A little known federal plan to adopt a clean fuel standard could cut Canada’s emissions by as much as Ontario’s coal phase-out (North America’s single largest emissions reduction initiative) — if done right.

The clean fuel standard, announced last November, will require fuel suppliers to decrease the carbon footprint of the fuels they sell in Canada.

But unlike similar regulations in British Columbia and California, which target transportation fuels only, the federal government is considering using the clean fuel standard to also target emissions from fuels used in buildings and industrial processes, such as heating oil and petroleum coke.

“Gas, solids, liquids, whatever. If it is a fossil fuel, it is going to be subject to this standard,” Clare Demerse, policy advisor at Clean Energy Canada, told DeSmog Canada. “That is a really … powerful signal. All fossil fuels in Canada have to improve their carbon performance.”

However, it does make the policy more complex to design and a number of questions remain on how the federal government will craft a regulation with such a broad reach.

The federal government is proposing to reduce Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions by 30-megatonnes by 2030, equivalent to 17.5 per cent of transportation emissions, via the clean fuel standard.

“It has been shown in California and to some extent in B.C. and Oregon that a clean fuel standard or a low carbon fuel standard works really well at greening your overall fuel mix,” Warren Mabee, associate professor at Queen’s University and Canada Research Chair in renewable energy development and implementation, said.

British Columbia’s low carbon fuel standard is responsible for one-quarter of emissions reductions in the province since 2007. California’s standard is estimated to have grown the use of clean fuels in the state by 36 per cent and made significant emissions reductions as well.

Despite advances in vehicle fuel efficiency and federal requirements for a small percentage of renewable content in gasoline and diesel, transportation emissions in Canada have remained steady at about 171 megatonnes for the last decade. In the meantime, freight emissions have grown an alarming 132 per cent since 1990.

Transportation is Canada’s second largest contributor to climate change.

A discussion paper on the clean fuel standard published last month by the federal department of Environment and Climate Change proposes making fuel suppliers reduce the carbon footprint of fuels by 10 to 15 per cent by 2030. If a fuel supplier cannot meet this target, the company can purchase credits from another supplier who has exceeded the threshold.

“What is really going to make these standards work is if there’s multiple ways for companies to get to where they need to be,” Mabee told DeSmog Canada. “So you can reduce the carbon intensity of your fuel, you can reduce your facility emissions…you can buy credits, you can sell credits. There’s a bunch of different things that can happen inside the system.”

Maximum Flexibility for Fuel Suppliers

The federal government has promised “maximum flexibility” to help fuel suppliers comply with the clean fuel standard.

But Ian Thomson, president of Advanced Biofuels Canada, said maximum flexibility for petroleum fuel suppliers could mean minimum flexibility for low-carbon fuel suppliers like the biofuels industry.

“The ones who really need lots of flexibility should be the low carbon fuel providers. Those are the folks who are facing a huge uphill battle,” Thomson told DeSmog Canada. “You’ve got David up against Goliath and you are telling Goliath he’s going to have maximum flexibility.”

On the flip side, Peter Boag, president of the Canadian Fuels Association, said reducing flexibility could make compliance with the clean fuel standard difficult for petroleum fuel suppliers.

“The more you start to layer on those additional requirements beyond the overall objective of reducing the carbon intensity to some level, you are starting to constrain suppliers’ ability to comply and you also start to make compliance more costly,” Boag told DeSmog Canada.

The federal government’s decision to “not differentiate between crude oil types” in the clean fuel standard may also be a point of contention for some. Oilsands usually produce more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional oil, but fuels from these sources may be treated as having the same carbon footprint in the proposed regulation.

Is a National Zero Emissions Vehicles Standard Next?

Jonn Axsen, associate professor in the Faculty of Environment at Simon Fraser University, said transforming Canada’s transportation sector will likely take more than a clean fuel standard. Additional measures like a zero-emissions vehicle mandate will probably be needed.

“The clean fuel standard just doesn’t send the right signal so that automakers are developing, innovating and creating the vehicle drivetrains. It’s a whole different process,” Axsen said. “It might not make sense for Canada to just have a low carbon fuel standard if it doesn’t have something very strong on the vehicles side as well.”

Developing “a Canada-wide strategy for zero-emission vehicles by 2018” is part of the pan-Canadian framework on clean growth and climate change, the federal government’s playbook on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Quebec adopted a zero emissions vehicle mandate last fall, whichit requires zero-emissions vehicles like electric cars to account for 15 per cent of all vehicle sales by 2025. California also has a zero emissions vehicle mandate.

Photo: Hakan Dahlstrom via Flickr

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Two weeks before the premiers met in Ottawa to finalize the pan-Canadian framework on clean growth and climate change, the federal government unveiled plans for a national clean fuel standard. If adopted, the measure could drive down greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the transportation sector, Canada’s second biggest contributor to climate change.

“One of the root issues around our climate problem is the fuel that we use to heat our homes and move our cars and so I think this is an excellent first step,” Dianne Zimmerman, director of Pembina Institute’s transportation and urban solutions program, said.

“The other piece of the puzzle is ensuring the infrastructure is in place to support alternative forms of fuel.”

In all provinces and territories, transportation ranks among the top emitters. Despite advances in vehicle fuel efficiency, emissions from transportation have barely moved up or down from 171 megatonnes annually or 23 per cent of Canada’s overall carbon footprint since 2005.

“The only challenge is political will,” Mark Jaccard, a leading energy economist in Canada, told DeSmog Canada when asked if the transportation sector faced any unique challenges in reducing its emissions.

“Around the world…we have electric cars, we have plug-in hybrid electric cars, we have flex-fuel vehicles that can run on 85 per cent ethanol, we can make ethanol with almost zero emissions,” Jaccard said. “All the technologies are there.”

What Canada is lacking at the moment are strong policies to support the necessary technological transformation to low emission vehicles. The pan-Canadian climate framework contains a section on tackling transportation emissions, but it is light on details.

Canada has committed to a 30 per cent reduction in emissions by 2030 based on 2005 levels.

Provincial Policies Don’t Make the Grade: Report

Canada’s transportation emissions are mainly from vehicles on the road. Personal vehicles — cars and light trucks — account for half of all emissions in the sector and freight trucks are an additional 32 per cent. Aviation, rail, marine shipping and recreational vehicles make up the balance.

“If we are serious about meeting our climate targets and we are committed to action to do so, decarbonizing our transportation is one effective way and electric vehicles provide an opportunity to do that,” Suzanne Goldberg, director of research at Simon Fraser University’s Sustainable Transportation Action Research Team (START), told DeSmog Canada.

The International Energy Agency estimates to avoid increasing the average global temperature by more than two degrees — the Paris Agreement target — sales of electric vehicles must exceed 40 per cent of all vehicle sales by 2040.

Goldberg and START analyzed federal and provincial policies that directly or indirectly affect electric vehicles sales in Canada and found no province will hit the agency’s proposed target.

START's Electric Vehicle Policy Report Card highlights provincial policy deficiencies. Image: sustainabletransport.ca

“The policies we have…aren’t pushing us to the levels we need to make a big difference in climate change,” Goldberg said. “The good news is governments have access to these policy tools and some governments have started to demonstrate leadership like Quebec and Ontario.”

Quebec led all provinces with electric cars projected to be 24 per cent of all vehicles sales by 2040. This is largely due to the province adopting a zero emission vehicle mandate last October, which requires at least 15 per cent of vehicles sales in the province to be zero emission vehicles like electric cars by 2025.

British Columbia and Ontario, which have purchasing incentives for electric vehicles, trailed Quebec substantially with 10 per shares for electric car sales by 2040. All other provinces will likely only reach five per cent electric vehicle sales by the target year. Goldberg and her research team published their findings in a report last November .

