On May 30, 2014 Quebec’s Ministers of Natural Resources and Wildlife and the Environment held a joint press conference to announce Quebec’s Hydrocarbon Action Plan. The plan lays out a cautious road map to deal with oil and gas and covers 2014 and 2015. A key feature of the plan is the strategic review of Quebec’s oil and gas sector.

This strategic exercise will assess current science to determine whether shale gas exploration, development and production can be carried out safely and, if so, under what conditions. Government views shale gas as an economic activity like any other. It simply needs to be closely regulated and taxed. Government needs to have its “fair share” of income generated by the activity.

Whilst Government is open to shale gas it has indicated that it will not force it on unwilling communities. In other words, shale gas production will not trump the need for local acceptance. The inducement for local communities to say yes to shale gas will, of course, be financial. The nature and scope of these incentives is not clear at this time.The approach has worked successfully for other activities that raised the ire of local communities, including wind power and mining.

In 2013 the US Energy Information Administration estimated Quebec’s recoverable shale gas at 30 trillion cubic feet. This gas is in the Utica shale gas formation south of the Saint-Lawrence River between Montreal and Quebec City. The area also happens to be long settled and home to much of Quebec’s best farmland. Hence, the considerable local opposition to shale gas exploration and development when industry first tried to assess the opportunity from 2008 to 2011.