Shaun Newman Podcast - #399 - Dr. Chris Keefer

Episode Date: March 15, 2023

Emergency medicine physician, President of Canadians for Nuclear Energy & host of the Decouple Podcast. SNP Presents: Legacy Media featuring: Kid Carson, Wayne Peters, Byron Christopher & Kris Sims March 18th in Edmonton Tickets here: https://www.showpass.com/snp/ Substack: https://open.substack.com/pub/shaunnewmanpodcast Let me know what you think Text me 587-217-8500

This is Francis Whittleson. This is Benjamin Anderson. This is Dallas, Alexander. I'm Alex Kraner. This is Forrest Moretti. This is Chris Sims. This is Chris Barber, and you're listening to the Sean Newman podcast. Welcome to the podcast, folks.

Happy Wednesday. Let's get down to Brass Tags, shall we? Okay. Saturday, March 18th, SMP presents Legacy Media. There's still tickets available, and you just got a couple of days left to go grab one. Look in the show notes. Just click on the link. There you go.

Here's the lineup of people that are going to be in either on stage or in the audience Saturday night. Okay, here we go. Kid Carson, Wayne Peters, Chris Sims, Byron Christopher, there's your headliners. In the audience, Tamara Leach, Layton Gray, Nadine Ness, Andy Lee, Marty Up North, Nick Von Dubbs, Meg Garland, Nicole Murphy, Sheila Gunn Reed, Shane Getson, Sarah Swain, Casey Madhu, Tarika, and Laga, Yackstack, Tanner Nadee. Oh, and this guy named Tews. Yeah, Tews is in the building.

Hey, if you need any more reason to come, I'm just saying the lineup that's going to be roaming around Saturday night in the building is going to be a pretty cool group of people. And I hope that entices you to grab a ticket. Hey, that's all I got for you on Wednesday. Friday, I'm already going to be down there and I'm going to be rolling. So I figure I might as well hammer you Wednesday. Get off your butt. Buy a ticket. I hope to see you Saturday.

that's what I'm at. That's where I'm going. Okay. Let's talk some guardian plumbing and heating, shall we? Blaine and Joey Stephan. Episode 337, if you want to get a feel from. You know, I just, I ran into a guy just recently at U7 hockey, of all places. And he said, you know, I finally started listening to you.

And I said, oh, cool. You know, awesome. He said, yeah, it was the Blaine and Joey Stephan interview that got me into it. I was like, oh, cool. Yeah, great guys. speak right from the heart. He goes, yeah, there's no bullshit there, is there? And I'm like, no, there most certainly is not.

Well, if you're looking for no bullshit workplace, how about Guardian plumbing and heating? They always talk about what makes them different. I'll tell you what makes them different, folks. It's that right there. And what we've been living through, they're not going to force their opinion on you. They're not going to make you do things

that maybe you don't want to do. Yeah, you got to the point. They're looking for plumbers, HVAC, techs, installers, and apprentices. and all you got to do is go to Guardian plumbing.ca where of course you can also schedule your next appointment at any time.

The deer and steer butchery. I tell you what, I am lined up my next date to get in there, get my hands a little bit messy as I'm going to be doing a little bit, you know, carving up a little bit of meat. I've been saying this for the last couple weeks now

that, you know, one of the cool things about the deer and steer, It's located here, butcher shop in the Ligminster area. So, A, if you're looking for a butcher shop, deer and steer. If you're looking for a little bit of an experience, a little bit of an eye-opener on how it's done, you can get your animal done there, and then you can go help, you know, essentially help with the process, which is super cool. And this guy will be doing it all over again here very, very, very soon, and looking forward to it,

probably by looks fit in April. and I think if you know you're at all interested in such a thing it's just another you know you know check on the old box or check on the old sheet that they can offer you either way you got an animal that needs a butcher shop you're in the Lloydminster area give the deer and steer butchery a call 780 870 8700 Erickson Agro Inc Irma Alberta I'm giving you I don't know who I'm you know I just I like kind of gave like the wave you know I just waved but I'm waving to nobody because there's nobody in the studio.

Anyways, I'm giving you the wave. Irma Alberta. I brought up the fact that Irma has been like, you know, they've just been popping out of the woodworks the last little bit. And of course, my text line lit up with that. So, hey, Irma, Alberta, Erickson Agro. That's Kent and Tosh Erickson family farm raising. Four kids growing their food for their community and this great country

and teaming up with the SMP. If, you know, you're looking to support the SMP, you can do that as well. Just go in the show notes. uh text me on the phone number would love to find a way to get the smp and whoever wherever you are hooked up we got spots still on monday wednesday fridays either way it sounds like the ericsons are coming to emminton so uh that's awesome i'm looking forward to uh shaking hands and all that good stuff uh the three trees uh tap and kitchen um that's jim spennerath and his team over there i um no i'm gonna say it again i mean you know i was going to do down

around it, but then I'm like, yeah, screw it. You're looking for a little bit of live music. You want a fantastic meal. Tews will attest, the meal is fantastic. And I will attest that live music, the experience of having somebody play a little dittle while you eat, while you hang out with some friends, maybe the wife, maybe the husband, maybe a couple of good friends. Either way, there's just something for live music, folks, that just is top notch.

And I tell you what, three trees tap and kitchen will give you an experience and great food like pretty much no other here in Lloydminster area so give me a call 780 874 7625 get your reservation today finally Gartner management is a Lloydminster based company specialized at all types of rental properties to help meet your needs I just signed on for another year with Wade isn't isn't that just you know I'm closing in on a year full time and um it's uh you know I've got once again I don't know why you know am I stressed right now what am I doing Trott um I signed on for another year. And I don't know why that is stressing me out when the fact remains weight has been fantastic. And I would say if you're looking for a new spot, maybe you're looking for a spot.

Give way to call. 780808, 5025. Now let's get on the tail of the tape brought to you by Hancock Petroleum for the past 80 years. They've been an industry leader in bulk fuels, lubricants, methanol, chemicals, delivering to your farm, commercial or oil field locations. For more information, visit them at Hancockpetroleum.com.com.com.com.com. He's an emergency room physician, president of Canadians for Nuclear Energy, and host of the DeCouple podcast. I'm talking about Chris Kiefer. So buckle up. Here we go.

This is Dr. Chris Kiefer, and you're listening to the Sean Newman podcast. Welcome to the Sean Newman podcast today. I'm joined by Dr. Chris Kiefer. So, sir, thanks for giving me some time this morning. Sean, it's a pleasure chatting with you. You know, before we got recording here, I was just saying, you know, like I stumbled on your podcast. And anytime I realize a guest has got a podcast, I'm like, well, I'm just going to, you know, hand over the mic because you being on the other side of this, you know, no, just as you get interviewing somebody and you get all these wonderful guests coming in and giving you tons of information, rarely do you get the flip side where you get to talk. Now, certainly you've, you've had some interesting people on your podcast.