The report concluded the “most effective policies” to slash emissions in transportation are a strong price on GHG emissions, long-term financial incentives and a zero emissions vehicle mandate.

Jaccard said he prefers a partial-zero-emission vehicle mandate to a zero emission vehicle mandate. Partial-zero-emission vehicles include electric cars, hybrids, and vehicles running on hydrogen fuel cells or biofuels. A mandate supporting these types of vehicles would give consumers and retailers more flexibility.

“What is important is the sale and use of conventional gasoline and diesel declines,” Jaccard said. “And that is what these mandates or a carbon price must do.”

Close to two million vehicles were sold in Canada last year, but less than one per cent of sales was for electric cars.

Electric Vehicles ‘Are Fun’

“New technology needs to be discovered and understood by the general public,” Ron Groves, outreach and education manager with Plug'n Drive, told DeSmog Canada. “In order to want [electric vehicles], they have to think it’s better product than the gas car.”

Plug’n Drive is a Toronto-based organization promoting the economic and environmental benefits of electric cars. Groves and Goldberg agreed that when people have the opportunity to test drive electric cars they are more likely to purchase.

“People really love to drive them. They are fun,” Goldberg said.

“We ask them before they get into the car ‘what do they think of EVs?’ and they say ‘yeah, I don’t know too much,’” Groves told DeSmog Canada. “And then at the end of the test drive we ask them ‘do you think you’d be more inclined to buy an EV?’ and the answer is always yes.”

Groves said it is up to governments, companies and organizations like his to educate the public and address public concerns about electric vehicles from “range anxiety” to how to they recharge. The range or distance a fully charged electric car can travel has grown to over 300 kilometres, depending on the model. Most electric vehicle owners recharge their cars overnight by plugging in at home.

“If you are going to encourage adoption, the public wants to know where they are going to plug in and if they see that infrastructure being installed it gives them a greater sense of security,” Groves said of charging stations.

“Even though the chances are half the time they won’t need it.”

Canada Can Make Huge Climate Gains by Cleaning Up Transportation Sector: Experts https://t.co/MdKYQTNs5C #cdnpoli

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) December 28, 2016

Freight Truck Emissions Grow 132 Per Cent Since 1990

Freight transportation by truck and rail predominantly runs off of diesel, a fuel that produces more carbon dioxide than gasoline. Heavier loads and longer distances make electrifying freight transportation tricky, but not impossible. Since 1990, emissions from freight trucks have grown a whopping 132 per cent, making freight trucks the transportation sector’s fastest growing source of emissions.

“It is more difficult to address emissions from heavy duty freight because of the nature of the fuel that’s necessary,” said Zimmerman of the Pembina Institute. “The one thing with freight is that it is closely tied to Canada’s GDP and so as that increases so to are the demands put on the movement of goods.”

“There are less technological opportunities for heavy duty freight and even for rail,” Zimmerman told DeSmog Canada.

Jaccard and his research team published a report last September that shows switching to biofuels could significantly displace diesel in freight transportation:

“Most trucks do not require engine modification to run on a high blend of hydrogenation-derived renewable diesel (HDRD), which could become a key biofuel candidate to replace diesel for trucks. HDRD could simply be blended with conventional diesel in increasing quantities over time, without the need for new refuelling infrastructure or new truck engines,” the report reads.

Also called green diesel, hydrogenation-derived renewable diesel is fats or vegetable oils that have been through a process called hydrotreating. Some studies suggest green diesel produces 80 per cent less emissions than regular diesel.

The federal government’s plans for a clean fuel standard will likely encourage some switching to biofuels. The proposed measure will require transport fuel suppliers in Canada to shrink the carbon footprint of their product, although it is not clear by how much. The federal government estimates the standard will take a 30-megatonne bite out of transportation emissions or the equivalent of removing seven million cars off the road.

Zimmerman said she would also like to see Ottawa develop a national land freight strategy to better coordinate freight between trucks and rail, cut down the amount of kilometers goods travel and minimize empty loads travelling on the road.

“When you look at addressing the largest GHG impacts [in freight], I think the greatest opportunity would be to look at a comprehensive strategy for both trucking and the opportunity for intermodal with rail,” Zimmerman said. “Inherently long haul trips and heavy trips are much more fuel efficient if going by rail as opposed to truck.”

Aviation the Next Low Emission Frontier?

Transport Canada estimates domestic and international aviation in Canada produced 17 megatonnes of GHG emissions in 2014, a 20 per cent increase since 2005.  Emissions from freight trucks reached 54.7 megatonnes and personal vehicles came close to 86 megatonnes in 2014.

If Canada plans on “meeting or exceeding” its 2030 GHG reduction target, aviation emissions will also need to be addressed.

“We have to go after aviation big time,” Jaccard said. “The Brazilians have flown jets on biofuels, on biokerosene…we can make that now. Again, we have the technologies, we have the fuels and it is a question of the political will.”

Last March, United Airlines announced it would begin using a 30 per cent biofuel, 70 per cent regular jet fuel mix for flights between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Air Canada announced last April it would join Canada's Biojet Supply Chain Initiative (CBSCI), a three-year project to insert 400,000 litres of a biofuel called biojet into the Canadian aviation market.

Image: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the GM Innovation Summit. Photo: Prime Minister's Photo Gallery

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Federal and provincial climate policies unveiled over the last year are paving the way for Canada to massively increase the amount of energy the country gets from renewable sources, according to a new analysis released today by Clean Energy Canada.

“For the first time the federal government and the provinces are working together to establish a national climate plan,” Dan Woynillowicz, policy director at Clean Energy Canada, said. “A big piece of the puzzle is not just cleaning up the grid, but electrifying other parts of the economy reliant on fossil fuels.”

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government is drafting a ‘pan-Canadian clean growth and climate change framework’ to be released this fall. Meantime, last year Alberta and Saskatchewan, Canada’s main oil and gas producing provinces, set ambitious renewable energy targets. And Ontario recently announced one of the most cutting edge greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction plans in Canada to date.

All of that means things are finally looking up for clean energy in Canada. Federal and provincial politicians now need to make good on their climate pledges for the country to reap even bigger benefits from this $500 billion global industry.

“There’s never been a greater opportunity to move forward on this file for Canada. There is certainly reason for optimism,” Robert Hornung, president of the Canadian Wind Energy Association, told DeSmog Canada.

“We are in a unique moment in time. Not just the federal government, but Ontario, B.C., Quebec, and Alberta have all expressed climate change as a priority,” Hornung said.

Clean Energy Canada says the renewable energy challenge facing Canada right now is different from other heavy greenhouse gas emitting countries like China or the U.S. Nearly 80 per cent of all Canadian electricity comes from non-GHG emitting sources (including nuclear power), three-quarters of which is hydroelectricity.

In the United States, on the other hand, fossil fuels produce close to 70 per cent of the country's electricity.

“We have a comparative advantage in Canada because our grid is already pretty clean,” Woynillowicz told DeSmog. “Canada is in an enviable position.”  

While other countries are focused on switching their electricity base from fossil fuels to clean energy, Canada has a different challenge. Sectors heavily dependent on fossil fuels  — oil and gas, transportation, and industrial processes — have hardly any renewable energy in the mix at the moment.

That means to reduce emissions Canada needs to do things like shift to electric vehicles and efficient electric-based home heating systems (like air and ground source heat pumps).

Has #CleanEnergy's Time Finally Come in #Canada? https://t.co/xncUcQSaPM @standearth @merransmith @SciPolEnv pic.twitter.com/9QMtSvt81X

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) June 16, 2016

“Clean electricity is one of the best tools to fight climate change,” Clean Energy Canada’s executive director Merran Smith told DeSmog Canada. “As we shift to power our economy by clean electricity there will be an increase in demand for electricity and we need that to be clean electricity.”

