Canada and global warming: a state of denial

I posted this under Alberta politics but it has relevance here because, sadly, the ongoing growth and expansion of Alberta oil industry based on bitumen exports and pipelines is an economic pipedream and environmental disaster as its greenhouse gas emissions helps destroy the planet at the same time. 

Canadians have been hosed by the federal government, the Alberta government, banks, the pipeline companies, and the oil industry. There is NO ASIAN MARKET FOR BITUMEN, as the following article explains. Not only that, the bitumen oil sands projects are economically unviable, in addition to being environmentally disastrous. But politicians can't say that and get re-elected.

Canadians are often told the Trans Mountain pipeline project is imperative to access Asian markets anxious to buy Alberta bitumen. ...

Crunching the cargo statistics from the Port of Vancouver a very different picture emerges. In 2016 — the last year that complete data is available — the U.S. accounted for 99.99 per cent of outbound crude oil shipments. Of the 1,185,289 tonnes of crude shipped in bulk tankers that year, 1,185,121 tonnes were delivered to the United States.  In fact, total crude tanker shipments from Vancouver peaked eight years ago in 2010 at 4.3 million tonnes and have since declined 72 per cent.

And what about those hungry Asian markets? Crude exports from Vancouver to China topped out in 2011 at only 28 per cent of total outbound shipments. By 2014, they dropped to six per cent, and in 2016 they were essentially zero. The next largest Asian importers of crude from Vancouver were Singapore, which peaked at four per cent of total shipments in 2009, and India reaching two per cent in 2013.

The market seems to have decided that shipping diluted bitumen across the Pacific Ocean is a money loser. Like it or not, the main customer for Alberta bitumen remains existing refineries in the U.S. already tooled up to process high-sulfur low-value bitumen. And with the current U.S. administration anxious to complete the Keystone XL pipeline to refineries in Louisiana, why do we need to endanger the B.C. coast with tankers carrying dilbit to the same market? 

Many Albertans would prefer to believe that once the Trans Mountain pipeline is rammed through, the good times will be here again. Again, the numbers tell a different story. 

Oil economist Jeff Rubin recently published a damning assessment of the viability of increased pipeline capacity out of Alberta. Asian markets actually pay $8 a barrel less than U.S. refineries for heavy oil like Alberta bitumen. Likewise, European refineries typically pay $3 below the U.S. market after a long expensive boat ride.

Many multi-billion-dollar bitumen projects are already the economic equivalent of dead men walking, according to Rubin. 

“Exxon had to write off US$16 billion of its oil sands assets, including all 3.5 billion barrels of bitumen reserves at its massive and still expanding Kearl Lake mine,” he writes. “Following the huge decline in oil prices since 2014, Exxon’s high cost oil sands resource no longer meets the US Securities Exchange Commission’s definition of a proven reserve, which is one that can be commercially exploited at today’s prices with current technology. Having already spent billions of dollars to develop the mine, Exxon and its Canadian subsidiary, Imperial Oil, have little choice but to complete the ongoing expansion, whose increased output only adds to the current glut of oil already weighing on the price of WCS (Western Canada Select diluted bitumen).”

In other words, the bottom has already fallen out of many bitumen projects, yet they stagger on, animated solely by political and economic inertia. Of course hope springs eternal in the oil industry, which clings to the idea that if the Trans Mountain project is uneconomic now, perhaps in 10 to 40 years prices will improve. 

On the same planet, but in an alternate universe, policy makers are striving to keep global temperature increases below two degrees Celsius. This would require decreasing oil demand by 20 per cent by 2030. If these efforts are successful, the market share of the most expensive, lowest value petroleum on the planet will be the first to go. 

The U.K., France and China have all announced impending bans of the sale and manufacture of gasoline and diesel vehicles. These bold actions are in stark contrast to the moral origami of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is maintaining with a straight face that the best way to protect the climate is by massively scaling up bitumen production. So absurd is this position that it seems hardly worthy of even ridicule. Beyond climate conference photo-ops and aspirational rhetoric, Canada has a wretched record reducing carbon emissions, and Ottawa seems determined to make it even worse.

So what about continued calls to approve the Trans Mountain pipeline? In this age of conflicted information, it is important to look at the sources and their interests. For instance, Scotiabank recently released a report advocating rapid pipeline approvals, stating “The sooner governments move to allow additional pipeline capacity to be built, the better off Canada will be.” Scotiabank has the largest exposure to oilsands debt of any Canadian bank at $32 billion. According to Peter Routledge, an analyst at National Bank Financial quoted in the Financial Postregarding the dangerous debt exposure of oilsands creditors, “Banks effectively go into business with their clients, businesses or households, when they lend to them. Therefore, it is in a bank’s interest for its clients to remain going concerns.”

https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2018/02/23/Fantasies-Keep-Pipeline-Plans-Aliv...

The David Suzuki Foundation has also praised BC's greenhouse gas emissions reduction plan while also pointing out what still needs to be done.

