Canada and global warming: a state of denial 2

The next Fridays for Future Global Strike will be on Friday November 29th, 2019. The map at the url below shows where these strikes will be occurring in Canada and elsewhere. By clicking on a particular strike marker more information is given about the time, exact place, etc. of the strike. 

To find those in Canada click on "All countries" at the top of the map and then click on "Canada". To find those on November 29 2019, click on "Future" at the top of the map and then click on "2019-11-29".

https://fridaysforfuture.ca/event-map/

Ontario Conservative Energy and former federal Conservative Minister of Natural Resources Greg Rickford cited a climate change denial blog in justifying the Ford government's ending green energy projects in Ontario. 

During question period at Queen's Park Monday, Rickford called Climate Change Dispatch one of his "favourite periodicals."

The website says its mission is to "deconstruct" climate change theories "propagated" by former U.S. vice president Al Gore and "the highly politicized" International Panel on Climate Change. It asks for donations to help "fight garbage science."

Rickford quoted from a post on the site, titled "Germany Pulls Plug on Wind Energy As Industry Suffers 'Severe Crisis'," in response to questioning from the Opposition about $230-million in cancelled renewable enery contracts in Ontario. ...

Rickford's comments come on the same day that the United Nations Environment Programme released its annual Emissions Gap Report. ...

The 168-page document, compiled by 57 leading scientists from 33 institutions across 25 countries, calls on governments to act immediately, within the next decade, to limit global warming to 1.5 C or 2 C by 2100.  ...

The NDP decried Rickford's reference on Tuesday, calling the site a "conspiracy website" and "digital rag."

It pointed out other articles on Climate Change Dispatch, including one post entitled "Carbon Dioxide (CO2) is Not a Pollutant" and a positive review of a book that compares climate activism to attitudes in Nazi Germany.

"Hate-filled conspiracy theories are not a foundation for good policy," said NDP Climate Crisis critic Peter Tabuns in a statement.

"We are past the point of debating whether climate change exists. Ontarians know climate change is real, and caused by human action. Does this government know that?"  

Meanwhile, a group of young Ontarians is suing the province over what they say is climate change inaction, arguing that the government has violated their charter rights by softening emissions reduction targets.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/greg-rickford-climate-change-blog...

The combination of a gale and climate change is resulting in 3 metre waves and flooding hitting Lake Erie now, that follows another flooding during Halloween. 

A gale warning has been issued for Lake Erie due to strong easterly winds in the forecast for Saturday evening.

The warning from Environment Canada will last through to Sunday morning.

The agency says there is a risk of shoreline damage, erosion and flooding along all areas of the Lake Erie shoreline, including the interior of Rondeau Bay.

https://windsor.ctvnews.ca/waves-could-reach-as-high-as-three-metres-as-...

This file photo shows a section of washed out beach in Port Colborne following the Halloween storm. - Dave Johnson , Torstar file photo 

Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority has issued a flood watch for the Lake Erie shoreline ahead of predicted low pressure system that will bring with it wind gusts of between 90 and 100 km/h starting Wednesday afternoon.

The agency said the event is expected to be similar in magnitude to the Halloween night storm that led to widespread flooding and damage along the shoreline from Haldimand County to Fort Erie.

https://www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/news-story/9740253-npca-issues-flood...

When people think of new fossil fuel pipelines, they usually think of the Trans Mountain pipeline from Alberta to the BC coast but there is a proposal for another pipeline from Ontario to Quebec's Saguenay region and from there to markets in Europe and Asia, despite all the questions it raises about climate change and the concerns the federal and Quebec governments raise about global warming. In fact, Premier Legault says that he is "open" to such a project. 

Quebec scientists have demanded that the pipeline proposal be rejected, noting we need to have less fossil fuel infrastracture, not more. These scientists also point out that total emissions from the project would cancel all the emission reductions Quebec has achieved since 1990, without taking into account leakages, which would further greatly increase emissions.

Tankers bound for Europe and as far away as India and China would carry LNG from a proposed liquefaction plant and marine terminal near this deep-water, inland port on the Saguenay Fjord. CBC News Interactives - CBC.ca ...

The wrenching debate over fossil fuels and climate change is lapping up against the shores of the magnificent Saguenay Fjord in the heart of Quebec. Here, just upstream from the Saguenay-St. Lawrence Marine Park — a protected area for the endangered beluga whale — two major, intertwined projects are in the planning and evaluation stages. 

Gazoduc is to deliver Alberta natural gas through an as-yet unbuilt, 782-kilometre pipeline extending from northern Ontario through Quebec's Abitibi and Lac-Saint-Jean regions. If the project gets approval, it would be an important boost for an industry struggling to get its product to market. ...