In B.C., that raises the specter of the controversial Site C dam, but even with an increased demand for electricity in the future (demand in B.C. has been flat for the past 10 years), Site C isn’t necessarily the best solution according to Smith.

“From an economic perspective, Site C is concerning because the cost of renewables like wind and solar power have been dropping dramatically,” she said.

“In the U.S. the price of solar has dropped 80 per cent over last six years and the price of wind has dropped 60 per cent over the last six years. As the cost of those keep going down, that makes them attractive — whereas eight of the last 10 hydro projects built globally have gone over budget.”

A new report released by Bloomberg New Energy Finance this week found that wind and solar will be the cheapest ways of producing electricity in many countries during the 2020s and in most of the world in the 2030s.

“The good news for B.C. is we already have so much large hydro, we really can add intermittent renewables on easily because we already have the large hydro that acts as a battery and acts as storage,” Smith said.

“We could build solar and wind in 100 megawatt units as we need it in rural communities. It could create work around the province. And we could bring it on line as we need it. So a decade from now when we need another 100 MW, it will be even cheaper.”

Woynillowicz sees the emerging national climate framework as the space to address how to power more of the Canadian economy with renewable energy.

“That’s the place to articulate a clear priority of electrification and establish renewable energy targets,” Woynillowicz said. “It will change the conversation around climate away from where jobs are going to be lost to what we are going to create and build.”

Studies have shown the two pillars to decarbonizing any industrialized economy are to first transition completely to non-GHG emitting electrical generation and then run the economy off this clean electricity.

Clean Energy Canada’s analysis highlights energy storage and electricity sharing between provinces as areas where Canada is starting to break ground in electrifying the economy. In regards to the latter, Hornung would like to see more happen politically.

“What the federal government could do is provide a platform for provinces and territories to talk about the shared challenges they face in optimizing their electricity systems and enable collaborative relationships,” Hornung told DeSmog Canada.

Hornung points out more renewable energy is sold to the United States than shared between provinces right now.

Ontario and Quebec, and Alberta and Manitoba have all signed separate memorandums of understanding to take steps toward integrating their electrical grids.

In a report released in February, Clean Energy Canada warned Canada was falling behind its peers on the international stage in terms of renewable energy investments. At the time, it was estimated clean energy investments in Canada had dropped by a whooping 46 per cent, while they increased in the U.S., China, India and the United Kingdom.

However, when analysts with Clean Energy Canada took a deeper dive into the numbers for this latest report, they uncovered the decrease in investments was only 15 per cent when accounting for all clean energy projects, making 2015 the second biggest year for renewable energy investments in Canada.

Meantime, the country’s installed clean energy capacity grew by four per cent last year despite that drop in investment dollars, which the think tank concludes was likely due to policy uncertainty.

Smith noted that an increased price on carbon is needed to level the playing field.

“Right now fossil fuels are getting a free ride for their pollution,” Smith said. “Clean energy is the future. This train is going in one direction and that’s off of fossil fuels and onto clean energy.”

— With files from Emma Gilchrist.

Image: 1010/Flickr

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You probably wouldn't guess it, but Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia are unsung heroes in Canadian wind energy — producing more than 10 per cent of their electricity needs from wind, more than any other provinces.

“Some electricity utility companies in Canada will tell you all you’ll ever get from wind is 10 per cent of your electrical needs,” Carl Brothers, an engineer and wind energy consultant, said. "In PEI, we are closing in on 30 per cent."

By comparison, Ontario, Canada’s biggest wind power producer, manages to meet about four per cent of its domestic demand through wind energy.

The shift to renewable energy in Nova Scotia and PEI in the last decade has been nothing short of remarkable.  At the turn of the 21st century, both provinces were dependent on coal and oil-fired power plants for nearly all of their electricity. Neither province possesses the massive waterpower resources Quebec, Manitoba and British Columbia rely on to produce renewable electricity.

Yet today Canada’s two smallest provinces have approximately 25 per cent renewables in their respective electricity mixes and wind power is a leading component. Germany, a global leader in clean energy, generates more than one third of its electricity from renewable sources like wind, solar and biomass.

“We took a look around at the domestic resources available to us and renewable energy, predominantly wind, just made sense,” Catherine Abreu, an energy campaigner for the Ecology Action Centre in Halifax, told DeSmog Canada.

“We have a lot of insight to share on what kind of investments and changes need to be made to existing infrastructure that will be true [for jurisdictions] across Canada as we move towards a clean energy economy,” Abreu said.

If Canada is to have any hope of doing its part to tackle climate change, the country needs to find a way to incorporate substantially more renewable energy into its energy mix. A recent study indicates Canada could produce close to 60 per cent of its primary energy (electricity, transportation, heating/cooling, industry) from wind alone by 2050.

Non-water based renewables like wind and solar currently make up only three per cent of the country’s electrical generation.

Lessons learned in the Maritimes’ rapid transition to wind energy could hold the keys to Canada finally plugging into this clean, sustainable and largely untapped resource.  

PEI Wind Power: "Islanders Own It"

Feeling the pinch from the rapid rise in fossil fuel prices in the early 2000s, PEI and Nova Scotia set ambitious provincial renewable energy targets. In 2008, the PEI government announced 500 megawatts worth of wind energy facilities to be installed in the province, which is equivalent to one third of Alberta’s current wind power capacity. Alberta is the third biggest producer of wind energy in Canada.

“One thing PEI doesn’t have in the ground are fossil fuels, but we have a wonderful wind resource,” Brothers told DeSmog Canada.

Brothers has been in the PEI renewable energy business for over three decades and is also the CEO of Frontier Power Systems in Charlottetown.

Even though PEI has yet to hit its 500 megawatt wind target, nearly 100 per cent of all electricity produced on PEI comes from wind farms, a feat unmatched anywhere in Canada. The rest of PEI’s electrical needs are met mostly by electricity imports from New Brunswick.

A key feature of early wind development in PEI was public ownership.

“Prince Edward Islanders have always had a strong environmental ethic,” Brothers said. “And there is a definite sense of public ownership and pride in our wind farms. Islanders own it.”

PEI Energy Corporation, a provincial Crown corporation, owned and operated early wind facilities and the PEI government guaranteed the loans for the startup projects. To this day, PEI Energy generates the wind power used domestically and private sector companies sell wind energy out of province.

This sense of public ownership may also explain why PEI has not seen the same public pushback against wind turbines that has been experienced by private companies in Ontario.

The benefits of wind energy go beyond cleaning up the province’s electricity. PEI’s North Cape Wind Farm, one of Canada’s first commercial wind farms, is now the site of the Wind Energy Institute of Canada, a leading national wind energy innovation and research institution.

The province’s Hermanville/Clearspring Wind Development Project provides approximately $350,000 annually to nearby landowners and the community at large through royalties and a newly established community development fund, according to the PEI government.

“At the end of the day we need to find a way to sustainability. Our grandchildren will think less of us if we don’t take the initiative,” Brothers told DeSmog.

Source: Canadian Wind Energy Association

Nova Scotia Leads All Provinces in Cutting GHG Emissions

Nova Scotia has quietly crept to the head of the pack as a provincial climate leader. The province implemented North America’s first “hard caps” on emissions in the electricity sector, has a 40 per cent renewables 2020 target and is in position to lead all provinces and territories in future GHG reductions.

Nova Scotia also has installed more wind power capacity than B.C., a province 20 times its size. The province’s Community Feed-In-Tariff, or COMFIT, program deserves much of the credit for gaining public acceptance of wind power.

“COMFIT projects in the end did not produce a lot of energy, but it did help in winning over the public,” Brendan Haley, a Broadbent Institute research fellow and former renewable energy campaigner in Nova Scotia, said.

