Globe and Mail exposes collusion with Australian coal grubbers by Alberta Energy Regulator CEO Rob Morgan
AER chief executive plotted by email with Valory Resources executives to suppress public hearing over Grand Cache coal mine
The Globe and Mail’s energy reporter Emma Graney reveals today an exchange of highly irregular emails between Alberta Energy Regulator CEO Rob Morgan and Valory Resources’ head of corporate finance Glenn Vassallo:
A series of e-mails between the head of the Alberta Energy Regulator, a coal-mining company and the Energy Minister’s office about a mine application has raised questions about the independence of the province’s energy watchdog.
At the heart of the e-mails is an application for an underground mine for steelmaking coal near Grande Cache, about 430 kilometres west of Edmonton. The project is Mine 14 by Summit Coal Inc., a subsidiary of Valory Resources Inc.
The e-mails were uncovered by a freedom of information request by two environmental groups and shared with The Globe and Mail.
On Aug. 21, Alberta Energy Regulator chief executive Rob Morgan cancelled hearings that would have allowed environmental groups to air concerns about the Summit mine. It was the first time in the agency’s history that a CEO has quashed hearings for a new fossil-fuel project.
Mr. Morgan said at the time that a hearing would be “impractical,” pointing to the “very unique circumstances” surrounding the case. That included the fact the AER had never conducted a hearing without the participation of any parties that were directly adversely affected, and that there were far more participants in the hearing who supported the application than opposed it.
On Thursday, the two groups that filed the freedom of information request – the Alberta Wilderness Association and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society – are heading to the Alberta Court of Appeal to challenge Mr. Morgan’s decision.
Mr. Morgan dismissed the hearing roughly two weeks after Summit asked the AER to do so. The company argued that holding hearings was “based on an incorrect interpretation of the legislative framework governing the AER’s process” and that the project had wide support from the local community.
Summit filed that motion on Aug. 6.
The same day, Glenn Vassallo, the head of project and corporate finance at Summit’s parent company, Valory, sent a copy of the motion to Alberta Energy Minister Brian Jean and his chief of staff, Vitor Marciano.
“Dear Brian and Vitor. Please find attached our motion lodged with the AER,” Mr. Vassallo wrote. “It is the win/win/win for everyone.”
Later that afternoon, Mr. Morgan e-mailed Mr. Marciano under the subject line “Summit.”
“Vitor, hoping to get your input,” Mr. Morgan wrote, explaining that he had just had a discussion with the regulator’s general counsel and its board chair. “Let us know when would be convenient.”
After clearing the meeting with deputy energy minister Larry Kaumeyer, Mr. Marciano advised Mr. Morgan to call when convenient.
Early the next day, Mr. Morgan asked when Mr. Marciano and Mr. Kaumeyer could “jump on a Teams call” about the issue.
Mr. Morgan declined a request for an interview. The AER did not answer questions about why he e-mailed Mr. Marciano asking for “input” about a file before the regulator.
Mr. Marciano told The Globe in an e-mail that at the Aug. 7 meeting, the AER briefed the minister’s office about how it had used its broad reconsideration powers under the Responsible Energy Development Act in the past.
There were also discussions “about the uniqueness of the situation” and how Indigenous nations could lose their participation status because they had removed their statements of concern upon deciding to support the project.
“It was made explicitly clear at the beginning of the meeting that any decisions about this matter were AER decisions to be made at the appropriate AER level and not ministerial decisions. No direction was given,” Mr. Marciano said.
On Aug. 8, AER hearing commissioners Shona Mackenzie, Cindy Chiasson and Andrew MacPherson said they had partly granted the coal company’s request. But they declined to cancel the hearing altogether, moving it instead from October to February.
Nigel Bankes, a professor emeritus of law at the University of Calgary, said the e-mail exchange calls into question just how independent from government the AER really is.
“What is disclosed I think is very troubling,” Prof. Bankes said in an interview, noting that Mr. Morgan’s request for input from the minister’s office came within hours of Summit’s application to the AER.
While correspondence between the minister’s office and the regulator is to be expected, he said, “there should never be correspondence in relation to a current application before the AER.”
To do so “creates the apprehension … or the actuality of political interference.”
This isn’t the first time Alberta energy watchers have raised concerns about the independence of the province’s regulator.
A 2023 report penned by three University of Calgary academics, for example, concluded that flawed end-of-life rules that govern the cleanup of inactive oil and gas wells were partly the result of undue industry influence on the AER.
Researchers Drew Yewchuk, Shaun Fluker and Martin Olszynski wrote that Alberta’s approach has been predominantly if not exclusively oriented toward “minimizing the sector’s economic costs in order to promote continued investment, at the expense of reducing the risk to the environment and endangering the polluter-pays principle.”
The appointment in February of Mr. Morgan concerned those who worried that the AER already put the economic success of the fossil-fuel sector above the interests of Albertans.
Mr. Morgan, an oil and gas sector veteran and former chief executive of Canada’s fifth-largest oil producer, said at the time that he takes his cues from the report produced by the Premier’s Advisory Council on Alberta’s Energy Future.
The five-member panel appointed by Premier Danielle Smith was given the task of developing a long-term vision for the province’s energy, including how to modernize the AER.
Link to article (requires subscription to Globe and Mail)
Just more proof of how corrupt the UCP government is and how little they care about constituents.
And it gets better 🤬 Valory Resources has stated that they have settled their 1.6 bil lawsuit with the UCP who has been making more backroom deals like they have before this coal policy was rescinded in 2020 after being in place for 44 years.
"Valory Resources, which wants to build a massive underground mine near Nordegg under 15,000 hectares of public land, told The Tyee that it has settled its lawsuit.
After the government cancelled its moratorium on coal exploration last January, Valory’s legal claim shifted “from a permanent expropriation claim to a temporary expropriation claim,” said Glenn Vassallo, head of corporate and project finance for Valory, in an email. Given the complicated nature of such a claim, “both Valory and the Alberta Government mutually agreed to settle and discontinue the claim.”
Asked if the Alberta Energy Regulator’s unprecedented cancelling of a public hearing on another Valory project was part of the mutual agreement, Vassallo replied, “No it was not.”
So they not only got paid out with Alberta taxpayer's money who have not been informed by their own government, but worse... it appears they will be able to go ahead and mine in Category 2 land in the Clearwater County that is in the largest area of Headwaters that supply freshwater for over 80% of Albertans and has no Metallurgical Coal Mines because Premier Lougheed protected it for this very reason!
ALBERTANS HAVE TO STOP THIS INVASION AND PROTECT OUR EASTERN SLOPES AND FRESHWATER NOW BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE!
Check out The Tyee 2025/10/30/Alberta-Big-Payouts-Australian-Coal-Miners