Its promoters say it would be among the greenest LNG plants in the world. Tanker ships would carry the LNG from the marine terminal, down the Saguenay Fjord and on to markets in Europe and Asia. ...

But standing in the way are profound concerns about increased greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, with many demanding action in the face of the global climate crisis. ...

Adrien Guibert-Betez, an organizer of the opposition group Coalition Fjord, doesn't think there is anything the promoter can do to make the project acceptable.

"All the scientists all over the world said that we have to cut our greenhouse gases, and by that, we have to stop the utilization of gas and petrol and coal. So at the foundation itself, the project is not a good project."

Guibert-Betez's coalition has been mobilizing residents along the Saguenay Fjord who question whether a company should contribute to the production of natural gas at all, regardless of its environmental commitments. ...

In June, a group of 160 Quebec scientists signed an open letter calling on the federal and Quebec governments to reject the projects because they are "incompatible with the idea of energy transition."

"It is essential to reduce the number of infrastructures linked to fossil fuels and not build more," they wrote, in order to meet the 2050 goal of carbon neutrality.

"The total emissions connected to the project in Canada would be comparable to the total of Quebec's GHG reductions since 1990," concluded the two principal authors of the letter, Université Laval chemistry Prof. Jesse Greener and Université du Québec à Montréal environmental science Prof. Lucie Sauvé. ...

That total, the scientists said, doesn't take into account leakage, known as fugitive emissions, along the way.

"Since natural gas is essentially made up of methane, a greenhouse gas that is 84 times more powerful than CO2 over a 20-year period, the contribution of these leaks to planetary warming is enormous," they wrote.

"So it is possible that the total GHG emissions associated with the project will be considerably higher than the best available estimates." ...

If it becomes simply another energy source in the market and does not replace coal or oil, "the result will be a global increase in emissions."

Université Laval's Greener says that last conclusion is important to highlight. "That's the massive amount of the problem: its utilization or misutilization downstream," the chemist said. "Obviously, we can't even guarantee that this gas is not going to replace sustainable energy projects." 

"So the report is being spun," Greener said. 

"If we're supposed to assume the product is going to be replacing dirtier forms of energy, there's no guarantee of that. And if you just look at the energy needs across the world, it's much more likely that these products are simply going to add to current consumption, not replace."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/energie-saguenay-how-green-is-na...

Victoria BC also held a student strike for climate action on November 29th that focused on the Green New Deal and ending BC's LNG projects. 

 

Traffic was diverted along Blanshard Street on Friday as Victoria students marched in a climate rally: Nov. 29, 2019 (CTV News)

The rally began in Centennial Square at approximately noon before youth activists marched southbound on Blanshard Street towards the office of B.C.'s Ministry of Energy, Mines & Petroleum Resources.

Student activists say they are calling on the government to begin a structured transition into greener sources of energy so that the province can become less dependent on coal and liquefied natural gas (LNG). ...

"So this specific strike we're targeting LNG and the Green New Deal and right now, the B.C. government is putting millions of dollars into LNG projects that will lock B.C into decades of GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions and we have to stop that," said Victoria student Grace Sinats. "If we allow them to put this much money into projects that will destroy our planet, there is no hope," said Sinats.  ...

"There are now people that think they can have this energy transition in 10 years, well, be my guest," said van der Hoeven. "It's impossible."

"It's not only about energy transition, it's also about an economic transition and it's about a societal transition," said van der Hoeven. "You know, the biggest issue ... is there will be new winners and new losers. That means if people feel they are being left behind, they will be protesting because they are not going to accept this.”

Students at Victoria's youth protest said that while they are calling on the government to transition away from LNG, they were aware of the challenges that workers in the industry may face.

"Not only do we wish for LNG and fracking to have a smooth decline, but we need a just transition for all workers," said Victoria student Elliott Anderson. "If we just stop plain-out and there’s no training for workers to go to a new place, our economy will collapse and there's nothing we can do about it. We need a just transition so that workers can continue to sustain families and themselves," said Anderson. ...

"I feel like a lot of the time people can forget about the strikes pretty quickly," said Sintas. "Like it’s this big event and then not a lot happens. So, I feel like having regular strikes is really important to remind people that this is still an issue and it’s not going to be solved overnight."

https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/student-activists-occupy-downtown-vic...

The climate action strike in Vancouver also focused on consumerism on Black Friday. 