Introduced in 2011, the COMFIT program guaranteed a predetermined fixed rate to be paid on the electricity local producers sold. Only community entities like municipalities, energy co-operatives, First Nations and universities could participate in and reap the benefits of the program. COMFIT incentivized getting into the renewable energy game by minimizing the financial risks for non-private sector players.

The results exceeded even the Nova Scotia government’s expectations.

A provincial government report estimates 125 megawatts of electricity are produced by projects under COMFIT and an additional 100 megawatts are expected to come online in the future. Most projects are wind farms. When COMFIT was established, the provincial government expected only 100 megawatts of electricity from the program.

“If you look at the latest energy policy, it is fairly transparent the current government is doing whatever it takes to push off any rate increase until after the next election,” Haley told DeSmog Canada.

Despite COMFIT’s success, the Nova Scotia government cancelled the program last August. The provincial government justified the move by claiming it was keeping consumer prices on power bills down. Nova Scotia does have some of the highest electrical rates in Canada.

A year earlier, the same Liberal provincial government capped Nova Scotia’s energy efficiency budget under similar same cost-saving pretenses. Haley says the province’s previously strong energy efficiency standards on electricity played a big role in Nova Scotia’s ability to make deep greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions cuts.

Source: Environment and Climate Change Canada, 2016

An additional reason for the Nova Scotia’s government cancellation of COMFIT was that the program “had achieved its objectives.” Abreu of the Ecology Action Centre argued at the time that surpassing COMFIT’s original goals “should be cause for celebration, not cancellation.”

Atlantic Canada Could Be Canada’s 100 Per Cent Renewable Testing Grounds

The renewable energy revolution in the Maritimes has somewhat stalled and the reasons are not only political.

“The Maritimes are really quickly coming up against the limits of our existing infrastructure,” Abreu said.

Electrical grids in Canada are designed to distribute electricity from a handful of large powerful sources like coal plants or hydro dams, not dozens of smaller intermittent ones like wind turbines or solar panels.

“We are figuring it out,” Abreu told DeSmog Canada. “New Brunswick is really invested in understanding smart grids and how to implement them, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick are experimenting with regional dispatch and utilities are doing the work to understand how to deal with intermittent renewable energy.”

PEI may be a ‘lab,' holding clues to solving Canada’s energy questions. Brothers and Abreu agree the province’s vast wind resource and size make PEI the ideal testing grounds for large-scale deployment of electric vehicles and other measures fundamental in shifting Canada from a fossil fuels economy to a clean energy society.

Brothers is concerned that with low oil and natural gas prices and without a price on carbon pollution, the PEI government has lost its appetite for building more wind farms despite the province’s heavily reliance on fossil fuels for energy and tremendous potential to go big in wind power.

A study in 2015 conducted by Stanford University Engineering Professor Mark Jacobson identifies Atlantic Canada, as well as the Pacific Coast, Great Lakes and the Prairies as areas in the world with “strong” wind resources available for power generation.

Image Credit: The Wind Energy Institute of Canada via Green Energy Futures/Flickr

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Environment Minister Catherine McKenna earlier this month said the federal government does not have a preferred carbon pricing system. Whether the provinces and territories go with cap and trade or a carbon tax, McKenna simply wants to see Canada produce less greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

“I just care about how do we reduce emissions at the end of the day,” McKenna said during a panel discussion on Canadian climate action in Ottawa. “That is the most important piece.”

Unlike the previous federal government, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government has made putting a price on carbon pollution a priority. A recent meeting between premiers and the federal government on a national climate strategy nearly broke down last March because of the Trudeau government’s insistence on a national minimum carbon price.

“The carbon pricing lobby sucked all the air out of the room,” leading Canadian energy economist Mark Jaccard told DeSmog Canada. “What we should be doing is looking at those jurisdictions that have made progress and learn from them instead of closing our eyes saying ‘I want a carbon price and don’t bother me with the evidence.'" Jaccard is not opposed to carbon pricing. In fact, he believes given Canada’s current political climate a national cap and trade system is feasible.

What concerns Jaccard is policymakers pushing for emissions pricing as the centerpiece of a Canadian climate plan are overlooking the success regulations have had in reducing GHG output.  

“You can meet our Paris Agreement targets strictly with emissions pricing whether cap and trade or a carbon tax. You can also do it strictly with regulations,” Jaccard said. “What looms large in the discussion is political acceptability.”

Jaccard’s and his research team at Simon Fraser University have put together a rather convincing case showing regulations are responsible for cutting more GHG emissions than carbon pricing systems in Canada and elsewhere in the world.

The evidence is not that hard to find either.

“The policy that had the biggest effect in B.C. was the electricity regulations I helped design for Gordon Campbell’s government in 2007, not the carbon tax,” Jaccard told DeSmog. “It forced BC Hydro to tear up two proposals for coal plants and abandon its own plans for a large natural gas plant.”

Halting the construction of three fossil fuels powered electrical facilities prevented four times more emissions than B.C.’s world famous carbon tax will cut, according to Jaccard. The carbon tax is expected to reduce B.C.’s annual emissions by 3 to 5 megatonnes in 2020. The province’s clean electricity regulation on the other hand will keep between 12 and 18 megatonnes out of the atmosphere by the same year.  

Ontario eliminating coal-fired power plants remains the “single largest regulatory action” in North America to reduce GHG emissions, the equivalent of taking seven million cars off the road.

Nova Scotia does not have a carbon price and yet the province is expected to lead all provinces and territories in future GHG reductions. Regulations like adopting North America’s first “hard caps” on GHG emissions in the electricity sector, setting ambitious renewable energy targets and tightening up energy efficiency standards have all put Nova Scotia in position to shrink its carbon footprint by 37.5 per cent in 2020.

“Is a carbon price more economically efficient? Of course it is more economically efficient,” Jaccard said. “All I am saying is can’t we — we so-called experts like me — learn a little bit from evidence from around the world, from what’s gone on in Canada and that’s the reason I might talk about regulations.”

Regulations and Carbon Pricing: A Fair Comparison?

Promising GHG regulatory actions are on the horizon in Canada as well.

The Alberta government last year pledged to phase out coal-powered electricity by 2030, which will take a 17 per cent bite out of the province’s large carbon footprint. Alberta produces more emissions than Ontario and Quebec combined.

Last March, Canada and the U.S. agreed to introduce national regulations halving methane emissions in their respective oil and gas sectors. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas packing a global warming punch far more potent than carbon dioxide.

Measuring Canadian carbon pricing systems against Canadian GHG regulations may not seem like a fair comparison. For an entire decade, the previous federal government went out of its way to slam the mere idea of making polluters pay from their emissions.

Carbon pricing has only recently recovered from this unwarranted attack.

But the success of regulations in reining in GHG emissions can be seen outside of Canada as well. Jaccard says analysts in Sweden and California — two carbon pricing pioneers — have told him regulations are responsible for reducing the majority of their emissions. Sweden adopted a carbon tax in 1991 and California has had a cap and trade system since 2012.

Joseph Pallant, manager of Brinkman Climate, said regulations do have a role to play in addressing climate change although they may not be enough on their own.*

“The question is not regulation or carbon pricing – we must clearly do both. Governments should regulate greenhouse gas emitting activities where doing so is efficient, but regulation alone can be a bit of a blunt instrument. We find it much more effective to spur innovation and implement new, clean technologies across the whole economy by putting a price on carbon,” Pallant told DeSmog Canada.

“Otherwise,” Pallant added, “we set 10 year targets and then wring our hands in year eight because we're off track and need to set another distant goal. Can’t stop climate change with discipline like that.”