In implementing its new climate plan, B.C. can re-assert itself as a climate leader in Canada. The plan contains comprehensive measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. From zero emission vehicles to increasing efficiency of buildings, and from cleaner fuels to electrifying industry, the plan has the potential to meet the province’s climate target of 40 per cent emissions reductions from 2007 levels by 2030. The plan represents a distinct shift away from fossil fuel use while recognizing the need for a just transition for affected industries and workers as the province moves to an alternative, clean economy.

Some key elements are still missing though. The plan is broken into two phases, and this phase will only get us 75 per cent of our needed emissions reductions. Phase two, which will be developed over the coming year, is meant to get us the remaining 25 per cent.  In addition, the province is still developing effective regulations to reduce and eliminate harmful fugitive methane emissions from the fracking industry.

Transportation: including personal vehicles, transit and the movement of goods — represents a large share of B.C.’s emissions. The new climate plan includes a few measures to tackle transportation pollution head on. A range of incentives and support will improve cost and access to charging infrastructure for electric vehicles. The government intends to make it much easier for consumers to buy electric vehicles by introducing a requirement that sales of zero emission cars and trucks increase over time so that by 2040 all new vehicles are non-emitting. They also have plans to support electric and low-emission buses and heavy transport vehicles. The plan commits to increasing the share of low carbon fuel in gasoline and diesel for cars and trucks, which will help keep emissions down during the transition to zero emission vehicles.

More efficient buildings: Another major source of emissions in the province is the energy used to heat and maintain buildings, including your home. The climate plan focuses on incremental changes to the code for new and existing buildings that will increase minimum standards for things like insulation. Existing buildings will also be tackled through improved energy efficiency standards and incentives for switching to more efficient heating and cooling, such as the use of electric heat pumps. ...

Industrial emissions: The plan gets a bit complex and squishy in places when addressing industrial emissions. It’s worth noting that the carbon tax applied to all fossil fuels used in the province (something all British Columbians pay for) will begin to increase annually again and provides one of the most important incentives for reducing industrial emissions. Carbon taxes work to reduce the demand side of fossil fuels, which is broadly effective and gives consumers and industry options for making reductions that fit best with their unique circumstances. Outside of the carbon tax, there’s a mixed bag of incentivizing fuel switching used in heavy equipment, improving electricity transmission lines to make it feasible to use electricity in some sectors instead of fossil fuels, and tackling some specific industrial emissions (like diverting agricultural waste to biomethane, as discussed above). There’s also a commitment to better reporting and data transparency, which is an important step. Despite these measures, industrial emissions are still projected to be significant in 2030, which raises some questions about how government plans to meet its longer-term targets, especially in light of its commitment to LNG and other industrial development.

Does this put B.C. on track?: Overall, the climate plan is a big step forward for B.C. It’s relatively broad and comprehensive and tackles some of our biggest emission sources. Government will have to move swiftly on phase two of the plan. Though another 25 per cent may sound like a bit of cleanup, some difficult and important work is needed to close the gap.

https://davidsuzuki.org/expert-article/british-columbia-takes-a-big-step...

In February, the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) told a private Calgary audience that cleaning up after the pollution created by Alberta's fossil fuel industry could cost as much as $260 billion. However, the documents supporting this were only revealed to the public in November when they were obtained by several media (the National Observer, Global News, the Toronto Star, and StarMetro Calgary).  For years, the public has been told that the clean up would cost $58 billion. The government meanwhile has only collected $1.6 billion in liability security from companies.

In 2015-2016, Albertans "collected $1.54 a barrel in royalties" (https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-s-energy-royalties-an-ele...) for the privilege of turning over a barrel to the fossil fuel industry, getting pollution for 0.5% of the clean up costs, increasing carbon dioxide emissions, and adding to a $260 billion taxpayer bill. For the fossil fuel industry, it's been nice work. 

The documents were used by Rob Wadsworth, a high-ranking AER official, in providing liability estimates to a private Calgary audience back in February. The liability costs pertain to the amount needed to shut down inactive oil and gas exploration wells, abandoned facilities and pipelines, as well as toxic tailings ponds near Fort McMurray, Alta.

Wadsworth blamed the costs on a “flawed system” of industrial oversight, urging companies and stakeholders to accept tougher regulations and begin the cleanup process promptly. 

“We can continue down our current path until the impacts are felt by the public … or we can start to implement the numerous changes that we know need to be made,” Wadsworth’s notes indicated. 

Until now, the public had been told the cleanup would cost approximately $58 billion. The AER said that Wadsworth’s estimates are based on a “worst-case scenario” of a total industry closure, yet Wadsworth’s presentation suggests the actual costs will be more than his estimates. Several experts who have reviewed Wadsworth’s presentation describe the situation as an economic and environmental crisis, the National Observer reports.

https://ipolitics.ca/2018/11/01/the-drilldown-cost-to-clean-up-albertas-...

 Environmental groups Stand.earth and Environmental Defence at the UN climate change talks in Poland today say that " Canada is living in a fantasy if the government thinks it can meet its greenhouse-gas promises without reducing how much oil and gas the country produces". The groups used the UN meeting to release a report that accuses the fossil fuel industry of undermining Canada's climate plans (https://environmentaldefence.ca/2018/12/10/media-release-canada-oil-and-...).