And on top of that, you've had some interesting travels on, you know, being the president of Canadians for nuclear energy. you've been to different places. Either way, I'm excited to hear some of your thoughts. With all that being said, I would like you to give a little bit of background to Canadians, to listeners from wherever they're tuning in. We've got Americans listening as well. Just some background on you, Chris,

so people can get a feel for you, and then we'll see where we head to. Yeah, I mean, so I like to start off by saying I'm a father. I have a beautiful four-year-old son, you know, put the important stuff out front. But yeah, I've had a pretty strange life. I'm an emergency physician. And, you know, when you apply to medical school, it's highly competitive.

And, you know, you have to construct a narrative out of your life to show, you know, why you should be a doctor. And I remember really struggling with that because, again, I've done a lot of interesting things in my life. And probably the most out of left field is, you know, when I was 18, I packed my bags and headed up to the Yukon territory. Ended up running a trap line up there as well. as becoming a horse wrangler and hunting guide. And I didn't come from a hunting or trapping family at all. So, you know, I've got that feel of, you know, rural Canada. Right now I live in Toronto, you know, Canada's biggest city for those who aren't aware.

But I spent a lot of time in the West, you know, worked for a rancher in Alberta. As I set up in the Yukon, I was born on the east coast of the country, Nova Scotia. I spent first decade of my life there. Physician. Where are you originally from? Born in Nova Scotia. My parents, they bucked the trend and ironically moved to Nova Scotia in the 80s for work when everyone else is going the other direction. Why on earth the Yukon?

I mean, I say that and folks, we do have Yukon listeners too. And I'm not saying Sean is hopeful to get up there this summer actually, weirdly enough. Yeah. But I don't mean that as any slight. I just go, that seems like a strain from Nova Scotia to the Yukon. That seems like a bit of a jump. That's all. Yeah, it's called a wild man.

I mean, listen, I, as I mentioned, I mean, my parents who are university professors come from a long line of engineers in my family. I didn't really have the engineering bug, unfortunately. And I grew up in the country. I was, I got really into survival training. And this isn't sort of like end of the world stuff built in the bunker. But I was just really, you know, I was a bit of an awkward, weird kid in school. And I spent a lot of time in the bush behind where I grew up, grew up in a little, didn't qualify as a village. actually. There's only, it was less than 400 people. So that's, that's a hamlet for you.

But I spent a lot of time in the woods. And yeah, I kind of took it, I took everything to an extreme. So, you know, I was interested in this whole kind of living off the land thing, building survival shelters, figuring out how to get potable water, you know, what plants you could eat. But I didn't come from a hunting family. And I spent a little bit of time with a high school teacher's uncle who was a trapper in northern Ontario. And I just figured, you know, this guy really understood nature, understood the land. You know, you have, you know, conservation biology professors that will go and study a little, you know, patch of prairie grass maybe for a few months a year. And they know some stuff, no doubt about it.

But, you know, I will see that as kind of a monologue. Like, you're people that go out sort of leave no trace camping. You're having a monologue. You're kind of parachuting in with a bunch of equipment made in Pakistan in the sweatshop maybe. Versus people that are, you know, really living off the land. And the kind of trapper lifestyle was one that was really fascinating to me. And so, you know, kind of took some time off school and scared the shit into my parents and ended up, yeah, on a trap line, not far out a white horse. Trapping lynx caught a wolverine, beaver, otter, that kind of stuff.

And then I ended up meeting out in the bush, love me out in the mountains. And I met a guy who ran a hunting outfit, never ridden a horse before and got put in charge of trailing in about 40 horses into some. pretty hostile country up into the mountains through, through tundraud, bog holes and stuff like that and learned how to hunt caribou sheep, moose. So it's been, again, a weird life. And trying to tie that into, you know, why I'd be a good

doctor's interesting. No, yeah, but I'm curious. So you tell me all that. And then now you're living in Toronto. That makes about as zero sense as anything, doesn't it? It does. It makes no sense. And it really does feel like a past life, to be honest, of the call of the wild is there. I'm eager to get back to the Yukon. I mean, long story short, I've got a kid here in Toronto and I can't leave the city for that reason. I've got family

here, family first kind of guy as well. So, you know, it's again, strange story, but honestly, I don't put strange in front eye. I think it's unique. It's, it's funny how you get from point A to point B and all the twists and turns in between there. And certainly, sir, you have a few of those. You know, when I stumbled across you, it's because of Brian Gitt. I'd had Brian Gitt. I don't know if that name means anything to you, but I'd had Brian Gitt on. He's been on multiple times. And he started sharing some of your stuff on Twitter. And I was like, you know, this, like this nuclear thing just keeps coming full circle around and round and around and around. and here it is again in my purview

and I'm like wow I haven't talked to you know I had Brian on I don't know what that was folks two months ago maybe and I'm just like it would be interesting to get somebody from Canada who's the president of Canadians for Nuclear Energy and I'm like you're a doctor who I'm just like how do you get like how do you how do you go from that to this you got to tell me a little bit of a story on I just I guess I'm wondering you know as much as you go from Nova Scotia to the Yukon, it's like doctor to head of the can, well, president of the Canadians for nuclear energy. I just, I'm curious. Hey man. Yeah.

And I'm happy to, you know, satiate your curiosities. Yeah, I mean, I've always been politically active. It was, you know, mainly stuff in my wheelhouse. I started, you know, one of the country's first clinics for migrant agricultural workers coming to pick tomatoes in southern Ontario or in the fruit patch. in Niagara, you know, mostly Mexican folks who didn't speak a word of English. I speak Spanish, so I was able to provide care for them. Did some work with refugees and things like that. When my son was born, I started thinking a lot about climate change because, you know,

having a kid, it starts to extend your timeframes out beyond your own selfish life, you know, hopefully another 80, 90 years into the future. And, you know, I got an argument with an oil and gas guy from actually up on the Yukon about climate. and, you know, I said what I had to say about it. And he disagreed, and I realized I hadn't actually, you know, dove into it all. I just was sort of taken, you know, I guess my sort of political tribes consensus on it. I mean, I'm still very climate concerned.

I have a more sophisticated view of climate now because of understanding, you know, in the words of Manitoban Professor Watzlov Smil that we live in a fossil field civilization, that if we were to leave it all on the ground right now, half the world would starve because of where we get our synthetic fertilizers for, which, you know, prop up our large population. So in your case, you know, when my son was born, I started thinking pragmatically about climate change. And being a solutions-focused guy, started looking around at, you know, what has been done to reduce emissions around the world. And very quickly you arrive at the conclusion that a number of countries, you know, that electrification is important. It's not the whole answer, but a number of countries have achieved low-carbon grids or even ultra-low-carbon grids.

