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Canada unveils plans for new oil pipeline to break dependence on US
Project to supply Asia with 1mn barrels per day comes amid trade hostilities with southern neighbour
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Ilya Gridneff in Toronto
PublishedJuly 3 2026
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Canada has taken a crucial step towards building an oil pipeline to supply Asia with up to 1mn barrels of crude daily as Prime Minister Mark Carney seeks to make the nation an “energy superpower” and break its dependence on the US market.
Carney said Alberta had submitted plans to the Major Projects Office to break ground on a more than 1,000km pipeline stretching to the western coast of British Columbia by September 2027.
“Canada has a ‘once in a lifetime opportunity’. An opportunity that will determine our future,” he told reporters in Calgary late on Thursday. Carney added that the pipeline route would follow “one that already exists through the Trans Mountain corridor to our Pacific coast”.
The Trans Mountain Corp, a federal Crown corporation, will build the pipeline with help from Pembina Pipeline Corp and become “a gateway to the world’s fastest-growing markets”, he said.
Carney said the series of announcements made on Thursday “will catalyse well over C$200bn [US$141bn] in new direct investments in Canada” as it advances its trade agenda across Asia.
Canada will “more than triple” its liquefied natural gas production by developing five terminals over the next decade, while Ottawa will spend C$10bn upgrading the Vancouver port, he said.
Alberta premier Danielle Smith wants to double the province’s oil production and have the pipeline built by 2035 to generate “billions in revenue over the coming decades”.
“There is no doubt whatsoever that this pipeline is a project of national interest, one that will help connect Alberta’s oil to global markets and strengthen our country’s economic future for decades,” she said.
The pipeline is part of Carney’s push to reduce reliance on US markets, where Canada sells three-quarters of its goods and services. Canada ships nearly all of its oil to the US, supplying about 60 per cent of American oil imports, or about 4mn barrels per day.
Carney has pledged to double non-US trade as President Donald Trump threatens to impose 100 per cent tariffs on its northern neighbour and regularly says Canada should become the 51st US state. Trump this week declined to authorise the long-term renewal of the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement that he negotiated during his first term in 2020.
Most of Canada’s oil exported to the US comes from the bitumen-rich oil sands of northern Alberta, the world’s third-largest reserve, which is regarded as some of the “dirtiest” to process.
The province is also home to a separatist push for independence from Canada that has gained momentum in recent years. A public vote on whether to hold a referendum to separate from Canada is planned for October 19.
The route that Alberta proposed for the new pipeline will largely follow the existing Trans Mountain Pipeline that stretches from Edmonton to southern British Columbia.
Carney also said that Ottawa would maintain a tanker ban that First Nations and environmental groups lobbied to keep in place to reduce the risk of potential oil spills.
“Today is a good day,” said Marilyn Slett, the elected chief of the Heiltsuk Nation on British Columbia’s central coast. “Oil tankers will never be part of our vision for a healthy, productive and sustainable North Coast.”
The Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline, which opened in May 2024 after a decade of delays and a total construction cost of C$34bn, has helped Canada export record levels of oil and gas.
While Canada’s oil and gas lobby was encouraged by the announcement, it has raised concerns over environmental regulations and a tax regime that it says is uncompetitive and impedes investment.
On Tuesday, Carney released a video distancing his Liberal government from the policy of former prime minister Justin Trudeau, who had clamped down on oil companies.
Carney, former UN climate envoy, acknowledged his embrace of fossil fuels to counter US trade hostilities would lead Canada’s carbon emissions higher, in a pivot that has attracted criticism from environmental groups.
“That plan was not sustainable over the long term,” he said.
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