksi Lisims LNG terminal and PRGT pipeline, just 150km from KKR-owned Coastal GasLink. The same American firms that took over Gulf Coast communities are moving to control gas exports through Gitxsan, Nisga’a and Ts’msyen territory.
The destination is power stations in Asia, where LNG is burned to generate electricity. Some in Canada believe it will “displace coal,” “reduce emissions” or serve as a “bridge fuel” to renewable energy. None of that is true.
According to analysis released in December by the outgoing U.S. Secretary of Energy, LNG is raising global emissions and delaying the adoption of renewable energy. For Trump and his Wall Street backers, that is exactly the point.
LNG is a fuel. Fuel must be bought and burned every day. It flows through taps controlled by despots and dictators. Its price can be manipulated by speculators and cartels. And supplies can be suddenly cut off in times of war.
Solar panels and wind turbines are technology. They allow anybody to capture energy from the sky, right where they live. And that technology is becoming cheaper every year, to the point that developing countries are starting to turn to renewable energy instead of fossil fuels.
That’s what the “Unleashing American Energy” plan seeks to fight. It’s a strategy to grow the power and profits of the oil and gas industry, and deepen the control of Wall Street corporations over land, water and what’s left of our democracy.
President Trump has made it clear he does not respect Canada as an independent country, never mind the sovereignty of Indigenous nations. He views the oil, gas and minerals under our feet as there for the taking.
If this is not true – if elected decision makers and Indigenous titleholders still have a say over what happens in our home – now is the time to prove it.
Capitulating to the MAGA billionaires will not only cost the people of B.C. and Canada a terrible price, it will grow the power of Trump’s movement.
The B.C. government must act soon, before Trump’s Wall Street allies tighten their grip on both our fossil fuel resources and our publicly-owned renewable energy infrastructure.
One way to buy time is to put the brakes on the Blackstone-backed PRGT pipeline. The project was approved more than 10 years ago, and its Environmental Assessment Certificate has expired. At the very least it should go through a modern project review.
Rather than fast-tracking construction this spring as the Cheniere and Bechtel executives demand, Premier Eby and his cabinet should pause and ask if this is really in the best interest of British Columbians.
Energy Minister Adrian Dix has orders to “ensure costs for energy remain low for people,” and “reduce our emissions while protecting residential ratepayers”. That alone should force a rethink of the LNG boom.
Some BC NDP politicians believe their government’s days are numbered – that a conservative takeover is inevitable. They should still fight for our right to determine our own future. They might be surprised how many people are ready to join.