And those places have done it either because they're drowning in hydroelectricity like Quebec, Manitoba, BC, or because they have nuclear. And really, there's a little bit of a scandal here, and a huge misunderstanding of this area, which is nuclear energy. A lot of myths that have been put out there, particularly by environmental organizations. And, you know, strange as it is, I feel like I'm fighting for an underdog here. I feel like there is, you know, a real urgency to deploying more nuclear energy for climate reasons, but not just for climate reasons. And, you know, for whatever reason, I'm a passion project guy. So, again, started researching the area, started the podcast, great vehicle, as you know, to learn and speak with experts from around the world. and we formed this nonprofit Canadian's nuclear energy three years ago now.

And we've done a lot. As you mentioned, I've given testimony before several standing committees of the House of Commons. My proudest moment was doing that on talking about the just transition. I'm sure that's an issue where you're based that comes up a lot. I think they've rebranded it recently because, you know, the term itself has been proven to be really just a branding and marketing term without much behind it. And, you know, I come from a part of the country where we had a transition, a just transition. It's illegal to burn coal in Ontario.

You know, fossil fuels are pretty great. They provide services that are very hard to replace. Nuclear was capable of replacing coal in Ontario. 90% of the energy to get rid of that coal came from nuclear. And those workers getting, you know, high paying, mostly union jobs. And these coal plants were able to move over to nuclear plants without any impact on their livelihoods, their well-being, their families. So it's a real good story, but again, one that is denigrated by the people who are supposed to be most concerned about climate and cleaner and things like that. So it's just, I find it,

I find it interesting. It tickles my, my fancy, I guess. Well, now you got me curious because you've said a blasphemy word out here in Alberta, and that is just transition. You know, I just actually sat at a thing last night where they talked about, talked about it and how it's coming for everybody's job and everything else. And I guess I go back to what you said right at the start, where you got in the argument with the oil field worker up in the Yukon, and you went, I don't really know a whole lot. And it's funny, this just transition, I mean, just basically, it talks about phasing out fossil fuels, roughly, and putting it into clean energy, and everybody will just nicely transition from one job to the next.

And I think when everybody looks at that out here, they go, that doesn't seem like it'll work that well, but maybe I'm wrong on that. So I'm curious, Chris, why pro just transition? Well, you know, again, I think what I'm calling for and what I'm speaking to is not this branding term, this marketing. The stuff that, again, frankly, people involved in energy like yourself, I'm imagining or for your constituents or those who are listening to you, they can see right through the bullshit.

You know, Just Transition is, you know, a fancy website with a bunch of actors wearing, you know, unblemished hard hats and reflective vest standing in front of solar panels and wind turbines. That's what it's being sold to you as. And it's being promoted by generally, you know, progressive left-wing academics who don't really understand energy, who are happy to say, you know, and I've had arguments with them. them. And they've said to me things like, well, yeah, it's true that, you know, people working in wind and solar get paid less than fossil fuel workers, but, and I said, I'm going to cut you off right there at the butt. That's not a just transition. These people have mortgages to pay,

kids to send to college, everything else. You're not going to democratically convince any fossil fuel worker to take a 25%, 50% pay cut to go and work, you know, in a different industry. And then, you know, when you actually look at the ramifications of, you know, at least what is being spoken about in terms of moving from fossil fuels to wind and solar, not nuclear, wind and solar here. What you're talking about is a supply chain, which 97% of solar waferes are done in China, you know, with a significant amount of slave labor in that supply chain. We spend tens of billions of dollars on another country's, frankly, a political adversaries, supply chain stimulating their economy. You know, they're making that polysilicon with good old Chinese coal, right? It's not

environmentally friendly. And then we import a bunch of finished products, these wind panels and solar turbines. You know, seven of the ten biggest wind turbine manufacturers also in China. And then what? You know, these fossil fuel workers transition into jobs that are temporary, that are, you know, not even geographically located because you've got to go put up a solar farm over here, over there. It's not tied to a community, to a tax base, a revenue base. And frankly, I call them Carney jobs. Because, again, they're temporary. they're low skilled, you know, why do people get paid good wages? It's because they have high skills or they're hard to replace. So what's the kind of bill of goods of this marketing and branding

term of just transition is, you know, it's very understandable and it's right thinking. It's common sense to see through that. When I talk about just transition, it's really harkening back to what the term should mean, trying to put some substance into it. Now, as I said, you know, fossil fuels are miraculous. They are what has driven, you know, our civilization, the enormous improvements that we've seen in qualities of life and lifespans and medicine and transportation and sending people to the moon and whatever. And frankly, in terms of just sustaining our population, like we've constantly been told that, you know, and this holds true for, you know, every other organism on the planet, there's a tendency to grow to the limits of your resources,

hit the edge of the petri dish and contract and die off. And fossil fuels have allowed that petri dish to expand and for our population to be what it is. And at this moment, like it or not, we are absolutely dependent on them to at scale provide, the very basics of our civilization, things like steel, things like cement. But things, you know, much more close to home,

we have to eat three times a day, things like synthetic fertilizer. Those are not easy to replace. I will not say that nuclear can replace all of those services. But nuclear is excellent at displacing coal for baseload power. We should be reserving that natural gas for the products that it can make in terms of fertilizer, in terms of plastics and things we need. We can be smarter with how we use our resources.

And just to finish off this just transition commentary, Canadian nuclear energy can do nuclear technology. This is the reactor that we designed ourselves. And it's remarkable engineering achievement. it provides 15% of the electricity of this country. That has a supply chain which is basically 100% in Canada. Every dollar we spend on this technology on building and refurbishing Canada reactors generates $1.40 in GDP and economic activity

because we mine the uranium, we turned into fuel, we build the power plants, we maintain them, we operate them, we decommissioned them, we handle the spent fuel, that is all in Canada. And that's very rare. I mean, I think, you know, Albertan and Saskatchewan oil and gas might be getting up to, you know, higher levels of an, you know,

indigenous supply chain, but nuclear is unique in that way. And it's got some of the best jobs, frankly, in the country, in terms of skilled labor, in terms of blue-collar labor, but also in terms of, you know, high-end engineering and things like that.

So, you know, my vision for Canada is one in which, you know, we reduce carbon emissions as much as possible. We displaced those fossil fuel services that we can. We use a technology, which produces no air pollution, produces no carbon emissions, contains all of its waste,

and provides excellent economic opportunity and jobs. So, I mean, there's my pitch. I won't go on too long, Sean, as you can tell them. I feel like I'm going to be cynical here, and I'm just going to say, well, then it really won't work, because any time it seems like it checks off too many boxes, here in Canada, we just don't do that. We just don't go, yeah, let's keep everything in Canada.