Pallant argues regulations are not always a slam dunk. He points to the promised oil and gas regulations of the Harper government, which were years in the making, and never saw the light of day. Emissions from oil and gas grew substantially during the Harper years and now the sector is Canada’s biggest contributor to climate change.

Regulations can take more time than carbon pricing systems to be crafted and implemented as well. It took Ontario roughly five years to produce province-wide coal phase out regulations, but only a year to table legislation for a cap and trade system.

With Canada and the rest of the world in a race against the clock to curb emissions in order to avoid the worst effects of climate change, delays on climate action have the potential of exacerbating an already dire situation.

“Carbon pricing is at its best where we implement a cap and trade system, making it more expensive to pollute by creating a specific limit on emissions. The carbon price then automatically rises to the level needed to pay for the required emissions reductions,” Pallant said. “Transparency is a key feature, as we can draw a line between our emissions today, and what we've committed in the future and know that we’re hitting our target year on year.”

“People interested in stopping climate change should be wary if pundits or governments try to pivot from carbon pricing and concrete emissions reductions because of some perceived difficulty in implementing such systems,” Pallant told DeSmog. “Nobody said this would be easy — but if we can’t do it in today’s socio-political climate, when will we ever be able to?”

But for Jaccard, ‘trying’ might mean finding more creative ways of understanding new roles for regulations in the energy marketplace.

Jaccard said he sees great value in what he calls “niche market” regulations. These regulations create space in the economy for the technological solutions to the climate crisis like electric cars or solar panels.

“What you want is a growing share of vehicles, for example, that have the desired characteristics of the future penetrating your market,” Jaccard said. “Regulations tell manufacturers that if you want to keep selling Hummers or big Ram trucks you can still do that, but you need a growing share of sales in low, ultra low and zero emission vehicles.”

“With niche market regulations the retailer has to pay a penalty per car if they miss their target. What they do or what they must be doing even though they don’t talk about it is cross subsidizing,” Jaccard told DeSmog Canada.

An example of cross subsidization is a California car retailer adding an additional $70 per vehicle on big sellers like SUVs and then using that money to decrease the price of lower emissions vehicles like Teslas, and hybrids. Increasing the affordability of low emissions vehicles could in turn help boost sales and meet the quota. A new, clean energy industry can expand without being utterly dependent on government subsidies.

“With a cap and trade you are trying to limit a bad like carbon dioxide,” Jaccard said. “With regulations like the renewable portfolio standards and the vehicle emissions standard in California instead we have decided we want more of something.”

California’s Zero Emissions Program requires 10 per cent of vehicle sales to be zero emissions vehicles. By 2025, the quota increases to 15 per cent or 270,000 new vehicle sales.

Canada does not have zero emissions vehicle quotas for cars. Close to two million vehicles were sold in Canada last year and an estimated 5,700 or 0.33 per cent were zero emissions vehicles.

The transportation sector is Canada’s second largest producer of GHG emissions.

*Correction: This article has been updated to reflect Joseph Pallant is manager of Brinkmann Climate, not president of the Carbon Solutions Project as previously stated.

Image: Kris Krug

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Many Indigenous leaders have expressed disappointment that only the leaders of the national organizations representing Inuit, Métis and First Nations were allowed to fully participate in the talks at a climate strategy meeting with the prime minister and premiers earlier this month. Other Indigenous leaders in attendance for the meeting in Vancouver were relegated to the role of spectators.   “Limiting conversation to three Indigenous voices from over 600 Indigenous communities across Canada is a vast under representation,” Melina Laboucan-Massimo, a climate and indigenous rights activist, said. “At a bare minimum, the regional chiefs should be at the table as well, but also Indigenous leaders and experts who work on climate should be as well.”   Regional chiefs were also frustrated that their input into the pan-Canadian framework for clean growth and climate change is limited, despite Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s promise of a “renewed, nation-to-nation relationship” with Indigenous people in Canada.   “We thought we’d have a chance to speak, but it was the national chief who was permitted to speak for about ten minutes. Ten minutes for all First Nations in Canada? That is a slap in the face to First Nations and embarrassment for Canada,” Ontario Regional Chief Isadore Day told DeSmog Canada. “Climate change is a matter of life and death. Our kids and grandkids will suffer if we fail to act and we only have a 20-year window to act. Clearly, we all need to work together.”

Treaty 6 Grand Chief Tony Alexis, an Alberta regional chief, said First Nations had been merely “asked to come and visit” the climate meeting. Chief Allan Adam of the Athabasca Fort Chipewyan First Nation in Alberta declared the federal government and premiers had “failed terribly” in addressing Indigenous concerns about climate change and protecting the environment.

“We Were Not Welcome At The Table": Chief Day   Two days of meetings took place in Vancouver: a meeting on March 2nd for Indigenous leaders, premiers and the prime minister and a meeting the following day exclusively for the provinces, territories and the federal government. Last-minute invitations to join the Alberta and Ontario provincial delegations allowed Day and Alexis to be present at the final meeting.   “We were not welcome at the table. If the meeting is an indication of how things will proceed moving forward, Indigenous peoples and Canadians should be concerned,” Day said.   Not all provinces appear comfortable with Indigenous leaders playing a significant role in the crafting of a Canadian climate framework either.   “From what I heard some provinces indicated during the meeting they would like to limit Indigenous involvement in the climate framework. I find this very concerning, not to mention deeply disrespectful,” Laboucan-Massimo told DeSmog Canada. “It is of immense importance for Indigenous governments to be engaged from start to finish at the four climate tables, and I hope that all levels of government respect that.”   Before the summit in Vancouver had begun, the federal government came under fire for failing to invite two other national Indigenous organizations — Native Women’s Association of Canada and the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples — to the talks. NDP Leader Tom Mulcair blasted Trudeau in Parliament for the “slight” and Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger pointed out in the past all five national organizations have been invited to attend first ministers meetings.   Indigenous Peoples To Be Consulted On The Climate Change Framework   A “broader engagement process with Indigenous peoples” is meant to take place alongside the work of four federal-provincial working groups studying key climate policy areas such as clean technology, carbon pricing mechanisms and greenhouse gas reductions strategies. If the recommendations are approved at a first ministers meeting this fall, they will make up the bulwark of a national framework shaping Canada’s responses to climate change.   The details of the consultation process have not been made available yet, but both Day and Laboucan-Massimo agree the process needs to be as comprehensive as possible for Indigenous concerns to be heard and incorporated.   "I think a climate change accord in Canada is necessary going forward. It would spell out how a constructive dialogue between Indigenous people and the federal government could take place," Day said.   Indigenous knowledge could also strengthen a national plan to address climate change. Scientists have already begun using Inuit knowledge and observations for studying weather patterns in the Arctic. Firsthand information like this can be used to test climate models.   “Because of the innate connection to the land, Indigenous people notice changes in the ecosystem, animals and water that others may dismiss. We’ve had centuries of observation, experience and intimate relationships to the land that has built this unique knowledge and sensitivity,” Laboucan-Massimo told DeSmog Canada. Laboucan-Massimo is a member of the Sakaw Nehiyawak (“Northern” or “Bush” Cree in English).   Laboucan-Massimo also sees the low-carbon economy as much more in line with Indigenous worldviews than fossil fuels economies.

“For the first time since the age of industrialization, there finally exists a technology that produces energy that is not in complete contradiction with Indigenous values and our way of life,” Laboucan-Massimo said. “The time is now for our communities to begin integrating renewable energy technology such as solar photovoltaic to help us become less reliant on fossil fuels.” 

Image: Melina Laboucan Massimo at a solar installation in her community of Little Buffalo in northern Alberta.

