When the Canadian government added the proposed Ksi Lisims LNG terminal on Nisg̱a’a territory in northwest British Columbia to its new list of fast-tracked “nation-building” projects this fall, it resurrected an idea many British Columbians thought had quietly faded away: that liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports are central to the economic future of both B.C. and Canada.
A decade ago, then-B.C. premier Christy Clark promised up to 20 LNG export plants, 100,000 jobs and a sovereign-wealth “prosperity fund,” turning B.C. LNG into one of the most polarizing issues in the province between 2011 and 2018.
My research on this period reveals how competing coalitions of industry, governments and environmental groups struggled over whether B.C. LNG represented a climate solution or a risky fossil-fuel lock-in.
In reality, most of those projects were shelved; only one major export terminal in Kitimat has now entered its first phase of operation.
In recent years, public debate over LNG has largely slipped from view. Media analysis of Canadian climate coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, shows a sharp drop in climate stories in 2020 compared to 2019 as COVID-19 dominated the news agenda. Ksi Lisims brings those debates back with a twist. It is promoted as an Indigenous-led project and as a pillar of a more “diversified,” resilient Canadian economy.
However, the rhetoric around Ksi Lisims as a “nation-building” project masks unresolved questions about who actually benefits, who bears the risks and how such projects fit within a rapidly changing global LNG market.
Ksi Lisims LNG is frequently described as an Indigenous-led project proposed “in partnership” by the Nisg̱a’a Nation, Rockies LNG and Western LNG and an example of what reconciliation can look like. Those aspirations deserve to be taken seriously. Yet, public documents tell a more complex story about who ultimately controls the project and where profits will flow.
What is resource nationalism?
As American political geographers Natalie Koch and Tom Perreault describe, resource nationalism is when “the people of a given country, rather than private corporations or foreign entities, should benefit from the resources of a territorially defined state.”
Scholars have used the related concept of petro-nationalism to describe how fossil fuel industries and their allies frame oil, gas and bitumen extraction as a national public good, casting critics as “anti-Canadian” or “foreign to the body politic.”
A key tactic in this tactic is what Canadian communications scholar Shane Gunster and his colleagues call “symbolic nationalization:” a “thoroughly capitalist enterprise organized to profit private corporations and shareholders” is presented as if it were a public enterprise serving citizens and the common good.
The language surrounding Ksi Lisims LNG fits this pattern. In a September news release announcing the project’s environmental certificate, the B.C. government called Ksi Lisims “Indigenous-led.” Premier David Eby emphasized that there has “never been a more critical time to diversify our economy and reduce reliance on the U.S.,” framing the project as part of “the next chapter of a stronger, more resilient Canada.”
Federal messaging has similarly bundled Ksi Lisims into a package of “nation-building” megaprojects intended to reshape Canada’s economy and trade patterns. Such narratives are classic markers of resource nationalism: the project is cast as serving the people and the national interest, even as its ownership and risk profile are far more complicated.
Who owns and controls Ksi Lisims?
The Nisg̱a’a leadership has framed the project as a vehicle for “sustainable economic self-determination” and as an example of what reconciliation can look like: “a modern Treaty Nation moving from the sidelines of our economy” to leading a major project.
Filings from B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office show that Ksi Lisims LNG is a “wholly owned” subsidiary of Texas-based company Western LNG.
Under the partnership agreement, the Nisg̱a’a Nation and Calgary-based company Rockies LNG sit on a steering committee until construction begins; only then do they become limited partners with specified governance rights. In other words, the project’s governance structure grants Nisg̱a’a important influence and potential revenues, but it does not resemble a nationalized public utility.
Moreover, Indigenous support is not unanimous. Along the route of the planned Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline that would supply Ksi Lisims, several First Nations — including the Gitanyow — have opposed the project and launched legal challenges. This raises a crucial question for any “nation-building” story: which nation, and whose consent, are we talking about?
A crowded global LNG market
The economic case for Ksi Lisims is being made at a moment when the global LNG market is undergoing rapid change — and not in ways that favour new, high-cost projects in British Columbia.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) forecasts that over 300 billion cubic metres of additional annual export capacity will become operational between 2025 and 2030 from projects currently under construction, primarily led by the United States and Qatar.
A 2024 study by the think tank Carbon Tracker, commissioned by the Pembina Institute and the David Suzuki Foundation, stated that B.C. is a late entrant to an LNG market “dominated by lower-cost competitors.”
The study found that all four B.C. terminals still awaiting final investment decisions — including Ksi Lisims — sit high on the global cost curve. B.C. projects are, on average, about 26 per cent more expensive than competing projects in countries like Qatar, the United States and Mozambique.
Carbon Tracker also notes that the world’s existing LNG capacity is sufficient to meet projected demand under all three of the IEA’s main scenarios, with no new LNG export projects needed to satisfy demand through 2040.
This fragile economic base for Ksi Lisims complicates the notion that LNG expansion is a reliable source of public revenue. It highlights that long-term LNG export contracts — often touted as a way to lock in stable prices — cannot fully shield against global market fluctuations.
Rethinking “nation-building”
Ksi Lisims LNG has been presented as a reconciliation project for the Nisg̱a’a Nation, a diversification tool for Canada’s economy and a clean fuel solution for Asian buyers. But the project’s ownership structure concentrates control and profits in foreign-backed corporate hands, even as its public branding emphasizes Indigenous leadership.
Regional First Nations remain divided, highlighting an unresolved debate over consent and the meaning of “the people” in resource nationalist narratives. B.C. is entering a crowded, increasingly risky LNG market late and at a cost disadvantage.
If we take climate commitments and economic justice seriously, nation-building in the 2020s should mean something different: investing in infrastructure and industries that reduce emissions rather than lock them in, and supporting Indigenous and local communities in ways that do not depend on highly volatile fossil fuel markets.
Public discussions about the Ksi Lisims LNG project offer an opportunity to question whether the government’s approach to “nation-building” still makes sense in a warming and changing world.
Sibo Chen receives funding from Toronto Metropolitan University and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. He is affiliated with International Environmental Communication Association and the Environment, Science, and Risk Communication Section of International Association for Media and Communication Research.
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.