That sounds like a great idea. Because, I mean, honestly, Chris, when I hear that, I'm like, yeah, I mean, you're speaking about literally oil and gas or you're like there's all these things in Canada that we could do, but we seem to not want to do it. We seem to get in our way. We seem to just muddle things up over and over and over again. And the nuclear thing is is really interesting because, you know, for me, I had, I had, oh, Patrick Moron. And he, he really phrased something that really.

is stuck with me. And that was, uh, nuclear energy should be lumped in with nuclear medicine, not with, uh, nuclear war. And I went, huh, that is funny. Because every time I think of nuclear, uh, energy, I think more of like destruction than, you know, um, I don't know, saving humanity, I guess, where would probably be the opposite of destruction, you know. And then when you tack on that we could do it all here in Canada, you're like, man, I don't know, when anything can be done all in Canada, we seem to really mess that up. over and over again. I don't know. That's a, listen, that's a Westerners thought on that. I'm curious your thoughts on it. No, your cynicism is, is very logical. And I mean, it's partially

what keeps me in the game here doing what I do. Because, you know, you've got to, you got our political classes out of touch. They're energy illiterate. And, you know, even amongst the nuclear industry, I find there's a real lack of a kind of strategic thinking of a boldness of this idea of having a national industrial policy. We had that before. I mean, again, you're going to hear a lot of myths around nuclear is too slow. It's too expensive, et cetera.

I mean, we commissioned 23 large candy reactors in 22 years. We've crunched the math on that. It's the equivalent of the whole Quebec James Bay Hydro project. You know, an absolutely enormous public works project, which again, you know, in 22 years, building up 15% of the Canadian grid is pretty extraordinary. And we weren't even trying to decarbonize at that point. We were just trying to meet growing demand.

So then when you put it out that way, that you could hammer off, I think you said 23 and 22 or 22 and 23 years? 23 and 22 years, yeah. 23 reactors in 22 years. The same speed as the James Bayhydro project. I mean, these things take a while. There's some planning. 100%. Yeah.

But when you put it that way, it's like, oh, okay. So why? Why? in a world that wants to go fully electric. They want everything, Chris, to have, you know, to not burn diesel or gasoline or they want all these vehicles. You know, we're hearing the numbers, 2030, 2035, 2050, they want everything to go that way.

And yet, when I listen, I don't know, why wouldn't they be like, well, actually, the fastest way, maybe the only way, probably the only way, that you could ever get to where you're not burning gas or diesel in vehicles, that the grid could actually power it and handle that is probably nuclear. I mean, I hate to say common sense, but that's what I hear when I'm listening to you and when I think about the problem. We're going to be burning diesel in farm machinery and mining trucks

and all kinds of applications, you know, as far as I can see into the distant, distant future. There's no replacement for the diesel engine. You know, I've heard it described as the beating heart of civilization and diesel fuel as the fuel, the blood. And, you know, that's coming from someone who's climate concerned, right? But, you know, as I've educated myself on energy, you know, people come back to you and say, well, yeah, I mean, you know, but trains and, you know, mining trucks, there's actually electric motors in there. Well, yeah, but it's because there's a big diesel electric generator on the back of those. And you just, you can't, there's all kinds of sort of pilot projects that show, hey, hey, look over here.

We managed to pull this thing off, you know, using hydrogen to make steel. Great. Can you scale that? Can I provide all the steel that eight billion people need? Especially, can I do that for all the steel you're going to need for your wind turbines, which have hundreds of tons of steel in each in each one? Just take Canada right now. You know, when you go out at night, folks, and I know my area knows this a ton. I was driving back from Eminton last night.

Stopped in an industry halfway point, right? roll in and there is like no less than 20 semis all sleeping bird, you know, pulled over for the night, whatever. And I'm like, and that is how our country runs right there. Like, and they don't have a solution for that. There, there is no solution. Oh, and I mean, I mean, you're probably more aware of this than I am. So cut me off if this is, if this is old news or going to be boring for your listenership. But, you know, the, the kind of amount of diesel available in the states, they're running at like a 30-day supply in terms of, you know, what they've got stored up. I mean, you know, the U.S. is quote-unquote energy independent now and that exporter of oil.

But, I mean, they're exporting the light stuff. There's a pretty tight squeeze on the heavy stuff. Venezuela has it. Alberta has it. But you need that for your heavy distillates, for your heating oil, for your diesel, even for your kerosene, for your jet fuel. Because as I understand it, in terms of the distillation process, you put light stuff in. You don't get a whole lot of diesel out of it. And so that brings up an interesting aspect of nuclear, which is using it for steam in order to, you know, make the oil sands lower carbon.

And that, you know, again, as a kind of eastern Canada environmentalist, you know, the oil sands are a dirty word. As someone who's become more and more educated in energy and just, you know, understands that energy is the lifeblood of human civilization, you know, that's a compromise. that I think we're going to need to make. We're going to have to find ways to, you know, get that process lower carbon, frankly, to not burn as much natural gas, you know, thawing out all of that oil sands. But that heavy oil is going to be necessary in order to keep these diesel engines going. You know, again, that feels very uncomfortable because, you know, two or three years ago, I would have been angry at myself for saying those kind of things.

But, you know, I've learned to be a little more pragmatic. And I think there are smart ways that we can bring down our emissions. quite a lot without crashing civilization. You've, you know, every time I bring somebody on you, it's kind of curious. I'm like, okay, I wonder what this individual is going to be like, because you come from the East, obviously, you know, out west. There's, I always, you know, it's like we're not supposed to agree on a whole lot. And yet when I, when I listen to Chris, you say some things that I probably have never heard

out of somebody from Eastern Canada. And I, sorry, folks, out of Eastern Canada. I got lots of listeners out there, too. You are all wonderful people. I'm just like, curious where this was all going to go. Because, you know, certainly do I know everything about nuclear or oil and gas? Certainly not. There's people banging their head against the dash probably at some point here.

But I do find some of what you're talking about. Very, very interesting. I got to come back, though. Let's talk some more about nuclear here, because this, there's this boogeyman that nuclear and I was a guy you know when you talk about

if I go back like a year I would have been like yeah I don't know why the push for nuclear is happening I'm starting to realize exactly why that is when you you got to go talk to Senate you got to go

I think meet Justin Trudeau I think you've gotten like very interesting access or opportunities with the Canadian government what is the biggest hurdle slow down

I mean, listen, I mean, there's certainly a desire amongst large swaths of the Canadian public to take action on climate change. Atmospheric rivers, you know, historic heat waves, you know, affecting BC last year. I mean, we're going to keep seeing more and more of that. You know, climate change is real and it does represent a threat. And, you know, over centuries, maybe an existential threat. It's a big deal. And so, you know, I'm glad. I'm sorry to cut you off.

