Canada is one of the world’s largest oil and gas producers, but a lack of export options is quietly costing us billions of dollars a year
Canadians are right to ask why governments are constantly short of money for hospitals, schools and seniors’ care while the country sits on one of the most valuable oil and gas reserves in the world.
The answer? Canada is underselling its oil and natural gas to the United States, and it’s costing us dearly.
Forced by a lack of export infrastructure, Canada sells most of its oil and gas to American buyers at a steep discount. While global markets pay full price, Canadian producers settle for less because they can’t access overseas buyers directly. Most oil and gas is shipped to the United States, which pays below international prices.
As a result, the country is bleeding revenue.
Lost revenue from selling oil and gas below market value
Estimated loss from underselling energy to the U.S.
Oil exported daily — mostly at a discount
Discounted natural gas sent south
• 340,000 nurses
• 880 schools
• 54,000 housing units
How much? A new online tracker from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy shows that, as of April 2025, Canada has forfeited more than $5.7 billion in oil revenue and $3.8 billion in natural gas revenue this year alone—a total of more than $9.5 billion and climbing by the second.
Annually, the combined losses are projected to reach $25.6 billion. That is money that could be spent building schools, hiring nurses, funding national defence or easing the tax burden on struggling Canadians.
This is not an abstract economic problem. It is a self-inflicted wound.
Because Canadian producers are cut off from international buyers, they sell crude oil for roughly $20 per barrel less than the global price and natural gas at a discount of about $2 per gigajoule—a unit used to measure energy. With Canada exporting more than two million barrels of oil and over 12 million gigajoules of gas daily, the discount costs add up quickly.
The daily revenue loss is about $70 million, more than $2.1 billion per month.
This is not just lost profit for producers. It is lost revenue for governments, lost jobs for workers and lost opportunity for communities across the country.
What could $25.6 billion a year buy Canadians? It is enough to fully cover the $19-billion cost of the 88 F-35 fighter jets Canada recently purchased. It could fund more than 340,000 full-time nurses at current salary levels. It could build or expand more than 880 schools across the country. It could provide 1.78 billion hours of in-home care for seniors and Canadians with disabilities. It could add over 54,000 affordable housing units to help ease the housing crisis. It could construct more than a dozen major highway projects like the Regina Bypass.
To be fair, some progress is being made. The federally owned Trans Mountain Expansion pipeline, which runs from Alberta to the B.C. coast, began commercial operations in May 2024. It nearly tripled Canada’s westbound export capacity from 300,000 to 890,000 barrels per day, giving producers access to markets beyond the U.S., including Asia and the U.S. West Coast.
But it is not enough.
Canada still lacks the pipeline and port capacity to fully compete on global energy markets. Until we fix that, producers will keep selling low, and Canadians will keep paying the price.
The solution is straightforward: approve and build the infrastructure needed to get our energy to market. The economic benefits are clear, and the alternative—watching tens of billions in public wealth evaporate every year—is no longer acceptable.
Canadians deserve to know what this lost revenue means for their daily lives. Thanks to the Frontier Centre’s live tracker, they now can.
Explore more on Canadian economy, Federal debt and deficit, Federal taxes
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