"Oil and gas is the major obstacle to Canada actually being a climate leader and not just talking about being a climate leader," said Dale Marshall, national program manager for Environmental Defence. The report accuses the industry of successfully lobbying Canada to water down climate policies or exempt it from them, including delaying cuts to methane emissions from oil-production facilities and exempting up to 80 per cent of oilsands emissions from the federal carbon price due to kick in next year. Marshall said Canada's policies to allow oilsands production to expand, and even buying the Trans Mountain pipeline to facilitate that expansion, are counterintuitive for a government that keeps claiming it wants to be at the forefront of global climate action.

Patrick McDonald, the director of climate for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, dismissed the report as a "targeted effort by special interest groups looking at only our industry." ...

The report, however, says the emissions from each barrel of oil produced in Canada have grown 20 per cent between 1990 and 2016.

Catherine Abreu, the executive director of Climate Action Network Canada, said at a news conference at the meeting in Poland Monday that even if the industry can use technology to reduce emissions per unit of oil, gas or coal produced, that's just a temporary fix in a world where the long-term plan has to be to stop using fossil fuels entirely. "There are a lot of countries who, like Canada, seem to be under the impression that their fossil fuels are somehow different from everyone else's fossil fuels," she said. "As if their coal, oil or natural gas is magically non-emitting and actually good for the climate, while everyone else's fossil fuels are the problem." ...

Right now the world's policies have it on track to exceed 3 C in warming by the end of the century. Canada is currently planning to trim its emissions by about 200 million tonnes a year -- the equivalent to what is produced by about 44 million passenger cars -- but a recent UN report from dozens of respected climate scientists said that if the 1.5 C target has any hope of being met, Canada's share of the necessary emissions reductions would be more like 400 million tonnes.

The oil-and-gas sector is one of the few areas where emissions are still increasing in Canada. Tzeporah Berman, international programs director at Stand.earth, said if oil-sector emissions keep growing, Canada will have to "squeeze" every other province and industry to get them to cut even more. Since most of the existing plan addresses the easiest and cheapest reductions we can get, cutting those other sectors further would require more costly and difficult regulations and policies, she said.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/environmental-groups-tell-world-canada-f...

Canada and the federal Liberals are facing more pressure at the Katowice Poland climate change conference. 

Catherine Abreu, executive director of the Climate Action Network Canada, said at the moment the only developed country really fighting for tougher cuts to emissions is New Zealand. ...

Other countries know that Canada is struggling to meet its own targets, that the Liberal government is facing legal and political pressure over its planned carbon tax and that Canada is continuing government support for developing oil and gas reserves.

Some officials are snarking that Canada is good for talking points but not action. ...

The existing policies under the Paris agreement have the world on track to exceed 3 C in warming. 

That report from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says Canada would have to double its planned emissions cuts to do its share to keep the world to the 1.5 C goal, but Canada's existing policies don't even get us all the way to our current target, let alone anywhere close to a tougher one.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/climate-poland-canada-lead-1.4943722

The Saskatchewan Environmental Society (SES)  has given the Moe government's environmental plan a failing grade in a report, entitled "Prairie Resilience" is not Enough, released this week. It warns about the growing costs associated with global warming to the province of Saskatchewan. SES warns that not implementing a price on carbon in Saskatchewan would lead to annual growing emissions as happened in Australia after its carbon levy was removed.

The report says parts of the province are seeing record-high summer temperatures, record-low precipitation levels and intensifying forest fire seasons, while other parts are seeing major flooding and "intense precipitation events." It says there has been an "acceleration in the number of extreme weather events, as reflected in Saskatchewan government spending on disaster assistance." The government spent $1,500,000 in 2002 and $32,795,000 in 2017 under the government of Saskatchewan's Provincial Disaster Program, according to the report. Between those years, the highest amount spent was $157,115,000 in 2012. The report says these numbers don't include crop insurance payments or firefighting costs.

The report also addresses Saskatchewan's greenhouse gas footprint and emphasizes the need to reduce it.  Saskatchewan has one of the highest per-capita emission rates in the world, according to the report. It says Saskatchewan makes up 10.8 per cent of Canada's emissions total, despite having just over three per cent of the country's population. ...

SES says it supports a carbon tax, citing the "positive impact of adopting a price on carbon and in negative impact of removing it," referring to a carbon levy in Australia. Australia saw a 1.1 per cent drop in greenhouse gas emissions under a levy, according to the report, but emissions have been rising on an average of 1.3 per cent each year since the levy was repealed in 2014. "In order to have any chance of achieving the required level of reductions these will need to be accompanied by a price on carbon," said Ann Coxworth, co-author of the SES report. ...

The SES report has numerous recommendations, such as cutting back on venting methane gas unless it's for safety reasons, setting strict regulations for monitoring and repairing methane leaks and denying further permits to extract the heavy oil resources with the highest carbon content. The report also recommends completely phasing out conventional coal-fired power stations, investing "heavily" in electricity efficiency and expanding renewable power such as wind and solar power, among other measures. ...

"We're also uneasy about the fact that as Saskatchewan moves off coal, it's increasing its reliance on natural gas for electricity generation," said report co-author Bob Halliday. "That's a problem in itself and it's an unsustainable practice." There is an emphasis on reducing emissions in the transportation sector as well, which includes establishing financial incentives for purchasing electric, hybrid and ultra-fuel-efficient vehicles. ...