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“Canada stands at the threshold of building our clean growth economy,” the opening line of Canada’s new declaration on clean growth and climate change states. The declaration was endorsed by the prime minister and premiers in Vancouver Thursday.   “We will grow our economy while reducing emissions. We will capitalize on the opportunity of a low-carbon and climate-resilient economy to create good-paying and long-term jobs. We will do this in partnership with Indigenous peoples based on recognition of rights, respect and cooperation,” the Vancouver Declaration continues.      The document itself is not a national climate plan, but rather lays the foundation for one to be finalized in the fall. The document represents a major change in the political tide for Canada, with the federal government, provinces and territories working together to reduce Canada’s production of global warming greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.   “Politicians coming together and talking about this is a great step for Canada,” Dave Sawyer, a leading environmental economist in Canada, told DeSmog Canada. “It is very positive that first ministers are setting up a process to align provincial climate policies and look to fill holes in policies across the country.”

Provincial Climate Policies Hold the Details

Canadians looking for meaningful climate action from the federal government since the signing of the Kyoto Protocol ­— the world’s first climate treaty — in 1997, may be disappointed the Vancouver Declaration lacks specifics.   The six-point document contains no renewable energy targets, sector specific regulations on GHG emissions, or any mention of Canada’s number one contributor to climate change: the oil and gas sector. The sole national target mentioned in the document is a commitment to meet or exceed Canada’s 2030 target of 30 per cent cuts in emissions levels compared to 2005 levels — a target established under the previous federal government that has been criticized as weak.   Sawyer argues many of the details missing in the Vancouver Declaration are actually contained in existing and emerging provincial climate policies and regulations.   “In the past, we have had this tendency of pledging to ambitious targets and then backsliding from there,” Sawyer said. “Over the last ten years of federal policy inaction, we have had a fair amount of provincial policy put in place to drive down emissions.”   In late 2015, Alberta released plans to cap oilsands emissions and phase out coal-fired electrical generation and Saskatchewan adopted  a 50 per cent renewable energy target for 2030. Ontario and Manitoba announced last year they would adopt cap and trade carbon pricing systems.   Building on the success of provincial and territorial policies is a cornerstone of the Vancouver Declaration which recognizes “the commitment of the federal government to work with the provinces and territories in order to complement and support their actions without duplicating them, including by promoting innovation and enabling clean growth across all sectors.”   "What is different this time around is we have a credible federal back stop," Sawyer, who is the CEO of the consultancy EnviroEconomics, told DeSmog. "A subtle reminder to the provinces and territories that if they don't find a way to drive down their emissions the federal government will find a way for them."

Carbon Pricing 'Mechanisms' to be Used 

Pricing carbon pollution emerged as a source of contention in advance of the First Ministers' Meeting. Prior to the Vancouver event, the premiers of Saskatchewan, Yukon, and Manitoba made it clear they would not support Ottawa imposing a national minimum carbon price on the provinces and territories.   During his election campaign Trudeau promised to implement a national price on carbon and indicated a carbon price was an intended outcome of the Vancouver meeting.   “I was happy to see the Prime Minister move away from an exclusive focus on carbon pricing. Carbon pricing alone won't get you there,” Sawyer said from Ottawa. “You need regulations, technology innovation, and other measures as well as carbon pricing to transition cost-effectively to a low carbon economy."   A compromise was found in the end. The Vancouver Declaration commits the premiers to “adopting a broad range of domestic measures, including carbon pricing mechanisms” but not an actual per tonne price of GHG emissions found in cap and trade or carbon tax systems.   What those mechanisms may include has yet to be defined. Any policy measure driving up the costs of burning fossil fuels for energy could be conceived as an aspect of carbon pricing. During the meeting, Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil floated the idea that the high rates Nova Scotians pay on electricity fulfills a similar function as a price on carbon.

Working Groups To Study Climate Plan Over Next Six Months 

The Vancouver Declaration also created four federal-provincial working groups that will refine recommendations on the pillars of an eventual pan-Canadian clean growth and climate change framework. Over the next six months the working groups will study clean technology solutions, carbon pricing mechanisms, GHG reductions “opportunities,” and adaptation and climate resilience.   The declaration requires the working groups to “engage Indigenous peoples in the development of the pan-Canadian framework on clean growth and climate change," adding the work of the declaration should be "complemented by a broader engagement process with Indigenous peoples.”   National Chief Perry Bellegarde of the Assembly of First Nations urged Canada to move quickly toward consultation with indigenous peoples.   “We are the first ones to feel the impacts of climate change and we know this crisis is real and it is upon us. Working together we can succeed but we have to start working now,” Bellegarde said in a statement.   Recommendations from the working groups will be submitted to the premiers and the federal government who will then finalize the Canadian climate framework in October. In the meantime, the federal government has committed to funding green infrastructure, public transportation and energy efficiency in social infrastructure to kick start and support low-carbon initiatives across the country.

Image Credit: Screenshot CBCNews.ca

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Quebec Environment Minister David Heurtel announced Tuesday the province is filing a legal injunction against TransCanada’s proposed Energy East oil pipeline with Quebec’s Superior Court.

"Today's motion is very simple and very clear. It signifies that whoever seeks to build a project in Quebec must comply with all Quebec laws and regulations," Heurtel said at a press conference.

"This is not only a matter of respect, but equally a question of fairness towards all companies that wish to do business in Quebec."

The announcement left oil-patch politicians like Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall once again bitter with Quebec for not fully supporting the west-to-east pipeline project. 

"I'm very disappointed," Wall said in response to the province's push for an injunction. "It seems of late that we seem to be forgetting what's best about Canada."   “The Minister himself was quite clear in pointing out it is not a position for or against the pipeline,” Karine Peloffy, executive director of Centre Québécois du Droit de l’Environnement (Quebec Environmental Law Center), said. “It is more an issue of insisting on the proper application of the law.”    Under Quebec’s Environment Quality Act, any pipeline longer than two kilometers must undergo a provincial environmental assessment and review prior to shovels going into the ground. If approved, 1,600 kilometres of the 4,600-kilometre Energy East pipeline will be built in Quebec and New Brunswick.   “We have laws quite specific to Quebec that take into account environmental risks and local health issues and concerns not necessarily considered at the federal level,” Peloffy told DeSmog Canada.

Peloffy points to the province’s adherence to legal concepts like protecting water as a collective resource and the fundamental right to live in a healthy environment as areas where Quebec’s environmental law differs from its federal equivalent.

Legacy Of Weakened Federal Environmental Protections 

Much of Canada's federal environmental legislation related to the protection of at risk species, fish and water protection was weakened or eliminated under the previous federal government, leaving some to wonder if provincial law is the last best defence for the environment.

The the Species At Risk Act, the Navigable Waters Protection Act and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act were significantly altered through two omnibus bills in 2012. In the wake of the legislative changes, hundreds of environmental assessments of energy projects were cancelled outright, eroding public trust in the ability of the National Energy Board, Canada's pipeline regulator, to adequately assess the environmental risk of new major pipeline projects.

“In 2012, the Harper government set out to scale back federal environmental legislation to the minimum amount required to satisfy its jurisdiction,” Ecojustice staff lawyer Charles Hatt told DeSmog Canada.   “Provincial environmental assessment legislation can sometimes fill gaps left by this narrow view the previous federal government took of environmental assessment,” Hatt said.   Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government promised to review the national pipeline assessment process but indicated pipeline review processes already underway — for both the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expanstion and Energy East — will continue on under the current regime. 

Quebec to Avoid Same Legal Ruling as British Columbia

Comments made by Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard earlier this week indicate the province is trying to avoid legal obstacles faced by British Columbia in the construction of the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline.

The B.C. Supreme Court found last January that the provincial government failed to fulfill its legal duty to consult with First Nations about Northern Gateway when it handed over its responsibility to conduct an environmental assessment of the project to the National Energy Board. 

