Corporate Power and Changes to Provincial Environmental Regulation During the First Year of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

How have Canada’s largest oil producing provinces altered key environmental policies since the onset of COVID-19, in response to the dual pressures of an oil sector in distress and the imperative to reduce emissions? While regulatory changes have been reported in the media, they have not yet been systemically reviewed or explained; this project aims to fill that gap.

Oil markets went into crisis in early 2020 as oil prices plummeted following an oil price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia and the economic downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, the global community has entered into a critical decade in climate history: the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has stated that a sharp reduction in emissions over the next decade is needed to avoid the worst consequences of climate change. Government policy interventions in this moment are both determining the future of the oil sector and defining possibilities for climate change mitigation.

This thesis analyzes changes to regulations made by the oil-producing provinces of Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador at this critical moment. Conducting a full review of provincial regulatory changes during the pandemic, I find that in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic Canada’s oil provinces demonstrated a clear pattern of supporting the oil sector by weakening provincial environmental regulation surrounding the sector. Regulatory changes observed in 2020 can be explained in part by considering corporate power, and strategies used by oil corporations to influence government, in each province. These changes to provincial regulatory frameworks shape Canada’s response to the ongoing economic and climate crises, and further expose Canadians to both the risks of climate change and the economic risk of an oil sector in long-term decline.