The SES report points out that Prairie Resilience indicates the province is aiming for 12 million-tonne reduction in greenhouse gasses between the electricity generation sector, the oil and gas sector and the industrial sector, but it doesn't include emission targets for other sectors.  The SES report says this is a step in the right direction, but for Canada to meet its obligations under the Paris Climate Agreement it would need to reduce 28 million tonnes of greenhouse gas per year.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/sask-environmental-society-c...

Environmental activists are believe that the COP 24 agreement reached in Poland is not ambitious enough to deal with the rapidly intensifying climate disaster. 

Diplomats from around the world have agreed a major climate deal after two weeks of United Nations talks in Poland. But climate campaigners warned the deal – effectively a set of rules for how to govern the 2015 Paris climate accord – agreed between almost 200 countries lacked ambition or a clear promise of enhanced climate action. ...

The agreement establishes rules to govern the 2015 Paris climate accord, which includes a goal of capping global temperature increases at no more than 1.5C.

However scientists say emissions of gases such as carbon dioxide need to drop sharply by 2030 to prevent potentially catastrophic global warming. And the meeting postponed decisions on pledging more ambitious action to fight global warming and on regulating the market for international carbon emissions trading.

Jennifer Morgan, executive director at Greenpeace International, said: “A year of climate disasters and a dire warning from the world’s top scientists should have led to so much more.  “Instead, governments let people down again as they ignored the science and the plight of the vulnerable. Recognising the urgency of raised ambition and adopting a set of rules for climate action is not nearly enough when whole nations face extinction. Without immediate action, even the strongest rules will not get us anywhere. People expected action and that is what governments did not deliver. This is morally unacceptable.” ...

Gareth Redmond-King, head of climate change at WWF-UK, said world leaders were in a “state of denial” about the problem. “They’ve made important progress, but what we’ve seen in Poland reveals a fundamental lack of understanding by some countries of our current crisis,” he added.  “Luckily, the Paris Agreement is proving to be resilient to the storms of global geopolitics. Now we need all countries to commit to raising climate ambition before 2020, because everyone’s future is at stake.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/cop24-climate-change-deal-pola...

In Canada, 50 BC based organizations have demanded that the provincial government "enact a Liability for Climate-related Harm Act — a law that will clarify the liability of companies that extract, refine and sell fossil fuels for their share of climate-change harm suffered in B.C. 

When a similar bill was debated in Ontario’s Legislature, supporters pointed out that it’s fiscally irresponsible for governments to assume that taxpayers will pay for the rising costs of climate change without recovering some costs from the industry that helped create them."  ...

We can stand with, and learn from, communities around the world that are taking fossil-fuel companies to task for their contribution to climate change:

• Ten B.C. communities — as well as the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities (AVICC) representing 53 local governments have written to 20 of the world’s largest fossil-fuel companies demanding that they pay their share of local climate impacts.

(https://vancouversun.com/opinion/op-ed/andrew-gage-taxpayers-future-gene...)

However, threats from the fossil fuel industry have intimidated some communities. 

Whistler Mayor Jack Crompton was forced to back-pedal last week after a letter he sent to petroleum producers seeking costs for climate change sparked a new skirmish in the ongoing B.C.-Alberta conflict over fossil fuels.

Crompton’s letter prompted swift protest from some in Alberta’s energy industry and led to cancelled travel plans and a decision to cancel part of an investors conference in Whistler. The mayor said he sincerely regretted that anyone would feel unwelcome in his resort town.

For experts, the outgoing letter illustrated at a local level several broad trends coming together in the conversation around climate change, while the forceful reaction it prompted was indicative of how polarized the debate has become.

Whistler was not alone in asking for payment from producers. More than a dozen other B.C. municipalities recently voted to join a campaign led by West Coast Environmental Law to ask oil and gas companies to chip in on the costs local governments are paying for climate change. The firm did not respond to a request for comment by deadline Sunday.

Kathryn Harrison, a political-science professor at the University of B.C., said the campaign was consistent with a larger strategy to shift attention from those who use fossil fuels to those who produce them, and to account for the here and now costs of climate change. It also comes as municipal governments around the world are taking on vocal roles on environment. “They are not typically the level of government that has the authority and responsibility for adopting things like carbon pricing and tailpipe emissions standards … but they are the ones on the front line when it comes to adapting to the impacts and costs of climate change,” Harrison said. ...

Among the municipalities that have joined the campaign is West Vancouver, according to West Coast Environmental Law. A form letter that was printed on letterhead from the district’s mayor’s office and posted to the environmental firm’s website requests industry recipients to make a financial contribution “to the mitigation of climate change.” The letter was neither addressed nor signed, but it was attributed to Mayor Mary-Ann Booth, who could not be reached for comment Sunday. “It is our position that you have played a key role in degrading the global atmosphere and creating a range of threats to our community. Your contribution is readily detectable globally and is therefore considered legally significant and actionable,” read the letter. “(As) we undertake the task of planning for, and building and modifying our infrastructure and services and developing a community that can withstand current and anticipated climate change, we request you to pay your fair share of the resulting costs.”