I didn't. When you talk about climate change is real. Can you lead me through that? Your process and getting to there. Is this something that has been taught to you as a young kid? Or is this something that you slowly worked your way into? And I mean, I mentioned your podcast. You've definitely interviewed a whole host of people.

So anyways, I'm just curious in your journey into that. I mean, definitely, you know, like I'd say, and we'll talk about this when it comes to nuclear, right? Like your political tribe determines a lot of what you believe. You have a lot of unexamined beliefs because, hey, you know, folks in my community, whether that's, you know, the party that you vote for, it's more in the U.S., I think, where people label themselves Democrats and Republicans. I'm a member of the disgusted party, frankly.

I don't like any of them. But, you know, we have a lot of unexamined beliefs. And so for climate, yeah, for sure. It's part of my political tribes, you know, set of dogmas and doctrines. But yeah, I have looked into the science as well and done that more deliberate investigation. And it's, yeah, to the best of my abilities and research abilities, it's a very real phenomenon. Then my next question, sorry, my next question then is have you interviewed guys like Patrick Moore or different people from the climate side of things that are labeled the climate deniers or the. climate, whatever, I actually don't know what they're called. I think they're climate denies. Is that what

it is? I don't know what they get labeled. I'm just curious because they have some interesting thoughts. You know, I want to, well, no, I actually, I'll let you finish. Sure. Yeah. No, I mean, I haven't interviewed yet. I made the request to a guy named Alex Epstein, who you're probably aware of. Yeah. He wrote the moral case for fossil fuels and fossil future. I've read both of those books. And he himself, you know, agrees that climate change is a very real phenomenon. He just says that, and I think I agree with him on this, this side of things, that, you know, fossil fuels, Again, it's not a super original idea. He's probably quoting the work of Vatslav Snell,

you know, Canadian academic here. We live in a fossil field civilization. You know, if you keep it all on the ground, a lot of people are going to die really fast. You know, like, as I was saying, 50% of the nitrogen in your body, which, you know, the protein in your body, the fundamental kind of building block of your body,

has a chemical signature related to the Haber-Bosch process, you know, which is natural gas dependent. And that is, you know, that nitrogen fertilizer, which again, provides the sustenance that feeds half the planet. If you were to follow the dictates of just stop oil or extinction rebellion, you know, their catastrophic predictions of 4 billion dead would happen, right? And that's not to say that climate isn't also a very real concern. I think it's just a much slower moving ship. But, you know, I think getting back to some of the things you were mentioning before, you know, nuclear as a dual-use technology, because I think we should spend a bit of time. And I'm sort of maybe.

No, no, no. It's my fault. It's a host seat here, right? So I'm also. Yeah, I'm pulling you everywhere. I was just curious, you know, one of the things that on this side that I've been frustrated with, not. there will be people yelling at the radio about climate change and everything with that. I just,

it doesn't matter to me what issue. It can be climate change. It can be COVID. It can be, guns. It can be, it can just be a whole list of, and all these hot topic issues.

And one of the things I've just seen out of media, and maybe I'm wrong in this, but certainly from my standpoint, I just haven't seen a balance. And I'm not saying Sean does a great job balancing. He's got his own biases and everything else. He's tried. And he continues to try.

And I was just curious with the when you go climate change is real boom, boom, boom. I'm just curious. Have you, I don't know, dug into the well of people who've been basically blackballed from the world? For sure. And I think I've developed, you know, while still disagreeing with some of those folks, I've developed a kind of empathy. I mean, again, I used to, again, come from political left where there's, you know, it's interesting.

There's a lot of censorship. There's a lot of, you know, we will only listen to ideas from, you know, this, this kind of set of books or this set of websites or this, I mean, this is happening, I guess, across the political spectrum that, you know, as we have more choice in terms of the media, we can consume, we silo ourselves more and more. But the left is particularly good at insulating itself from ideas that make it uncomfortable. And so, you know, I would say 10, 20 years ago, I wouldn't even want it to listen to someone like Alex Epstein. I'd just say, oh, he's a fossil fuel show. I'm not even going to engage with his ideas. I'm a much intellectually richer person for having engaged them. I can disagree with them on certain topics.

But in terms of the ways in which the term climate denier, I mean, that's a direct, what I'm trying to say here, illusion to Holocaust denier, right? I mean, the way that that term is thrown around. While disagreeing with so-called climate deniers, I can have some empathy to understand where they are coming from, Why are they are so hostile to so-called climate action? Because what's being sold is a false bill of goods.

It's made in China technologies, which actually don't significantly reduce carbon emissions or displaced fossil fuels. We've run the experiments on that. Germany has spent half a trillion euros on a wind and solar dominant energy transition. Coal, you know, for two years in a row now is the number one source of electricity on their grid.

They've had some modest reductions in emissions at an enormous price. And again, those wind turbines and solar panels are all in the garbage in 20 to 30 years. And you're installing solar panels in northern Europe with an 8% capacity factor? I mean, come on, right? So I can, you know, in terms of the skepticism, I get that. Or in terms of this just transition skepticism and saying, well, fuck it. You know, maybe climate's not really an issue.

You know, these are kind of narratives and things we tell ourselves to feel better about ourselves. And there's a lot of reasons why people, I think, you know, are skeptics. I personally am not. But I think that what nuclear offers is a very real form of action that we can take. And, you know, it is kind of a too good to be true story because it's like, wait a minute. So we can, you know, not sacrifice or economic well-being, if anything, stimulate the Canadian economy, right? We can produce reliable, affordable power that underpins, you know, the productive forces of our society, you know, the industry, manufacturing, whatever you have it, right? And, you know, that is ultimately what creates a wealthy country that can afford, you know, healthcare

that can afford all of the frills that we have in a modern industrialist country, right? And we can do that with, you know, very little environmental impacts. The thing about uranium, it's several million times more energy dense than coal. That means, you know, I'm going to be overly simplistic here, but that means, you know, essentially a million times less mining impacts. right that means you know the land footprint like you know a nuclear power station looks kind of big when you're standing next to it when i go over to the picker nuclear station i go this power is you know the largest city in the country it's pretty extraordinary and so you tick all the boxes with this technology what you don't take what one box you don't tick is that nuclear can't replace all fossil fuel services that's a hard pill for me to swallow but there it is we're still going to need those heavy distillers we're going to need that diesel fuel we're going to need you know to feed the world um and so So, again, I think nuclear is a very, very important piece of the puzzle. And, you know, it's, again, it's almost kind of too good to be true in terms of ticking those boxes. You know, I was going to ask that, and you mentioned ticking the boxes.

