Canada never put a cap on carbon pollution from the oilpatch. New draft rules are ‘weeks’ away

The Canadian government says it will unveil a draft of new rules to cap heat-trapping pollution from the oil and gas industry within a matter of weeks.

“We’re finalizing [it],” federal Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault said at a news conference on Parliament Hill on Tuesday. “It’s a matter of weeks before we’ll be able to present draft regulations on the cap for the emissions of the oil and gas sector.”

Successive Liberal and Conservative governments have been promising to crack down on carbon pollution from the sector for decades, but none have imposed any binding regulations. If adopted, these would be the first-ever national rules in Canada to put a limit on the industry’s carbon emissions, which are a significant driver of climate change.

Canada has the world’s third largest proven oil reserves, most of which is in Northern Alberta in what is commonly known as the oilsands region. Because that oil is buried in tar-like deposits, it requires large amounts of energy and water to extract, leaving a larger environmental footprint than other crude oil operations and many other forms of energy.

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Oil and gas companies have successfully lobbied governments to hold off on cracking down on their pollution, arguing that more stringent environmental rules would harm their business and lead to job losses in a sector that employs tens of thousands of Canadians.

Environmentalists say the economic costs of not acting — such as the need for evacuations and rebuilding as wildfires, floods and other extreme weather events become more common — would be far greater than the cost of reducing pollution from oil and gas companies.

Guilbeault’s comments come as the Liberal government faces a confidence motion launched by Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives over Canada’s price on carbon pollution. Poilievre has said he believes Canada can tackle climate change with new technologies, but has not provided any details of an alternative plan.

If the Conservative motion succeeds, it would trigger an election. So far, the other two opposition parties, the Bloc Québécois and the New Democrats, have said they will not support the motion, although NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has also recently criticized the federal carbon pricing scheme, saying he would rather “an approach to fighting the climate crisis where it doesn’t put the burden on the backs of working people.” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government maintains that the federal rebate program means eight in 10 households receive more money back than they pay in carbon levies on consumer goods. 

Trudeau introduced carbon pricing in 2019 as one tool to achieve promised reductions in Canada’s carbon emissions. The federal government has also reached agreements with the provinces to require reductions in oil and gas emissions of methane, which is another greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.

Canada would need to significantly reduce pollution from the country’s oil and gas sector in order to meet its international commitments under the Paris climate treaty. To stay under the treaty’s lower limit of 1.5 C of global warming, the world’s emissions need to be cut by roughly 50 per cent by 2030.