Squamish, Victoria, Saanich, North Saanich, Colwood, Highlands, View Royal, Sooke, both the city and district of Powell River, Sechelt, Castlegar, Rossland and Slocan were all listed by West Coast Environmental Law as having voted to send “accountability letters.” It is unclear how many in fact did mail letters.

Lisa Helps, the mayor of Victoria, sent a letter to Chevron asking for the company to pay 3.34 per cent of the city’s climate-related costs going forward. That letter was posted on West Coast Environmental Law’s webpage.  ...

Letters of response that municipalities had received from BHP, Total and Shell were also posted on West Coast Environmental Law’s website. “BHP accepts the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment of climate change science, which has found that warming of the climate is unequivocal, the human influence is clear and physical impacts are unavoidable,” wrote Fiona Wild, BHP Billiton’s vice-president of sustainability and climate change. “As a leading global resources company, we are committed to playing our part in addressing climate change.”

Manoelle Lepoutre, Total’s senior vice-president of civil society engagement, said Total had always been guided by the observance of laws and regulations. “In view of the foregoing, we consider that Total cannot be held liable for the consequences of climate change.”

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/b-c-municipalities-take-cover-a...

Here's the details on the latest subsidy of $1.6 billion handed out by the Trudeau Liberals to the Alberta fossil fuel industry. Canada already had the largest fossil fuel subsidies by far of any G7 country. At the same time, we are ignoring the $415 trillion, that's right trillion - not billion, that investors have available for investment in non-fossil fuel industries (see quote below). 

This comes just after Liberal Finance Minister Bill Morneau's November fiscal update update that increased fossil fuel subsidies to write off a larger fraction of assets during the year investments occurred.

At the same time, Liberal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna continues the doublespeak of saying we are going to increase our carbon reduction targets while at this month's COP 24 climate change conference that just finished this weekend, while the Liberal Natural Resource Minister and the Trade Diversification Minister hand out fossil fuel expansion subsidies. 

Canada will make available $1.6 billion in financial support to help Alberta's oil and gas sector expand into new markets, Natural Resources Minister Amarjeet Sohi announced Tuesday. Sohi made the announcement alongside International Trade Diversification Minister Jim Carr at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology in Edmonton. Carr described how the money will be used to help the oilpatch in part with liquidity concerns. ...

Export Development Canada (EDC), the Crown corporation that is already managing the loansrelated to the government's purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline, will make another $1 billion available to "exporters of all sizes" to help companies invest in new technology, "address working capital needs or explore new markets," Sohi said. Another Crown corporation, the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC), will be creating another $500 million "energy diversification" financing program for "higher risk" oil and gas companies dealing with market uncertainty. Sohi pointed out there is also $50 million available through Natural Resources Canada’s Clean Growth Program and another $100 million available through Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada’s Strategic Innovation Fund. ...

Sohi said the financing being provided through EDC and BDC is "not a subsidy for fossil fuels. These are commercial loans, made available on commercial terms. We have committed to phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies by 2025, and we stand by that commitment," he said.

Environmental Defence didn't see it that way, in a statement released shortly after Sohi'sannouncement. "Today, Canada announced another massive backslide on its longstanding commitment to eliminate fossil fuel subsidies," said Patrick DeRochie, Environmental Defence's climate and energy program manager. Today's announcement, he said, "caps off a year of irresponsible government handouts to support an industry whose growth is incompatible with Canada’s climate targets."

A recent study by the International Institute for Sustainable Development showed that, per unit of GDP, Canada is the largest provider of fossil fuel subsidies in the G7. The G7 pledged in 2016 to eliminate “inefficient fossil fuel subsidies” by 2025.

This month, 415 investors, with $32 trillion in assets-under-management, called on governments to “set a clear timeline by 2020 for the phase-out of all fossil fuel subsidies.” ...

Canada has committed to cutting its carbon pollution 30 per cent from 2005 levels by 2030, and the Trudeau government has moved to implement a price on pollution nationwide, alongside other measures such as investments in green infrastructure.

But Canada's Paris climate agreement target won’t achieve the emission cuts the IPCC report said is necessary. In addition, the UN environment agency said without stricter measures, Canada will fall short of its current target. Nevertheless, Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna said this month she expects Canada to adopt even higher carbon pollution targets in 2020.

Annie Bérubé, Director of Governmental Relations at Équiterre, said investments in Alberta's energy sector should be in renewable energy, and not fossil fuels. "The federal government’s support for oil and gas workers must be an investment in a just and equitable transition towards renewable energy," she said. After this month's international climate talks, COP24, where Canada promoted more ambitious targets to cut carbon pollution, "it is incomprehensible that the federal government is still investing in increasing the amount of dirty energy that we export," added Bérubé. ...

Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s Nov. 21 fiscal update allowed Canada's oil and gas industry to benefit from a new program that allows businesses to write off a larger share of assets in the year an investment was made.

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2018/12/18/news/sohi-announces-16-billi...

