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Alberta Premier Danielle Smit and Ontario Premier Doug Ford, pictured at last year’s Calgary Stampede, announced plans for a new pipeline route on Monday.Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press
Alberta and Ontario are proposing a new 3,300-kilometre pipeline route to deliver crude oil across the country in a bid to reduce Canada’s reliance on foreign markets.
The proposed route, called the Northern Shield Energy Corridor, would travel across four provinces from Hardisty, Alta., to Sarnia, Ont., and would be able to move about 500,000 barrels of oil per day and expand to up to 800,000 barrels a day, according to a news release from the Ontario government.
Yet the cost of such a project – and who would pay for it – were not immediately known.
The announcement was jointly made by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and Ontario Premier Doug Ford at a news conference in Calgary on Monday, during that city’s annual Stampede event.
“Our plan to build the Northern Shield Energy Corridor is a plan to protect workers in Ontario, Alberta and every part of the country,” Mr. Ford said in a news release Monday.
The pipeline route follows a memorandum of understanding signed last year by Alberta, Ontario and Saskatchewan, which committed to new energy and trade infrastructure.
Ontario said the pipeline would be built exclusively with Canadian steel and lead to manufacturing and supply chain jobs in the country.
The proposed route would end in Sarnia, which has refining capacity. Ontario said it is also exploring pipeline extensions to new and existing ports. It said the proposed route would also provide Manitoba and the Manitoba-Crown Indigenous Corporation with the opportunity to explore the feasibility of a pipeline extension to the Port of Churchill.
“By connecting Alberta’s energy with Canadian refineries and markets, we can create jobs, grow our economy and make better use of the world-class resources we already have,” Ms. Smith said in a statement.