Is there one, you mentioned the fossil fuel thing is a tough pill to swell? Is there another one that's been a tough, you know, I assume, you know, listening to you, Chris, you've talked about this an awful lot. You've researched it an awful lot. is there one other thing that you just go like and you know what people should be aware of this like this part of it is whether it's in design phase whether it is dangerous whether it is you know i i don't know i i assume because one of the things that uh i've really enjoyed of talking to different people who are pro nuclear is just how open they are about because i mean like honestly we can't you know these are the problems these are the biggest problems we got and uh other than that it's It's because everything's like it's too good to be true. It's too good to be true. For sure.

And I think it's, I think that's a great question and it's very important. You know, we have like the straw man arguments like you find your opponent's, you know, weakest, most ridiculous argument and you argue against that. No, we should hold ourselves to a higher account and sort of steal man ourselves. And so, you know, I'm not going to say the common things, although I think it's, they're worthy of discussion.

I don't think, I think waste is actually a selling point of nuclear energy because we produce an absolutely tiny amount of it. It's fully contained. It's never hurt anyone in the history of stores. nuclear waste. Safety, we can talk about that as well. That's really not a big concern of mine. When you look at nuclear accidents around the world, the actual health impacts have been, even of Chernobyl, have been, you know, very small compared to other forms of energy accidents. And, you know, we've had no issues with our candos that have resulted in any radiation type

injuries. Even Fukushima, you know, the highest healthist authorities, the UN Scientific Committee and the effects of atomic radiation say they don't expect to have a single death as a result of radiation from a triple meltdown. You know, it can't get much worse than Fukushima. But, you know, what I will say in terms of acknowledging the challenges of nuclear energy is that it's hard. Like, it requires a real culture of excellence. It requires a lot of high-level planning and coordination between, you know, the regulator,

the government and industry. And when, when does nuclear succeed? In Ontario, again, mostly in Ontario, it was 20 of the 23 reactors in 20. in 20 years. That's because there was a lack of coal. We were importing fairly expensive coal at that time from the U.S. Didn't have coal, didn't have gas, right? We had uranium, and we had the second biggest research center in the world after the U.S.,

after the Manhattan Project. People don't know that. Canada has been a massive player in terms of nuclear research, and so we had the guts and the balls to develop this technology. So it was for energy security reasons. And it was frankly because the economy was growing rapidly, and energy demand was growing rapidly. And so where are the other places that nuclear has really taken off?

I mean, the U.S. in the 1960s, France, this is a fascinating story. You know, we're talking about numbers here. They commissioned 54 reactors in about 15 years. And they accidentally decarbonized their electricity system, right? But that occurred because of the OPEC oil crisis. France also, no coal. They were burning, you know, oil was dirt cheap in the 60s. You know, about 20, 30% of electricity was oil-fired generation.

We think that's crazy in this day and age, right? And those prices shot up through the roof because of the OPEC crisis. And so there was a need for energy. When hard time strike, when you actually need the stuff, nuclear is again, it's the most viable thing to replace fossil fuels. Not again, not all fossil fuel services, but for electricity, for baseload, it's great. And so country after country, like Japan, why does Japan have a whole bunch of nuclear reactors? Well, they had some coal.

They burned it all to kind of industrialize. And they're an island nation, you know, who are vulnerable. and require energy security. You know, South Korea, functionally an island because they've got the North Koreans above them. They don't have a lot of fossil fuel. So if your fossil fuel limited, you do that.

I'd say one exception to the rule is Russia. And, you know, for all the evils of Vladimir Putin, not a bad energy policy. You know, again, ruthless, realpolitik, but, you know, major exporter of natural gas. And they said, don't get high in your own supply. Let's build a bunch of nuclear plants here so that we can free up that natural gas for export.

and let's build relationships around the world, building nuclear reactors for these countries that, again, need them because they don't have enough fossil fuels. And again, that's, you know, if I was going to make a pitch to Saskatchewan and Alberta, oil folks, I'd say, you know, nuclear provides a way to make, you know, these oil, oil sands, lower carbon, you know, may end up being more economical once the technology is developed more. but also, you know, you have more that you can export if you're not burning it yourself. And you're, you know, developing this industry, which is 100% here in Canada with all the economic benefits. So I'm kind of tailoring my approach here to what I think your audience is, but hopefully that makes some sense. As far as Alberta and Saskatchewan goes, it feels like every, and once again, folks,

and now I sit in the podcast chair and I don't, I don't go out to the site every second day, you know, heck every day. Once upon a time, it felt like, and I would say even to the day, it feels like Ottawa, maybe just, I can say the federal government, I don't need to spick out a specific city. It feels like it's under attack nonstop. So you talk about freeing up, you know, we're not burning it so we can ship it elsewhere.

One of the problems we've had is we haven't been able to get it shipped anywhere, you know, because of, you know, different bills coming down saying, listen, you're not, you're not going to complete these projects. You're not going to have these projects. And that's been a big, a big issue. You know, when I talk about Bill C-69, 69, yeah, I'm pretty sure it's 69 with the no more pipelines essentially talk, you know. And so then what Western Canadians do, you get creative. And then you start shipping it on trains everywhere, you know, and you create these pucks and you find ways to get around.

some of the rules that have been put in. That's, you know, when I think about it, when, like, what you're talking about, it sounds really fascinating to me. But one of the, the reason why Western Canadians, I think I can speak for both provinces sitting on the border and border, is, has been the last like 15, 20 years and all the attacks that have come at the focus of the energy industry. And saying all that, you know, I'd read once upon a time, and I don't know, if this is true, that oil lobbyists had lobbied against nuclear a while back because they knew

it could cut down on how much fossil fuel would be needed. And when I listen to you, I go, I wonder if that isn't part of this as well. Absolutely. There's a record of that. And you'll see it in terms of Australia is a great example. Obviously, a big coal country. I have great uranium deposits as well, but a lot of the anti-nuclear activities right there on the pamphlets, you know, it's sponsored by coal companies or coal unions. I'm going to blank on exactly which nuclear plants in the U.S. have been blocked in that way or funded. You know, you have like these, you know, we want sun, not nuclear.

And the pamphlets been sponsored by the coal industry. This is more historic going back 30, 40 years. Some of the science that was done that very much overestimated the dangers of radio, was done through Rockefeller sponsored researchers. So, you know, these are getting into a little bit of kind of conspiracy theory, and I don't think they're super useful to drench up, but certainly, yeah, there's attention there. I don't know. You follow the fall of the money, Chris, and that'll tell you, that'll tell you a story on a lot of different things.

One of the things I will say is that, you know, wind and solar and natural gas play quite well together. You know, you can turn on and off natural gas, especially paker plants very quickly to deal with the fickleness of the wind in particular. It's very unpredictable. It's amazing looking at wind production cycles. I mean, it looks like one of my patients having a cardiac arrest, frankly. So unpredictable. But I think, again, I think the reason that people are skeptical about wind and solar out where you are is because you understand that it's not a reliable source of energy and that it has the potential to. to really crash your economies.