Here's a summary look at how climate change will affect the different regions of Canada: 

[quote]

Pacific Region

Climate change could impact dramatically on British Columbia and the Yukon:

• Higher air temperatures could result in droughts in southern coastal and interior zones; cause landslides by melting glaciers and permafrost in northern and mountainous areas; reduce the flow of rivers and streams; make forests drier and more defenceless against pests, diseases, and fire; and imperil wildlife on land and in water.
• Warmer ocean temperatures could result in shifts in the ranges, spawning time, and food supplies of marine species, like Pacific salmon, thereby depriving terrestrial species, like bears and bald eagles of nourishment.
• Rising sea levels could threaten such coastal zones as the Fraser River delta with floods and erosion.
• Increasing rain and snow could cause flooding throughout the interior.

Western Mountain Region

The Rockies’ extremes of climate and altitude make them particularly prone to the effects of climate change:

• As temperatures rise, low-elevation glaciers are rapidly melting and may disappear or cause landslides that put wildlife habitat at risk; plant and animal species are shifting upward, for example, sagebrush is replacing glacial meadows, and life forms restricted to the highest peaks are being displaced by others moving up from below.
• Increasing precipitation means deeper snow, which could make it more difficult for animals like deer and elk to forage for food and drive them into valleys where they are more vulnerable to car and train collisions and predator attacks.

Prairie Region

The consequences of climate change in Canada’s Prairies could be severe:

• Rising temperatures, decreasing rainfall, greater rates of evaporation, and drier soils will mean habitat loss both on land and in water.
• Warmer weather may prolong the growing season and expand agriculture further north. It could also cause longer, more frequent droughts, diminished crop yields, and the spread of desert-like conditions over part of the southern Prairies.
• Widespread fires in the boreal forest region may cause the northward expansion of grasslands and shrink the habitat of the woodland caribou and many other species.
• More than 50 percent of Prairie potholes could disappear.

Boreal Forest Region

Scientists predict that this northern region – comprising one-third of the planet’s forests – will be one of the areas most affected by climate change:

• Dry, warm weather could alter the ecosystem, making the forest fire season weeks longer, sparking more frequent and sever “monster blazes,” and doubling the area burned each year. Rising temperatures could also result in more frequent and deadly attacks by forest pests, including spruce budworm and pine beetle.
• The species composition of the forest could change as conditions suitable for the growth and regeneration of pine, spruce, fir, and other temperature-sensitive trees continue to shift.
• The timberline could move hundreds of kilometres further north, pushing the tundra back to the Arctic Islands and reducing it to one- to two-thirds its current size.
• As evergreen trees lose ground to hardwoods in the region’s lower latitudes, losses from the southern margin of the forest will likely exceed the gains in the north.
• More than half of the boreal forest could vanish in the next hundred years due to climate change.

Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Region

Climate change models predict major impacts on this region’s lands and waters:

• Average temperatures could rise by 2 to 5°C while precipitation could increase by up to 25 percent by the end of this century.
• More days when heat stress and air pollution threaten the health of wildlife and humans, changes in forest composition due to shifting vegetation zones, increases in the frequency and severity of forest fires, the northward extension of agriculture, and a longer growing season are among the changes expected on land. Significant declines in the populations of neotropical migratory birds, including many wood-warbler species, could result.
• As the region warms up, the temperatures of lakes, streams, and rivers will rise and much more water will evaporate. The levels of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River could fall by a metre in 30 years, reducing the volume of water that flows through the system and circulates oxygen to biologically productive zones.
• These changes will benefit some aquatic species and spell disaster for others. Cold-water fish, like salmon and trout, could suffer substantial loss of both habitats and populations. Such species at risk as the spotted turtle and swamp rose-mallow could see their habitats dry up while the nesting sites of waterfowl become more accessible to predators in Great Lakes marshes.

Atlantic Region

This region will be particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels and increased storm activity.

• Increased coastal erosion, sedimentation, flooding of low-lying habitats, shrinking of tidal flats and nesting beaches needed by shorebirds, and submersion of barrier islands vital to breeding raptors and colonial birds are among the effects of sea level rise.
• Most at risk are salt-marshes. These coastal wetlands have adapted to a unique mix of fresh and salt water. Too much salinity could throw them off balance and harm the habitat of a wide range of species, particularly fish and waterfowl.
• Heavier rainfall would increase the volume of run-off polluting bays and estuaries that provide key stopovers for migratory bird sand nourish and feed countless species of molluscs, crustaceans, and fish.
• Changes in sea temperature would affect the range, distribution, and food supplies of sea-bird and marine-mammal populations.
• Heightened storm intensity, frequent fires, and other ecological pressures would increase the die back of coniferous trees and promote a transition from boreal to mixed and temperate forests.

Arctic Ocean Region

The far- reaching impacts of climate change will be felt nowhere greater than in Canada’s Arctic, one of the fastest-warming regions on Earth:

• As temperatures rise, climatologists anticipate not only the shrinking of the Arctic tundra but also the shrinking of the Arctic sea ice . This frozen platform is integral to the lives of a huge array of species, such as walruses , seals, and polar bears, that feed, travel, and breed on its vast expanses. Algae living under the sea ice are the foundation of an ocean food chain that supports plankton, copepods, fish, sea birds, and mammals. The average thickness of the sea ice has shrunk by 40 per cent in the past three decades, jeopardizing the future of this web of life.
• Among the species affected most is the black guillemot, a sea bird whose populations have plummeted since 1990 as the melting of sea ice increases the distances it must fly to forage for food.

http://cwf-fcf.org/en/about-cwf/contact-us/faq/faqs/how-will-climate-cha...

