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Worrying About Reclamation and Abandonment Obligations in the Context of Property Assignment Consents

On February 22, 2023

In Energy, Natural Resources, Provincial Court, Uncategorized

By: Nigel Bankes and Drew Yewchuk

Case commented on: Canadian Natural Resources Limited v Harvest Operations Corp, 2023 ABKB 62 (CanLII)

PDF Version: Worrying About Reclamation and Abandonment Obligations in the Context of Property Assignment Consents

This decision is principally about when a court can or should grant partial summary judgment. For that reason alone, we anticipate that it will be appealed. But the underlying concern that led to this litigation was (and still is) the decision of Canadian Natural Resources Limited (CNRL) to contest assignments pursuant to a purchase and sale agreement (PSA) between Harvest Operations as the vendor and Spoke Resources as the purchaser. CNRL and Harvest were parties to some 170 agreements affected by the PSA, including 133 land agreements, 30 facility agreements, and 7 service agreements.

Do We Need a Forum Within Which to Discuss Issues of Electricity Law and Policy in Alberta?

By Nigel Bankes

On February 20, 2023

In Energy

By: Nigel Bankes

PDF Version: Do We Need a Forum Within Which to Discuss Issues of Electricity Law and Policy in Alberta?

I am not a technical electricity expert and I do not have day-to-day access to technical experts, but I have been following some of the law and policy issues in the electricity sector in Alberta over the last decade or so. I am concerned that we don’t have a suitable forum within which to publicly discuss and develop electricity law and policy for an increasingly decentralized electricity system that continues to decarbonize and has access to a greater diversity of generation. On top of this is the emerging policy of the “electrification of everything”. There is massive complexity here, but the public deserves to be involved in a discussion of the relevant issues.

Fighting Over History at a Special Meeting of the Law Society of Alberta

By Drew Yewchuk

On February 16, 2023

In Announcements, Legal Education

By: Drew Yewchuk

Commented on: Resolution on Rule 67.4 Defeated at The Special Meeting of the Law Society of Alberta held February 6, 2023

PDF Version: Fighting Over History at a Special Meeting of the Law Society of Alberta

This post describes the procedure and results of the Special Meeting of the Law Society of Alberta held on Monday February 6, 2023, and then comments on what it all meant. The purpose of the special meeting was described on ABlawg in a previous post by Koren Lightning-Earle, Hadley Friedland, Anna Lund, Sarah N Kriekle, Heather (Hero) Laird here, and I refer readers needing background on the Resolution, and the purpose of the Special Meeting, to their post. I attended the special meeting and this post follows up with notes on the meeting itself.

Total Claims that its ROFR Rights Were Violated in the Sale of Teck’s Interest in the Fort Hills Project

By Nigel Bankes

On February 13, 2023

In Contracts, Energy

By: Nigel Bankes

Case commented on: TotalEnergies EP Canada Ltd v Suncor Energy Inc, 2023 ABKB 59 (CanLII).

PDF Version: Total Claims that its ROFR Rights Were Violated in the Sale of Teck’s Interest in the Fort Hills Project

Suncor, Total, and Teck all owned interests in the Fort Hills Oilsands Project (54%, 24.4%, and 21.5%, respectively). Teck agreed to sell its interest in the project to Suncor. The sale triggered a right of first refusal (ROFR) in the relevant agreement. The sale included some of Teck’s other assets (the other assets) but the sale was also subject to a condition precedent that required Teck to vote in favour of a proposed operating budget for the Project (the budget approval covenant). Suncor’s proposed operating budget had been hotly contested among the three partners for a number of years. Total and Teck had repeatedly voted against Suncor’s budget proposals, with the result that those budgets were not approved and operations had to revert to the last approved budget of 2021.

R v Hills and R v Hilbach and Section 12 of the Charter: The Twelfth Dimension of Sentencing

By Lisa Silver

On February 9, 2023

In Criminal, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, Indigenous, Sentencing

By: Lisa Silver

Cases commented on: R v Hills, 2023 SCC 2 (CanLII); R v Hilbach, 2023 SCC 3 (CanLII)

PDF Version: R v Hills and R v Hilbach and Section 12 of the Charter: The Twelfth Dimension of Sentencing

Editors’ Note: This is the third in our series of posts to mark Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Week at the University of Calgary, which deals with the impact of mandatory minimums sentences on the Charter rights of Indigenous persons.

We live in four dimensions of space, famously described by the space-time continuum imagined by Albert Einstein. In legal terms, a courtroom is an example of this kind of space we perceive when practicing law. If we look outside of law and further into the field of physics, even more dimensions are possible – upwards of 26 according to the Closed Unoriented Bosonic String Theory. This article is concerned with a previously unacknowledged dimension of the law, found within the confines of the sentencing hearing. In the recent Supreme Court of Canada decisions of R v Hills, 2023 SCC 2 (CanLII) and R v Hilbach, 2023 SCC 3 (CanLII) a new dimension of the sentencing hearing is revealed through the application of s 12 of the Charter, which protects the right “not to be subjected to any cruel and unusual treatment or punishment”. Specifically, in Hills and Hilbach this section is engaged by the minimum terms of imprisonment mandated by the offence provisions, both of which involve firearms. The subsequent s 12 inquiry is, like the dimensions conjured by string theory, not necessarily perceived by everyone in every sentencing hearing but is an ever-present reminder of core sentencing principles, like proportionality and parity, which ensure the continual presence of human dignity in the sentencing process. Although this twelfth dimension has been revealed by virtue of the Hills and Hilbach decisions, the s 12 inquiry itself reveals much about the limits of sentencing and the frailties of our system of justice.