Supporters of the Extinction Rebellion movement take part in a protest and funeral march for the environment Friday, November 29, 2019 in downtown Vancouver, BC. JASON PAYNE /  PNG

“Nov. 29 is Black Friday. On this day, huge corporations exploit consumers by encouraging us to buy more and more. Their ‘special offers”’ trigger a sense of urgency and ‘exceptional opportunity’ to consumers, resulting in an overconsumption of unnecessary goods,” the group, which also goes by XR, states on its Facebook page.“We will mourn for the future of our planet, our ecosystems, and the lives lost due to climate crisis, human and non-human,” XR said.

Participants were invited to wear funeral attire to the event, which began at 1 p.m. at Art Phillips Park on Burrard Street. ...

The march concluded at Robson and Burrard, where Extinction Rebellion shut down the intersection for a post-funeral wake that included a garment repair station, screen printing activities, clothing swap and live performances.

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/climate-activists-protest-mass-...

Despite its promise to deal effectively with climate change during the election, the Trudeau Liberal government continues to support pipeline expansion. Today, just one month after the election, the Enbridge's Line 3 pipeline from Alberta to Manitoba is up and running carrying 400,000 barrels a day, with the Line 3 US extension expected to be completed next year, which would increase pipeline flow to 760,000 barrels per day. 

In this file photo, Enbridge workers weld pipe just west of Morden, Man., in 2018. The Canadian portion of the pipeline went into commercial operation Sunday. (John Woods/The Canadian Press)

A major pipeline project — long anticipated by the Canadian oilpatch — reached a significant milestone Sunday as Enbridge's Line 3 pipeline from Alberta to Manitoba is now up and running.

Calgary-based Enbridge sees commercial operation of the Canadian portion as important progress, even as the U.S. portion of the pipeline replacement project is still navigating Minnesota regulators. ...

The Line 3 replacement is the largest project in Enbridge history, with a total cost expected to top $9 billion, of which the Canadian portion is about $5.3 billion. ...

The company has operated Line 3 since 1968, shipping oil from Hardisty, Alta., to Superior, Wis. The Canadian portion of the line runs from Hardisty to Gretna, Man., a distance of 1,067 kilometres. ...

The American part of the project could still be in service in 2020. Timing is unclear, though, after state utility regulators in Minnesota in October ordered further study on the potential effects of oil spills in the Lake Superior watershed. ...

Upon full completion of Line 3, the pipe will have oil export capacity of 760,000 barrels per day (bpd). 

Until the U.S. side of the project is finished, it will operate at about 400,000 bpd. Still, that will help the company boost the oil-moving capability of its current system across western Canada. ...

Of the other two major oil pipelines for Canadian crude, construction is proceeding on the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion to the B.C. coast. The Keystone XL pipeline has been delayed by court challenges in the U.S. ...

All three major pipeline projects have faced opposition over concerns about their environmental impact, including climate change, should Alberta's oilsands continue to grow and add to industry's carbon emissions.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/enbridge-line-three-shipping-oil-1.5377031

Besides the environmental dangers created by the proposed Ontario to Saguenay Quebec LNG pipeline, there are major questions about the job numbers offered by the pipeline supporters - numbers that are even questioned by economists. Furthermore, those jobs will be temporary and gone was construction is finished relatively leaving few jobs in their wake. As the picture below shows, there are relatively few jobs created for the many billions that goes into such a megaproject. 

A group of Quebec economists have gone public with their criticism of a proposed 750-kilometre natural-gas pipeline and a liquid natural gas (LNG) processing plant that GNL Québec intends to buildin Saguenay, expressing serious doubts over its promised economic benefits.

In an open letter published Tuesday in several media outlets, the 40 signatories contend that the gas carried along the pipeline would replace cleaner, conventional natural gas or renewable source electricity as well as increase greenhouse gas emissions.

The economists contend that natural gas replacing more polluting forms of energy, such as coal, is not a credible assertion.

They also question the promise that 6,000 jobs would be created directly or indirectly by the construction of the project and of 1,100 more once the processing plant is operational.

The economists point out that last month, Quebec’s Commission de la construction announced that more than half of the construction trades in the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean area lacked workers, that mining firm Rio Tinto had to repeatedly halt production because of a shortage of workers and that Resolute forest products needed to find 800 employees to replace those on the verge of retirement. ...

The authors of the letter conclude that the jobs promised by GNL Québec will be filled by workers from outside the region or those quitting their jobs to work on the construction of the plant, which will simply increase the area’s labour shortage.

https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/economists-question-number-o...

..these people have been dismantling environmental regulation and monitoring. now want to be in charge of nuclear energy. this is a nightmare added on to the ecological crisis we already face.

Ford, Moe and Higgs look to nuclear to fight climate change

Three of Canada's premiers will announce Sunday a plan to fight climate change by working together on small nuclear reactors, a company that's developing the technology said Saturday.

