Canada, rare among nations, has managed its resource extremely well, to the benefit of all Canadians. A new set of choices await the current crop of political leaders charged with managing these assets.
According to some measures, the US alone is sitting on more than a century’s worth of natural gas at current rates of consumption. And because it emits half the greenhouse gases of coal, new unconventional reserves present the country--and the continent, for that matter--a unique opportunity to address concerns about energy security and climate change.
Massive accumulation of gold by the biggest bullion-backed exchange-traded fund has been driven by a sinking US dollar and concern that the USD12 trillion of government stimulus unleashed to combat the global recession will result in out-of-control inflation.
As is the case leading up to every Olympiad, the amount of economic activity the 2010 Vancouver and Whistler Winter Olympic Games will generate has been one of the two central questions ever since a bid was first proposed, the other, of course, being the question of how much they’ll cost Canadian taxpayers.
The “shape” of recoveries are usually cast in the form of letters--specifically L, U, V and W. This simplified analysis is used most often to describe how the economy will emerge from recession--quick and strong, gradual, a stutter, or long and painful. Most observers are cheering for a V.
A recent IMF Working Paper by Rocco Huang, economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, and Lev Ratnovski, economist at the North American division of the International Monetary Fund, concludes that “the funding structure of Canadian banks was the key determinant of their resilience during the turmoil.”
The US spends much more on health care than Canada, both on a per-capita basis and as a percentage of GDP.
A report by the US Geological Survey (USGS) found that 25 areas inside the Arctic Circle contain about a fifth of the world’s undiscovered but recoverable oil and natural gas reserves.
SAGD involves the drilling of two horizontal wells, one at the bottom of the formation and another about five meters above it. The upper well injects steam into the reservoir. The resulting heat melts the bitumen, which allows gravity to assist it to flow to the lower well, and the bitumen is pumped to the surface.
Perhaps no better illustration of Canada’s economic dependence on the US can be found than in the history of car making in North America. From the early days, the Canadian auto industry, and thus to a large to degree the Canadian economy, has been a junior partner to the Big Three and the US economy.
