Canada's patchwork approach to fighting climate change
By Fiona Wagner • Bankrate.com
The risk is that environmental standards that vary from province to province will cause confusion for companies operating
in different parts of the country. What's more, until GHG reductions are seen as a competitive advantage, it will be hard to convince
companies to make meaningful changes.
"Governments have had this go slow, teeny tiny step approach -- it doesn't drive the technology change that is required,"
says John Bennett, executive director of Climateforchange.ca. "All the easy
things that should have already been done will happen, but we won't get any company replacing big capital items or creating new industries
because they don't have to. You get bigger and better investment with a harder target. You get more innovation and you actually meet
targets sooner."
Actions for change
There are dozens of ways for countries to deal with reducing GHG emissions, including improved residential and industrial energy efficiency
programs, switching to cleaner fuels such as biodiesel or ethanol and using new technologies that replace or reduce GHG emissions. There
are also market-based policy options, including emissions trading and offsets. (For a primer on carbon finance, please read Bankrate
Canada's "The cost of carbon".)
And yet, even before Canada ratified Kyoto in 2002, there was provincial dissent on how to reduce GHG emissions. This
challenge for consensus was further complicated by provincial jurisdiction over natural resources including oil and natural gas, both
major contributors to GHG emissions and hence drivers of climate change.
- Alberta opted for an alternative in-house intensity-based approach, arguing that Kyoto would devastate the province's
oil and gas industry.
As of July 2007, under the Climate Change and Emissions Management Act, large polluters are required to reduce emissions
by 12 percent by improving operations, buying performance credits from Albertan facilities that reduce more than required, buying offsets
from Alberta-based projects or contributing to an technology fund. Like the federal plan, this uses intensity-based targets that are linked
to productivity levels.
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