THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick
The result of the current federal election — a Liberal minority depending on the NDP or Bloc Québécois for assist — has been extensively seen as having a “Groundhog Day” facet to it. It left the composition of Parliament very a lot because it was earlier than, reinforcing questions concerning the necessity of the election within the first place.
But the election has main implications for Canada’s method to local weather change and different environmental points. Many progressives probably needed the outcome: a Liberal authorities — however one they might not totally belief to fulfill its guarantees on local weather, baby care and a bunch of different points — reliant on extra progressive events to remain in workplace.
The general final result might have really left Canada higher positioned than earlier than the election to make important progress on lowering its greenhouse fuel emissions.
Holding the progressive vote
The Liberals’ efforts to carry onto progressive voters within the face of challenges from the NDP, Greens and, in Québec, the Bloc Québécois, translated into a powerful menu of local weather commitments.
Even earlier than the election, the federal government expanded Canada’s dedication to decrease greenhouse gases to a 40 to 45 per cent discount by 2030 relative to 2005. (Canada’s earlier goal had been 30 per cent under 2005 ranges.)
Learn extra:
Canada lastly has a local weather plan that can let it meet its carbon targets by 2030
Canada has additionally mentioned it’s going to attain net-zero emissions by 2050. Beneath that situation, the small print of which have but to be absolutely developed or modelled, any remaining greenhouse fuel emissions must be balanced by the quantities absorbed by organic processes (equivalent to rising bushes) and carbon sequestration or storage applied sciences.
The federal government’s December 2020 local weather coverage paper proposed to extend the backstop federal carbon worth to $170 per tonne by 2030. It’s now anticipated to comply with via on that.
The marketing campaign produced a promise to make sure the oil and fuel sector hits net-zero emissions by 2050, “with five-year targets beginning in 2025.” There have been additionally commitments to a 75 per cent discount in fossil business methane emissions from 2012 ranges by 2030, and to “develop a plan to phase-out public financing of the fossil gasoline sector, together with from Crown companies.”
Electrical energy, transportation and buildings
About 17 per cent of Canada’s electrical energy comes from fossil fuels. Along with the deliberate phase-out of standard coal-fired electrical energy era by 2030, a proposed “clear electrical energy customary” would deliver the electrical energy grid to net-zero by 2035. Thermal coal exports would finish by 2030.
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Transportation is the second-largest supply of greenhouse fuel emissions in Canada. The federal authorities has accelerated its goal so that each new passenger car bought in 2035 and past is a zero-emission car (ZEV). The commitments include electrical car rebates of as much as $5,000 for 500,000 patrons, plus 50,000 new charging stations throughout the nation. And a low-carbon gasoline customary would cut back emissions from gas-burning autos that stay on the street.
For properties and buildings, which account for about 13 per cent of Canada’s emissions, the federal government has promised $5,000 vitality retrofit grants for practically half 1,000,000 households, with interest-free loans of as much as $40,000 for deeper retrofits. There will even be a nationwide technique to deliver the constructing inventory to net-zero by 2050 with “formidable milestones alongside the way in which.”
Following via might be essential
The essential query now would be the follow-though on these commitments. Most of the authorities’s guarantees, just like the commitments to scale back fossil gasoline and electrical energy sector emissions, may result in important federal-provincial conflicts, notably with Alberta and Saskatchewan.
Over the previous six years, the Liberals’ method to addressing local weather change has had some profound contradictions. The federal government bought and permitted the Trans Mountain pipeline, and it has supported controversial applied sciences like small modular nuclear reactors, carbon seize and storage, and fossil-fuel dependent “blue” and “gray” hydrogen.
Learn extra:
Why inexperienced hydrogen — however not gray — may assist resolve local weather change
To its credit score, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s authorities had already carried out much more substantive local weather insurance policies than all of its predecessors, Liberal and Conservative, mixed. The federal government’s minority standing, depending on two opposition events with robust commitments to local weather motion, will assist see these additional commitments via to implementation, even when some say its pledges nonetheless fall brief of what’s wanted to fulfill the revised emissions discount targets.
The election additionally had important implications for the opposite events. The credibility of the Conservative occasion’s stance on local weather change stays suspect, and is bolstered by the anti-environment legacy of the Stephen Harper authorities and the behaviour of present Conservative provincial governments in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario. Help for the Inexperienced Get together collapsed to its lowest degree in 20 years, but the NDP didn’t make any important good points amongst progressive voters regardless of a comparatively robust marketing campaign efficiency by Jagmeet Singh.
The general outcomes have left Canada fairly well-positioned to maneuver ahead on its local weather commitments. The query now might be whether or not the re-elected Trudeau authorities will carry via on its guarantees. Its survival via the following federal election might nicely depend upon the outcomes.
Mark Winfield receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Analysis Council of Canada