In Ontario here, we're still paying off these subsidies because we did a big renewables build out. It's going to have cost us $60 billion for these 20-year contracts when all is said and done. It was such a scandal and such a burden on rate payers that the province took over the expense of these subsidies. We're spending $3.1 billion a year, paying off these private developers that got these sweet contracts,

just guaranteed every kilowatt hour you make. we're going to pay you way, way, way above the base rate. So it is interesting the way different energy sources play together. Certainly wind and solar don't play well with nuclear because nuclear provides that steady base load that can underpin the reliability of a system and, you know, wind and solar jumping all over the place. Well, I just, you know, I think it was Brian Gett that talked about wind and solar definitely having their place. No different than hydro having its place, right? You got a giant river.

You know, you can do some things. You're out in the middle of the prairies. I'm sorry. hydro is kind of like a hard thing to do, you know? Yeah, absolutely. It's kind of. And when it comes to wind and solar, I think a lot of us out in West, especially where we sit, we go solar for eight months of the year, we got no sun. Like, I mean, I don't have to be a rocket scientist for that.

And we live in like a place that just wants to kill you. Like, I mean, literally, it's coal, right? So you can't have intermittent power. One of the things that I think is very interesting about nuclear is it isn't intermittent. power, right? Like you're and it seems like and maybe you know the statistics on this Chris, it seems like it is very cost effective, you know, like you're not getting it for 20 years. You know, like when we talk solar panels, we talk about waste. We talk about what it takes to build them, where you build them and then how long you have them for. Not to mention the fact

where we live and all the other things. When it comes to nuclear, I feel like those, that's why it seems like this is such a great idea because all those things don't come into effect. It's an excellent value proposition. Like I said, nuclear is hard though. And we've certainly seen, and it's been very publicized, the cost overruns with the Vogel reactor. That's the only new reactor built in the U.S. in the last several decades. Europe's also having a hard time bringing their EPR reactors online, you know, going way over budget, way over time. And that's unacceptable. And there's reasons for that. It's not because the technology, is too complicated or it's undoable.

We've done it in the past, right? As I said, 23 reactors in 22 years. But it's hard. It does take coordination. It takes real excellence. I think Alberta and Saskatchewan are well suited for it because of the, you know, the engineers per capita, the skilled traits people that you have because of the oil and gas industry. But nuclear is an excellent value proposition when pulled off properly as we did in Ontario.

It's the second cheapest source of electricity. We've already got 40 years out of our nuclear plants. The great thing about the Kanda reactor is that you can refurb. You can swap out all the components that age, that have age limits on them, you can get another 40 years of the power of them. So, you know, some of our nuclear stations are going to go 80 years. And that means the people working at those plants, their grandkids have good jobs, right? This is intergenerational, high quality employment, six-figure employment for the skilled trades, like, easy. And thousands and thousands of jobs, there's 76,000 people working in the sector.

And, you know, as you mentioned, you know, you live in an environment that's trying to kill you. I mean, I live in a hospital. People are trying to, I don't, sorry, I shouldn't say it, live in it. I work in a hospital. People are trying to die all the time on me, right? They're dependent on technology. My own son spent five weeks in an incubator. You know, when I think about the power cutting there, that's got serious consequences.

And yes, you know, hospitals have, you know, diesel generators is backup and some batteries and things like that. But, you know, the scale and scope, the scale and scope of energy transition that people are talking about, they're saying we need to electrify everything. And then they're saying we should do it with the sources of power that are the least reliable. It doesn't make any sense. I mean, you just got to listen to some of the third world countries talk about trying to run hospitals off of diesel generators and some of the horror stories that go on there and realize we don't want to get anywhere near that. I don't want to go anywhere near that. You said nuclear is the second cheapest energy. I think I said, I heard you say that.

What is the first? Hydro in Ontario. Hydro. Yeah. Interesting. And again, this is, we're an interesting moment because as I said, there's been real challenges with building nuclear. recently. Not in China, not in South Korea. They've got their shit together, right? They never let their supply chains atrophy. You know, they didn't have people that hadn't worked in the sector for 30

years trying to come and build a nuclear plant. It's not easy, right? But Canada is actually uniquely well suited, Ontario in particular, because as I said, our Kanda reactors have this opportunity at their midlife at 40 years or 35 years to renovate them, to refurbish them. And so we've got over 10,000, you know, skill trades people, project managers, engineers, etc., that are working on these projects. You know, we've really dialed them in. They're coming in under budget ahead of schedule. And that means that we're intimately familiar to the technology.

The supply chain is humming. The factories are humming that make all the parts. Our project managers know how to run insanely complicated projects. And we're well suited to start doing some new candy reactors. And it's actually being talked about seriously now. And this isn't just for climate reasons. I mean, we had a decarbonization report in Ontario saying we'd have to build 18 gigawatts of nuclear. That's more than doubling what we already have.

But politicians don't actually, when the push comes to shove, politicians do the easy stuff on climate. They'll install the EV charging stations. They'll throw up a few solar panels here and there. They'll sprinkle some R&D money on some hydrogen projects or whatever else. But what actually drives political change is economic imperatives. We're going to see a lot more immigration to Ontario. we're reshoring a lot of critical industries. You know, we're starting to do steel, electric arc furnaces, etc.

These have huge demands on the grid. And so for very pragmatic economic reasons, demand is going up again. And nuclear is an excellent fit for that, especially if you're taking coal off the table. And in Ontario, we're trying to minimize our gas use as well. So, you know, we're probably, I would say, Canada is the best positioned country in the entire Western world to start going on nuclear.

And there's a great export market before. We've exported, I can't remember the exact number now. I think it's about 10 candid reactors to China, South Korea, Argentina, Romania. And it's a great reactor because it runs on natural uranium, on enriched uranium. So there's a lot of benefits, again, both domestically and internationally in the export market. Do I dare ask a really complicated, dumb question, folks? Why not? Okay, here we go.

When you say unenriched uranium, I've heard this before. What is the difference between enriched, enriched? I don't even know if I'm saying that right, uranium and why does Canada differ? I assume this is a huge technical question, but I'm curious. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so again, uranium's, you know, the heaviest naturally occurring element on that periodic table. And it's certain isotopes of it are unstable.