While Canada has a grand total of 50,000 electric vehicles out of 33,800,000 (0.15%), the Norwegian government has been highly successful in encouraging a shift to electric cars and plans to allow electric car sales by 2025. Although there are some problems, such as battery life and not enough recharging stations, Norway is way ahead of Canada in the shift to electric cars to reduce carbon dioxide emisssions. 

A silent revolution has transformed driving in Norway. Eerily quiet vehicles are ubiquitous on the fjord-side roads and mountain passes of this wealthy European nation of 5.3 million. Some 30 per cent of all new cars sport plug-in cables rather than gasoline tanks, compared with 2 per cent across Europe overall and 1-2 per cent in the U.S.

As countries around the world — including China, the world's biggest auto market — try to encourage more people to buy electric cars to fight climate change, Norway's success has one key driver: the government. It offered big subsidies and perks that it is now due to phase out, but only so long as electric cars remain attractive to buy compared with traditional ones.

"It should always be cheaper to have a zero emissions car than a regular car," says Climate and Environment Minister Ola Elvestuen, who helped push through a commitment to have only sell zero-emissions cars sold in Norway by 2025. The plan supports Norway's CO2 reduction targets under the 2015 Paris climate accord, which nations last agreed rigorous rules for to ensure emissions goals are met.

To help sales, the Norwegian government waived hefty vehicle import duties and registration and sales taxes for buyers of electric cars. Owners don't have to pay road tolls, and get free use of ferries and bus lanes in congested city centres. These perks are being phased out in 2021, though any road tolls and fees would be limited to half of what gasoline car owners must pay. Gradually, subsidies for electric cars will be replaced by higher taxes on traditional cars.

Registration tax on new cars is paid on a sliding scale with a premium for the amount of emissions produced. Elvestuen pledges that the incentives for electric vehicles will be adjusted in such a way that it does not scupper the 2025 target.

"What is important is that our aim is not just to give incentives," he says. "It is that we are taxing emissions from regular cars."

Using taxes to encourage consumers to shift to cleaner energy can be tricky for a government — protests erupted in France this autumn over a fuel tax that hurt the livelihood of poorer families, especially in rural areas where driving is often the only means of transportation.

In this sense, Norway is an outlier. The country is very wealthy after exporting for decades the kind of fossil fuels the world is trying to wean itself off of. Incomes are higher than the rest of Europe, as are prices. ...

Norway has pledged to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases by 40 per cent by 2030, compared with 1990 levels. The country has work to do: by 2017, emissions were up 3 per cent compared to the 1990 baseline. Cutting emissions from road transport will allow Norway to reduce the amount it has to spend buying up emissions certificates from other European countries to meet its target. The savings are likely to run into billions, potentially balancing out the cost of subsidizing electric cars.

Norway is looking to China for help in developing the market. China has invested heavily in electric vehicles as it looks to meet its own Paris climate accord commitments, to clean up its choking cities and to get in early in a growing area of manufacturing. In October, 6 per cent of new cars were electric, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, up almost 50 per cent from a year earlier. The market has huge growth potential, experts say, and like Norway, the market boom has relied on government incentives. The hope in Norway is that the sheer size of China's market will encourage the industry to develop the technology more quickly — improving battery life, for example — and force down prices.

Experts say the electric vehicle market needs to develop more for sales to keep growing. Battery life on smaller vehicles is slim and the resale market is untested. Fast battery charging points are slow compared with gasoline pumps, and on Norway's often empty mountain roads, these points are uneconomical despite government subsidies for the private companies that set them up. Even in city centres, construction of such points has not kept pace with sales. 

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2018/12/19/news/norway-sees-boom-electr...

Canadians continue to be BSed about Canadian oil being sold at a discount in an effort to promote the building of more pipelines. 

Yes, there is a price differential between Canadian oil and most U.S. oil, but it’s not because of any “discount.” It’s because Canada’s heavy crude, called Western Canadian Select, is a lower-quality product. ...

The simple fact is that not all oil is equally valuable The price for a barrel of oil depends on many factors: the type of oil, the difficulty and cost of refining it, as well as the cost, distance and method needed to transport it. These factors are what drive the price of Canadian oil down, not a discount. Yes, oilsands crude typically sells for $15 to $25 less than lighter oil, but it's because it's an inferior, heavier oil that is more expensive to transport and refine. Occasionally, as in October, the differential spikes — often because a pipeline has ruptured or a refinery has shut down — but generally quickly returns to the average margin, as it did this fall.

Heavy oil transportation costs are also higher, primarily because it is thicker and has to be diluted with an expensive, gasoline-like lubricant known as condensate to make it slippery enough to pump through pipelines, which an extra cost that lighter oils don’t require. A recent government report estimates that diluting with condensate costs an additional $14 on each barrel of heavy oil shipped.