New Brunswick-based ARC Nuclear Canada said in a news release that its president will attend a signing ceremony Sunday between the provinces of New Brunswick, Ontario and Saskatchewan to work in collaboration on the modular reactors "in an effort to mitigate the effects of climate change."

In British Columbia, forests have been devastated by pine beetle infestation and wildfires over the last decade. This year this has contributed to massive job losses in the industry. Studies now show these problems are studying all the way across the country to Eastern Canada, as trees there are now becoming more susceptible to the pine beetle and wildfires. 

What the forest industry in the rest of the country can look forward to: "barely a day goes by without an announcement about layoffs, temporary closures or permanent mill shut downs in British Columbia's struggling forest industry. ... I would say 80 per cent or more of the coastal forest sector is down. ... Low timber prices and the large-scale destruction of Crown harvest zones during the pine beetle epidemic and two successive record wildfire seasons have hurt the industry" (https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/12/01/news/uncertainty-logging-ind...)

Pines killed by mountain pine beetle infestation in the 100 Mile House are of British Columbia glow red among the green of other trees.Postmedia News files

Mills in the heart of Canada’s timber industry have fallen quieter this winter as wildfires and infestations made worse by climate change have made vast tracts of once valuable forest into barren stands of dead trees.

Canada’s forestry industry is facing an uncertain future due to falling demand from a cooling U.S. housing market, increasingly frequent and intense forest fires and the continuing damage from pests such as the mountain pine beetle. ...

“We’re kind of at that point in the cycle where, unfortunately, permanent reductions have to happen,” said Ed Sustar, a forestry products analyst at Moody’s Investor Service. “It’s going to be a relatively sizable part of the B.C. lumber industry." ...

British Columbia, home to close to a third of Canada’s wood manufacturing jobs, is showing the most visible effects of reduced supplies as numerous companies have cut back mill production in recent months. ...

The supply issue has, however, been looming for some time, as the large swaths of B.C. forest killed by a pine beetle epidemic decay into worthless dead stands. The tinderbox created by the outbreak, combined with warmer, drier weather, have in turn helped create back-to-back record forest fire seasons in the province.

In 2017 wildfires destroyed about 1.2 million hectares of forest. This fiscal year it’s estimated at 1.4 million, compared with an average of 151,000 hectares for the 10 prior years. ...

The wild card in all of this continues to be the effects of climate change, and how much it will change the supply picture.

“It’s already really created huge problems in terms of timber supply,” said Sally Aitken, a professor at the University of British Columbia.

“Climate change will touch pretty much everything we do in forestry, and everything that lives in forests.”

She’s studying how to create forests that will be more resilient to climate change, by selecting genetic varieties of trees that could better withstand the changes coming.

The impact of climate change on the health of forests is hard to predict, however, as changing weather patterns lead to both wetter and drier conditions, while a variety of threats including insects like the pine beetle, fir beetle, spruce budworm as well as diseases and fungi get worse.

Barry Cooke, a forestry researcher at Natural Resources Canada, describes the trend as climate weirding, since so many factors are at play.

“You have climate changes percolating through this cascade of physical and biotic consequences,” said Cooke.

His research has focused in part on Canada’s far north forests, where melting permafrost has let to what he describes as drunken trees falling over in the waterlogged soil.

But he notes that government research is showing climate change impacts are coming to all areas of the Canadian woods, including the fires of the west coming east. He also sees a deterioration in the quality of the forests, as growth-rings thin and faster-growing but lower quality plants and trees mask the decline of core species.

“Yeah there are a lot of trees here, but they’re not as healthy as they used to be…the forest is in a process of transforming,” said Cooke. “We are seeing growth declines in Eastern Canada, and this wasn’t predicted to happen this soon. We thought maybe in 20, 30 years we might see this, but it’s happening already.”

https://business.financialpost.com/commodities/agriculture/the-changing-...

epaulo13 wrote:

UN Chief Warns Global Warming 'Point of No Return' Is Hurtling Toward Us

United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Sunday that the world's efforts to stop climate change have been "utterly inadequate" so far and there is a danger global warming could pass the "point of no return." ...

He noted that the world has the scientific knowledge and the technical means to limit global warming, but "what is lacking is political will".

The UN Secretary-General also said on the eve of the COP 25 Madrid conference that countries must end "Subsidies that promote the use of fossil fuels are helping 'to destroy the world', and are a bad way to deploy taxpayers’ money, the head of the United Nations said on Tuesday." (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-global-climatechange-energy/fossil-fu...)

