Who's Paying "Fair Share" on an Energy Equivilent Basis?

In a previous post we examined who pays a "Fair Share" between the petroleum and forestry industries.

Ironic, as we know that the Royalty Review Chairman "ALPAC Bill Hunter" is a forestry man.

I've produced some data from ALPAC's Forestry Management Agreement, which was agreed to back in 1998 and has never been amended for inflation.

http://www.srd.gov.ab.ca/forests/pdf/FMA_ALPAC.pdf

It is stated ALPAC shall pay:

on all coniferous species $2.09 per cubic metre

on all deciduous species $0.40 per cubic metre

Good deal! For ALPAC, that is.

Under the so-called "Fair Share" royalty revision, oil companies would pay up to $251.20 per cubic metre (based on $80 WTI and dollar parity)

Oil paying $251.20 per cubic meter versus forestry paying $0.40 per cubic meter.

Who'd be paying a "Fair Share"?

I don't have an energy equivalency for wood handy, so let us assume burning a cubic metre of wood would yield roughly the same energy as burning cubic metre of oil.

Different products for sure but using energy equivalency we can consider each commodity as an "apples to apples" comparison.

With this assumption, it means that on an energy equivalent basis forestry companies would be paying as little as 0.15% to the Alberta Government as oil companies.

Never mind the fact that forestry companies merely have to cut and haul away timber from the surface, pretty easy technically.

The location of the trees is known, assuming they can see the forest for the trees.

It'd be interesting to examine the capital and operating parameters of each industry, and compare how much energy each can produce for a given capital and operating cost input.

I can't see how the forestry industry would have higher operating and capital costs than the oil industry on an energy equivalent basis.

They do not have to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars per hectare to lease the rights to exploit.
They do not have to shoot seismic.
They do not have to drill wells which can be thousands of feet deep (both productive and dry)
They do not have to pump fluids (oil and water) or haul fluids up thousands of feet.

Both industries do need road infrastructure (which is commonly shared), haul their products to market, and conduct value added processing to yield a marketable product at central facilities.

So here we have a petroleum industry with an assumed higher operating and capital cost structure, paying almost a thousand times as much to the government in royalties than the forestry industry on an energy equivalent basis.

Does this offend anyone's sense of fairness?

In a future post, it will become more clear why I'm linking energy and forestry.

It is because the forestry industry is trying to recreate itself as an competitor to petroleum as an energy source.

BIOFUEL.