“Essentially the courts ruled the B.C. government acted illegally by abdicating its responsibility to review Northern Gateway to the National Energy Board,” Peloffy said.

"I want to point out that this [injunction] should not be interpreted as us being for or against the project," Environment Minister Hurtel said Tuesday. "Rather, as in other provinces, it is an attempt to have our laws and regulations respected." 

TransCanada Refuses To Supply Quebec With An Environmental Impact Study of Energy East 

TransCanada may have also played a role in provoking the Quebec injunction.   “I clearly informed TransCanada Pipelines that it needed to table a project notice for Energy East," Environment Minister Heurtel stated in a media release. "In the face of its inaction, the government has taken action. This is not only a matter of respect, but equally a question of fairness towards all companies that wish to do business in Quebec."

Under normal circumstances in Quebec, when a company wishes to undertake a major project it must submit a notice with the ministry of environment. This in turn triggers a review by a provincial agency called the Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement or BAPE and leads to the issuance of a governmental authorization of and conditions for the project.   The province asked TransCanada in 2014 to provide an environmental impact study of the Quebec portion of Energy East for purposes of conducting a provincial review and the Calgary-based pipeline company has yet to respond.   Despite TransCanada not following proper Quebec procedure, the province decided to go ahead with a review of Energy East regardless. The review is scheduled to begin next week.   Quebec environmental organizations have concerns about the provincial review in its current form.   “A big issue with the current review is the minister has been able to carve out pieces of the mandate they didn’t want to be studied,” Peloffy said. “Normally in a provincial review all aspects of the environment are looked at, including economic aspects and Indigenous rights. The Minister decided both are outside the purview of the review.”   TransCanada’s non-compliance with Quebec law has given Heurtel the legal leeway to cater the review of Energy East to a more limited set of criteria than is standard in the province. The review’s findings will only serve to inform Quebec’s position during National Energy Board hearings and not result a provincial government decision on Energy East.   Quebec Environmental Law Centre, Equiterre, Nature Quebec and Fondation Coule pas chez nous are calling on the Quebec government to suspend its Energy East review until the province’s Superior Court delivers a ruling on whether TransCanada has breached Quebec law. All four organizations filed a joint motion with the Superior Court against the Energy East project on February 18th.   If built, the $15.7 billion dollar Energy East pipeline will transport 1.1 million barrels of western Canadian oil and oilsands crude 4,600 kilometres to New Brunswick every day. To date, TransCanada has submitted over 30,000-pages of documents as part of its Energy East application to the National Energy Board. The Board has not determined if the application is complete. 

Image Credit: David Heurtel via Twitter

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Clean energy investment surged to $497 billion worldwide in 2015 while in Canada investment in renewables experienced a massive 46 per cent plunge to around $5.4 billion, according to a new report released Monday by Clean Energy Canada.

Global investment is up from a total of $420 billion in 2014 with nearly one-third of of new investments occurring in China. Spending on renewables increased in the U.S. by seven per cent, in India by 23 per cent and in Mexico by 114 per cent.    “Canada’s performance was out of step with its peers in 2015,” Clare Demerse, senior policy adviser at Clean Energy Canada, told DeSmog Canada. "This should be a wakeup call, although we hope this is a one-off and not the start of a trend."

Cheaper technology can partially account for the drop in investments in Canada. In the U.S., for example, over the last six years the unsubsidized cost of wind energy went down 61 per cent and 82 per cent for utility-scale solar PV. 

The amount of money invested in Canadian clean energy may have been cut in half last year, but the construction of new renewable energy projects only slowed by 30 per cent, according to Clean Energy Canada.   “When you couple [clean energy's] declining costs with free fuel from the wind, sun, water, biomass and the earth’s heat, you have a formula for ever increasing competitiveness with fossil fuels,” the report states.

Source: Clean Energy Canada, 2016

Uncertain Clean Energy Policy in Canada Played a Role

Imprecise policies and a lack of clean energy regulation created uncertainty for investors in Canada, the report finds.   “Pipelines trumped power lines as a national priority,” it concludes.

Canada has no national climate framework or greenhouse gas regulations for the oil and gas sector. The bulk of Canada's climate action in recent years has emerged at the provincial level.   “In the longstanding absence of federal climate leadership, provinces led the charge," Demerse told DeSmog Canada. But, she added, "some of the provinces that are big players in clean energy were rethinking policies in 2015. Uncertainty is hard on investors.” 

British Columbia, a province praised in recent years for its world-class carbon tax, is investing heavily in a liquefied natural gas (LNG) export industry as well as the major Site C hydrodam. A recent review of B.C.'s Climate Action Plan found the province is unlikely to meet its climate targets. 

Ontario, Canada’s leader in wind power, confirmed it will spend over $25 billion on refurbishing aging nuclear reactors to clean up the province’s electrical grid instead of doubling down on domestic renewable energy or importing relatively cheap water power from Quebec.   However, some progress on provincial climate policies was made at the end of 2015.   Ontario and Manitoba both announced they are joining North America’s largest carbon market by linking up with the Quebec-California cap-and-trade system. A new Alberta government unveiled plans to phase out coal, cap oilsands emissions and introduce a carbon tax. Saskatchewan also set admirable renewable energy targets, which aim to have half of the province's electricity coming from renewable sources by 2050.

According to Clean Energy Canada these provincial targets need to be translated into clear policy to boost investment in the sector. 

Canada’s Clean Energy Potential Barely Scratched 

“Canada is incredibly well positioned for clean energy success,” Demerse told DeSmog. "Yes, we may have the third largest oil reserve in the world, but we are also the third biggest producer of hydroelectricity. And we have the potential to do so much more with our clean energy resources."

Demerse believes this week’s national climate strategy meeting between the federal government, Indigenous leaders and the premiers is the perfect opportunity to lay the foundation for a clean energy plan for Canada. 

“The new federal government can do a lot to change this. Adopting real, meaningful clean energy targets would provide more certainty for investors,” Demerse said.   According to a groundbreaking study led by Stanford Engineering Professor Mark Jacobson that examines how countries can run off of 100 per cent renewable energy by 2050 , Canada has only begun to scratch the surface of its ‘clean energy superpower’ potential.

  Canada's energy mix in 2050 according to Jacobson's analysis. Source: The Solutions Project.

“The main barriers to getting to 100 per cent clean energy are social and political, not technical or economic,” Jacobson said during a climate and energy forum in Washington, D.C., last November.   Canada already generates roughly 60 per cent of its electricity from renewable sources and this is nearly all from hydroelectricity or waterpower. By comparison, Germany produced just over 30 per cent of its electricity from renewable energy in 2015, which was mostly from wind, solar and biomass. Canada has one of the world’s cleanest electrical grids.   But currently, non-water based renewables like wind and solar make up a mere three per cent of the electricity Canada generates.   The Stanford study projects solar and wind could make up 21 per cent and 58 per cent respectively of all of Canada’s required energy by 2050. Waterpower in Jacobson's 2050 scenario becomes the junior partner to wind and solar at 16.5 per cent of the total Canadian energy mix. The study's authors conclude there is no need to build additional hydro dams like the Site C dam in B.C. or continue with nuclear power generation.

Image Credit: NAIT via Flickr 

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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed Wednesday the federal government will meet with Indigenous leaders and premiers in Vancouver in early March in the hopes of laying out the framework for a national climate strategy.   “I look forward to working with the premiers on combatting climate change and moving toward a greener, more sustainable Canadian economy better positioned to compete globally in the areas of clean knowledge and technologies,” Trudeau said in a media release.

The Prime Minister announced he will meet with Indigenous leaders on March 2 to inform a national climate framework discussion with the premiers in a First Ministers' Meeting scheduled to take place March 3. First Ministers' Meetings did not occur under former prime minister Stephen Harper.

