Federal Climate Change Platform Revealed
On Tuesday, the federal government released their new plan to reduce emissions by 40% below 2005 levels by 2030 and reach net-zero by 2050 which you can find in full here. The plan is costed for $9.1 billion dollars and spells out how various economic sectors will be able to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. So, what’s in it? Here we go:
Projections that the oil and gas sector will be able to cut emissions by 42% below 2019 levels by 2030 which will help guide Ottawa on how it forms the regulatory cap on oil and gas emissions promised during the 2019 election campaign.
Dedicating $2.2 billion for the Low Carbon Economy Fund to help finance clean energy projects and $850 million for clean electricity developments.
$780 million for efforts that conserve wetlands and other natural features that help store carbon. These natural features are projected to help reduce emissions by 30 megatonnes (4% of 2019 emissions).
$400 million to build more charging stations for electric vehicles while also dedicating $1.7 billion more for the incentive program for electric vehicle buyers. The plan will also require that a minimum of 20% of new light-duty vehicles sold in 2026 are zero-emission vehicles and will increase the threshold to 60% in 2030 and 100% in 2035.
Continuing to raise the price of carbon emissions. The current price of $50 per tonne of emissions will look like bus fare compared to the $170 price tag set to kick in by 2030. The goal being to push consumers into cleaner sources of energy.
A wider deployment of CCUS (carbon capture, utilization, and storage) technology that helps to capture and reuse or store carbon dioxide emissions. The technology has already been implemented in Saskatchewan and Ottawa said it would want to see it utilized to help reduce the intensity of Alberta’s oil patch emissions and other oil-producing areas. Not released yet is the investment tax credit that will be rolled out to encourage adoption of CCUS.
Limiting growth in the oil and gas sector by eliminating fossil fuel subsidies and develop a plan to phase out federal funding for the fossil fuel sector. This would be done with the intention of pushing the sector to develop and pursue new technologies that would make the extraction process cleaner and greener.
Creating a transition plan for fossil fuel workers so that they aren’t left in the lurch as Canada transitions to a greener economy and cleaner sources of energy. This will involve distributing $2 billion dollars to “futures funds” in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland and Labrador. These funds will help workers upgrade existing or develop new skills that would place them at the forefront of the zero-carbon industry.
The plan outlines a few other ideas that aren’t fully expanded on. The full plan can be expected to be revealed on April 7th when the federal government releases their budget. It’s an interesting plan in its current state. It doesn’t quite do much to lessen the immediate impact of the fossil fuel sector’s emissions but by giving them time to figure it out for themselves, perhaps it will lead to more actionable solutions. Some critics have said it’s too soft and doesn’t go far enough, while some critics say it’s unreasonable to believe the Trudeau government will actually meet their stated goals since they haven’t done so yet. It’s hard to say either way just yet considering the full, detailed, plan hasn’t been released nor costed. Once the budget comes out, the picture will be much clearer on whether this plan is feasible or just another pipe dream. April 7th. Circle it on your calendars. Any judgements before then are premature at best, disingenuous at worst. It should also be considered that any judgements made on April 7th or soon after will also most likely be incomplete since the plan would have had no time to actually take effect.
The wait-and-see game sucks, especially for politicians, but it’s truly the most reasonable test we have at measuring the effectiveness of governmental measures. But before we say anything good or bad, let’s at least see the whole thing first.