Tack on the higher costs of refining the complex, sulphur-rich hydrocarbons in heavy oil and there you have it: the price differential explained, without resorting whining about Canada or Alberta being picked on. In fact, if you correct for higher transport and refining costs, most of the time Canadian oil has been selling at a premium, not a discount.

Canadian oil prices will likely drop even further in the future as new fuel standards for marine shipping kick in. The new rules, known as International Maritime Organization (IMO) 2020, will limit the use of lower-quality, higher-sulphur heavy sour crude like those produced in Alberta. This will shrink Alberta’s share of marine fuel market and add an additional two to three dollars a barrel in refining costs to remove the sulphur. ...

Alberta Premier Rachel Notley and Prime Minister Trudeau’s manipulation of the word “discount” to describe the price differential between heavy Canadian oils and lighter oil down south is Big Lie #1. Premier Notley knows that different quality oils fetch different prices, but touts the so-called discount anyway to try to save her political skin. Jason Kenney, Alberta’s opposition leader, is even more outrageous in his “discounted oil” rhetoric, threatening to provoke a constitutional crisis or attack the charitable status of oilsands opponents. Federal Liberals, led by Trudeau and Finance Minister Morneau, are equally barefaced promoters of this propaganda. Shame on all of them. And shame on the Canadian media for regurgitating this snake oil in up to 100 stories a day.

But it doesn’t stop there. Big Lie #2 is the claim that Canada is losing $80 million a day because of the so-called oil price discount. The “$80 million a day” lie is the oil discount lie juiced up on steroids. 

Where did this huge number come from? It comes from Rachel Notley and it's built on quicksand. Notley’s source is a highly-criticized Scotiabank report claiming a $40 million per day loss from the phony oil discount. Scotiabank’s report has been discredited for relying on faulty assumptions, inaccurate calculations and good old-fashioned puffery. Yet hundreds of articles cite Notley’s claim without mentioning the source’s flaws — or even pointing out that she inexplicably doubled Scotiabank's $40 million calculation to $80 million. Not to be one-upped in Whopper World, Jason Kenney is now claiming a Trump-like $100 million a day in losses. ...

Recently Notley said, “Make no mistake, this price gap is a real and present danger to the Canadian economy." She contends the phony gap is due to a lack of pipeline capacity to move Alberta oil to markets. Trudeau, Morneau, Kenney and others are spewing similar fibs. Their scheme is impressive: Use discount frenzy (#1) to allege an $80 million a day national economic crisis (#2) in order to demand support for the Trans Mountain pipeline as The Solution (#3).

Canadian discount boosters claim that the Trans Mountain pipeline is essential to access new markets in Asia to create competition. Competition, they argue, will drive up prices. Sounds good in theory, but it ignores the extra processing and transportation costs of heavy oil. A new pipeline doesn’t make those costs go away, or get rid of the upcoming IMO 2020 sulphur standards, it just adds additional costs for oil tanker transport across the Pacific. The boosters' claim that shipping to Asia will bump up prices also falls apart under scrutiny. If this claim were true then you’d think that oil companies would be elbowing each other out of the way to ship their current oilsands crude to Asia on the existing Trans Mountain pipeline (you know, the one that Trudeau just spent $4.5 billion of our tax dollars to buy).

The reality is that there is no backlog of oil waiting to be shipped to Asia. In fact, Trans Mountain frequently operates at less than full capacity and, despite a blip last month, Alberta producers shipped hardly any oil through it to Asia over the last few years.

The reason? There is no price premium in Asia. In fact, former CIBC Chief Economist Jeff Rubin concludes "heavy oil ... typically trade at more than US$8 a barrel less, not more, in Asian markets compared to the prices Gulf Coast refineries pay.” Canadian oil producers aren’t lining up because they don’t want to lose $8 a barrel by selling their oil in the Asian market. ...

Give Notley, Kenney, Trudeau and Morneau credit for nesting three Big Lies on top of one another to exponentially multiply their impact. Even the Liar-in-Chief down south has trouble matching that. Despite its erroneous factual basis, the Three Big Lies strategy is working. The Canadian media is amplifying Alberta’s claims and Trudeau has Ottawa ponying up $1.6 billion more of our hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize Big Oil in Alberta.

The truth is Alberta has no one to blame but itself for the fix it is in. Generations of bad provincial policies dug Alberta into this hole, and now Notley and Kenney are using brinkmanship to force Trudeau to fast-track more bad policies to dig Alberta out. While the discount frenzy idea metastasizes, what’s missing from most media coverage is the fact that the Alberta government has known for years that the lesser quality (and therefore lower price) of oilsands crude makes their industry vulnerable to boom and bust cycles. ...

Sadly, successive Alberta governments ignored the warnings, and now want Canada to bail them out with further subsidies and climate unfriendly policies. Unfortunately, the gap between the rhetoric and the reality isn’t unique to Albertan or Canadian politicians. It’s a global problem. Trudeau inspired the world at the Paris Climate talks in 2015 by claiming “Canada is back.” He’s good at promises and apologies, not so much at standing up to Big Oil. While in years past, that may have been merely annoying, now it’s life-threatening.

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2018/12/26/opinion/discount-frenzy-dirt...