According to Clare Demerse, Ottawa-based energy policy adviser with Clean Energy Canada, the meeting provides an unprecedented opportunity to discuss Canada's renewable energy transition.   “The right people will be in the room to move forward on a national approach [to climate change]," Demerse told DeSmog Canada. "Whether it’s electrical production, or natural resources extraction, provinces make big decisions on energy in Canada."

Meeting to Capitalize on Low-Carbon Economy

According to the Prime Minister's press release, the Vancouver meetings "will focus on effective ways to adapt to climate change, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and capitalize on the opportunities presented by a low-carbon economy to create good-paying and long-term jobs." 

“We’d really like to see the conversation in Vancouver be about what we're going to build, not just about what we’re going to cut,” Demerse said. “How many electric cars will we see on the road? How are we going to make buildings more energy efficient? How much solar, wind and water power needs to be produced in 2020 or 2030?”   “This is not to say reduction targets shouldn’t be discussed. But the discussion needs to be more focused on the ‘how’ instead of just the number."   Canada was one of the only countries among the world’s top ten greenhouse gas gas emitters not to provide a national clean energy plan to the United Nations in the lead up to the Paris climate talks last December. Other heavy emitters like the United States, European Union, China and even Mexico submitted plans with clean energy targets along with their GHG reduction targets.    The $125 billion the Liberal Party promised during the federal election to invest in infrastructure could go a long way encouraging provinces and territories to adopt strong climate policies.    “The low-carbon infrastructure dollars could be used to reward a province or territory for raising its carbon price, or for adopting stronger climate policies,” Demerse said.   Green infrastructure and public transit were two priorities in the Liberals infrastructure spending pledge. The Liberals also committed to increasing Canada’s Low Carbon Economic Trust to $2 billion.

Feds Could Set a National Minimum Carbon Price

Carbon pricing could also play an important role during the first ministers meeting.   “The First Ministers will consider all policy measures at their disposal to make sure Canada can take advantage of the significant appetite for expertise in the clean growth economy,” the PMO announcement states.   Currently, British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Quebec all have some sort of carbon pricing system: either cap and trade or carbon tax. Last December, Manitoba announced it would join Ontario and Quebec’s cap and trade market, which is linked with California’s.   Unlike his predecessor, Trudeau is a supporter of making polluters pay for their greenhouse gas emissions. He is also an advocate of the provinces and territories choosing the system that suits them best.   The problem now lies with the different prices on emissions in different provinces. B.C.’s carbon tax is $30 per tonne of carbon, but Quebec’s carbon price, which is meant to fluctuate, is about half that.    “Eventually Canada will want one coherent national carbon pricing market. The bigger the market, the more diverse the opportunities to reduce emissions,” Demerse said.   “But we aren’t quite there yet, and certain provinces have done a lot of leg work to create their own carbon pricing systems. So, to create consistency between the different system and jurisdictions, the federal government should set a national minimum price on carbon."

Image Credit: PMO Photo Gallery

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After languishing in the darkness for ten years, a national climate policy in Canada could take shape during an anticipated first ministers meeting in Vancouver next month. The meeting fulfills a Liberal election promise “to establish a pan-Canadian framework for combating climate change” and meet with provincial ministers within 90 days of the UN COP21 climate negotiations in Paris.    “If there ever was a time this could work it would be now,” Jennifer Allan, PhD candidate and researcher with International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), said. “Canadians are mobilized and there’s more momentum for change than there’s been in the recent past, if ever.”   “The federal government and the provinces are not going to be able to sneak anything weak — or failure — out the backdoor,” Allan told DeSmog Canada.   Although Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has not officially announced the meeting to discuss a national climate plan with the premiers, the government of Newfoundland and Labrador published a media release earlier this week identifying March 3 as the date of the first ministers meeting to discuss a national climate change framework. 

Other sources confirmed the meeting will be held on March 3rd during the Globe Series, an international environmental business summit in Vancouver.

The early March date falls just within the federal government’s pledge to hammer out a climate framework with the provinces ninety days after the climate talks. The Liberal Party platform promised to meet with the provinces with the intended goal of establishing a national framework for combating climate change, “to develop real climate change solutions, consistent with our international obligations to protect the planet, all while growing our economy."   The task before the prime minister and premiers ­— figuring out how to rein in Canada’s rising greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions — will be a difficult one. The most recent emissions data from Environment and Climate Change Canada shows the country is way off course in meeting the weak GHG reduction targets set under the previous Conservative government.

  Source: Environment and Climate Change Canada, January 29th, 2016.

Under former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada indicated it would reduce its GHG output only by roughly 14 per cent based on 1990 levels by 2030. The Trudeau government has said it wants to improve on this target, but has not said by how much.   Canada currently exceeds 1990 levels by 18 per cent.

Climate Action Creates Jobs 

Politically, the ground does not appear very fertile for the provinces, territories and federal government to all agree on a climate strategy that must include a plan on how to diminish Canada’s dependence on fossil fuels. Canada has agreed to phase out the use of fossil fuels by the end of the century and eliminate net carbon emissions by 2050.    Last month, Montreal-area mayors received criticism from Alberta and Saskatchewan politicians for refusing to support the proposed Energy East oil pipeline.   Even CBC personality Rick Mercer derided Montreal for suggesting the environmental risks of the pipeline outweigh potential economic rewards.   The low price of oil has sent the Canadian dollar on a downward spiral and triggered job losses in the oil patch. Many in Canada are concerned what a downward turn in oil production could mean for the economy.   “There’s unfortunately this old myth out there if the economy isn’t doing well it is certainly not the time to talk about environmental protection,” Allan said. “There’s been a lot studies done showing across the world climate action creates jobs.”   A 2014 report found the clean energy sector employs more people than the oilsands (also called tar sands), despite the $1.3 billion in subsidies the oil and gas industry receives from the federal government.   Globally, clean energy is a booming $300 billion industry right now.   Paris Agreement Should Guide a Canadian Climate Strategy

Under the Paris agreement, countries pledged to reduce GHG emissions in order to cap the rise in global temperatures at “well below 2C” (Celsius) and even “pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5C.”   “The reference to 1.5 is a call for greater ambition than we’ve seen in the past,” Allan said, who attended the Paris talks as part of IISD’s Reporting Services Division.   “I think this will give some leverage for those within Canada who want to see the contributions put forward by the Harper government strengthened,” Allan told DeSmog Canada.   But the Paris agreement is light on details in regards to actual hard GHG reduction targets. The agreement allows countries to set GHG targets and reduce emissions in whatever way suits them.   Allan says this may be a blessing or a curse.   “The Paris agreement gives countries a tremendous amount of flexibility. In Canada’s case, the doors are open for us to come up with meaningful climate action in a way that is best for our economy and political structure. This is a good thing,” Allan said.   “This also means there is very little guidance in terms of policies and targets we should undertake,” Allan told DeSmog.   The commitment to keep planet’s temperature increase “well below” two degrees or even at 1.5 degrees (Canada was one of the countries pushing for the inclusion of 1.5 during the Paris talks) will have to be guiding principle in creating a national climate strategy if Canada is serious about breaking with past climate inaction and meeting international obligations.   Another nugget from the Paris agreement that could inform the first ministers meeting in Vancouver is the concept of no backsliding on previous commitments. Countries are expected to submit their plans to cut GHG emission to the UN every five years. Each plan is suppose to outdo, that is, outline deeper GHG cuts than in the previous one.   “So in a way the conversation starting now with the premiers is the first go around. Chances are they are going to have this conversation every five years or so to see what they can do that is more ambitious than the last time,” Allan said. 

Photo Credit: US EPA

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