New Canadian regulator faces immediate test

A flurry of responses to a proposed change in pipeline capacity allocations has compelled the new authority straight into action

The Canadian energy sector got a new oversight body in late August, with the Canadian Energy Regulator (CER) taking over from the National Energy Board (NEB). But it inherited from its predecessor a controversy that has seen it already plunge into the fray. Since the end of July, Canadian oil producers both large and small, representing over half the country's production, had filed letters with the NEB, complaining that a move by Canadian midstream firm Enbridge Energy to convert 90pc of capacity on its Mainline crude pipeline system to long-term contracts lasting up to two decades, and leaving only 10pc available for spot shippers, represented an abuse of market power. The Mainline is Canad