So uranium 235 makes up about less than one. percent of uranium ore that you take out of the ground. The other 99% is uranium 238. I don't get too much of a science lesson here, but that 235 is unstable. You hit it with a neutron, it splits. And when it splits, you get that E equals MC squared Einstein equation. And the speed of light squared means you get a shit ton of energy out of that reaction. Right. And so when people again make that association with nuclear weapons, that's highly enriched uranium, getting it up above 90%. In the other power plants around the world, basically every other power plant uses enriched uranium to level between 3 and 5%. That uranium enrichment technology was pretty jealously guarded

by the U.S. in the early days when Canada was developing its nuclear technology. So we said, let's try and find a way around that, and we used heavy water. And basically, that allows us to use unenriched uranium because the reactors are so efficient. And so we can dig it out of the ground, It does need to go through this. Enrichment is complex. You got to run. It used to be gas diffusion. You got to run nowadays.

It's centrifuging. It's costly and it's high tech. And again, for those weapons proliferation reasons, it's restricted to a certain number of countries only. So we managed to bypass all that. And we can dig that uranium out of the ground in Saskatchewan, do minimal processing, turn it in the fuel pellets, put into our candy reactors. And we get 100% energy security. and all the economic benefits.

It's a great source of energy. I'm going to ask a curious question as well. I keep saying the word curious. I apologize. I don't know why that's stuck in my head this morning. Are you pro or against carbon tax? Oh, boy. Oh, boy.

Yeah, no, I mean, thank you. I really have to do a lot more thinking on it and a little more investigation. You know, I think if carbon taxes are collected and spent on stupid stuff, that's a real problem. I think carbon taxes are an attempt. It's kind of a individual consumerist type of action, right? Which I think doesn't have a great track record. If we make certain things expensive, people will make consumer choices to do other things.

That's not the way you accomplish big things. That's not the way you build 23 nuclear reactors in 22 years or start any big industrial projects, right? You need private industry and government to get behind it. You need to issue some bonds. You know, that's not the way that James Bay Hydro project. it got built. I can give you any countless number of examples. I don't think this is going to happen on an individual level. I think this needs to be a little bit more planned out. So I'm going

to dodge the question slightly. And honestly, I think that hopefully does not just look like evasion, but rather I will confess, I have not looked into this issue enough to have formed an educated enough opinion. But that thing said, I think you said if it's spent responsibly, I think it was words. So we can both agree then it's a, it's a shit show. Because I watch these governments and I go, like, I don't think they're, they're just throwing money left, right and center. If you, you know, when I look at it as reasonable, I hope I'm reasonable, folks. When I look at it reasonably, you go, if you just put solutions together that worked, it would lower the cost for everybody. You lower the cost.

You're going to bring people around because they're getting, you know, businesses are going to be attracted to that, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And you just see the explosion of ideas and different things to try and attack it. Carbon tax. What is it? What did Chris Sim say? Tripling here by 2030. So that means everything I do is going to be more expensive. And I don't see any solutions right now that make any sense coming from it, at least in Alberta. Maybe I'm wrong.

Maybe there's some coming folks that I just don't know about. What if you tax people on things which are necessities like keeping your house warm and getting from A to B and you're not providing a viable alternative. I mean, the whole thing is meant to incent, you know, more virtuous, better, climate-friendly behavior. What if what's on offer is not actually all that useful, not all that effective in terms of climate behavior? Or maybe not even possible.

I live in a place. I live in a place where everywhere I go, I have to travel. I don't live in, I don't live in, and I apologize if this sounds tongue and cheek about Toronto, but I don't live in Toronto or a big center where we have, you know, public transit. We don't have that. And we live in a place that's minus 40. So you go out, you got it. Like, you go out, you drive your vehicle.

If you work in the oil field, the oil field is spread out. It's all over the place. That's our industry. That's what we do. And it's like, can you build things maybe down the road that get away from maybe? But right now, all we're doing is trading attacks to, you know, to hammer the individual and businesses and farmers and everything. And I just,

I don't see what's coming of it. That's me. Well, I think you're helping educate me as well because, you know, ultimately we live in a democracy. People need to vote in favor of things. And if this is a form of climate action that's turning people against climate action,

then it's not all that productive. Right. So, and if there's not, if there's not actual viable alternatives that are being explored, explored by the government, then, I don't think it's very viable.

I'm still going to hold off of my final answer there and be a bit of a weasel, but I'll be open and honest about it. I appreciate you coming on, Chris. You know, I always enjoy Twitter's an interesting land. I've found some just absolute interesting minds come through there. And certainly you've, I wasn't sure another conversation in nuclear, but when you're a Canadian talking about nuclear,

I appreciate, as much as I love Brian Gett and his thoughts. being American, talking about Canada. I enjoy having some Canadian people on to talk about it. And you've spurred on some interesting thoughts for me this morning, which is what I look to do out of these conversations. Before I let you out of here, I want to do the Crude Master final question. And if you're going to stand behind a cause, then stand behind it absolutely. What's one thing Chris stands behind after we just talked about nuclear for an hour?

But hey, what's something Chris stands behind? God, I don't want to be super boring on this, but I mean, I'll be a diehard here. Yeah, I will stand behind the idea that nuclear energy is, it really is, I was going to say, the future of energy. I mean, I'm actually interviewing someone in a couple hours who does a lot of work looking at shale production in the States. And essentially, from his analysis, you know, those big fields are starting to look an awful lot like Hubbard's peak or Hubbard's curve, I should say. And ultimately, as I was saying, I think that nuclear is the most viable replacement for a number of vital fossil fuel services. And so eventually we're going to be doing a lot more nuclear, whether anybody likes it or not, because as those fossil fuels become constrained, and we may be talking quite a few decades out. But we better start getting prepared and start building.

And so I think a nuclear future is inevitable. I think it can be a really bright one. I think it can bring a lot of prosperity. It can minimize, you know, ecological impacts, whether that's, you know, clean air, clean water, or, you know, less carbon in the atmosphere. It's a, it's a really important tool that we've got to get behind and start working on. And, you know, for your listeners, I think Alberta and Saskatchewan have a lot of potential. It's already being investigated. There's a memorandum of understanding between Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, New Brunswick.

To move forward with this, Saskatchewan is looking at replacing its coal fleet with new. nuclear. I think that's an excellent fit. You know, you get to preserve those communities and jobs around a power source that's, you know, as reliable, provides those vital services that are needed. But again, preserves that quality employment and is good for the environment. So we got a win-win here. I thought, you know, I've never done a nuclear interviewer always and asked what about the waste, but that's actually kind of refreshing. Maybe we would touch on that at a future point if you ever have me back. Sounds good, Chris. Well, I appreciate you giving me a few minutes this morning.

And, well, you know, this has become a trend, Sean. I don't know where the paths go, but if they do cross again, I look forward to it. And I appreciate you coming on and honestly being open with your thoughts. And, you know, I think the world needs more open discussion on, well, some interesting topics, some difficult topics. and you've, I personally, I think I wasn't sure what I was getting out of Dr. Chris Kiefer this morning

and I've enjoyed the conversation. Absolutely, Sean. It's been a pleasure chatting with you. Thank you for having me on.