Unfortunately, the Trudeau Liberal federal government and provincial governments provide $60 billion (which is $1,650 per capita) to Canada's fossil fuel industry, according to the International Monetary Fund, which is a major corporate ally. There is no sign of this ending. In fact, because of election results in October and pressure from the large oil producing provinces, subsidies may well increase, despite what this means for the health of the planet. 

Alberta's oilsands North of Fort McMurray. Photo: Louis Bockner / Sierra Club BC 

According to a new International Monetary Fund (IMF) report, Canada subsidized the fossil fuel industry to the tune of almost $60 billion in 2015 — approximately $1,650 per Canadian.  

Yet subsidizing one of the world’s wealthiest industries is folly. Such subsidies not only hurt Canadian taxpayers and the economy — they also exacerbate the climate emergency.

Indeed, the G20 countries have already agreed that subsidizing fossil fuels is irrational in a warming world — and have called for action to eliminate inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that distort markets.

The problem is that subsidies encourage the production and wasteful consumption of fossil fuels all while impeding the shift to cleaner renewables. 

For these reasons, during the last election campaign Justin Trudeau sensibly committed to “phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.”   

The problem is that government has not yet delivered on this promise.   ...

Canada continues to subsidize the fossil fuel industry in myriad ways. First, it provides tax breaks under the federal Income Tax Act. For example, in 2015 the federal government introduced a new accelerated depreciation rate for equipment used in LNG facilities, which was a change proposed by the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. ...

Second, government provides funding to the fossil fuel industry at favourable rates through direct financing and loan guarantees. A recent example is Export Development Canada’s administration of a nearly $5 billion loan to support the government’s controversial purchase and operation of the Trans Mountain pipeline.   Ottawa has no plan to recoup that principal cost from industry — and is also subsidizing half the interest expense with taxpayer dollars.

Third, Canada provides direct funding to the fossil fuel industry through research, development and other services provided by federal agencies. 

For example, the federal government is paying $1.5 billion for the Oceans Protection Plan, an initiative to safeguard bitumen transport through the Port of Vancouver. This plan was necessitated by new oil tanker traffic — and should be paid for by oil shippers. ...

The IMF estimates that elimination of global fossil fuel subsidies would reduce CO2 emissions by 28 per cent and reduce premature air pollution deaths by 46 per cent. Equally important, the IMF concluded that elimination of subsidies would actually result in a net economic gain. Eliminating fossil fuel subsidies will be a win for the environment andfor the economy.

In sum, Canada needs to implement robust carbon taxes to pay for the massive climate change costs that society now confronts. Just as important, Canada must finally follow through on its specific promise to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.  

After all, claiming to fight climate change while subsidizing fossil fuels is as crazy as brushing your teeth while eating Oreos. It may make you feel virtuous, but it isn’t going to work.

https://thenarwhal.ca/canadas-fossil-fuel-subsidies-amount-to-1650-per-c...

Earth Needs Fewer People To Beat the Climate Crisis Scientists Say

https://twitter.com/business/status/1200078223037673472

"11,000 scientists call for population control in mass climate alarm..."

Wondered when they'd get to this. Knew it was coming. Seems only fair white liberals agree to go first to set a good example.

The Spanish Socialist government of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is the first large economy to promise to implement a Green New Deal but is facing restrictions from European Union rules and hostile opposition from the right, as well as problems both internally and with the Socialists political allies. Meanwhile  the Canadian federal and provincial governments promote more pipelines. 

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez became the first major world leader to endorse the idea of a “Green New Deal". ...

Now, as Madrid prepares to host the United Nations’ 25th Conference of the Parties following Chile’s abrupt decision to back out amid fiery protests over inequality, Sánchez’s government is offering an alternative vision of what it might look like to close the income gap and lower emissions at once. That will be on full display this week as world leaders hash out plans to meet the 2015 Paris Agreement’s goals, and under the terms of the pact, consider more ambitious targets. 

On the face of it, Europe’s fifth-largest economy makes a sweeping industrial policy to curb emissions and expand the public sector look like good politics. In April, Sánchez’s Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party, or PSOE, won reelection, even picking up votes in the coal-producing region where, just months earlier, his government shuttered most of the country’s remaining mines. ...

It was a narrow victory and, without a majority in Parliament, the Sánchez administration was forced to call another snap election last month. The Socialists again eked out a slim win, and this time agreed to form a coalition with Unidos Podemos, a party to its left. If Sánchez’s center-left vision of a Green New Deal could be criticized for not being ambitious enough, the inclusion of the anti-austerity Podemos could make the country the first to seriously attempt the kind of Green New Deal progressives elsewhere have laid out to curb soaring economic inequality and planet-heating emissions. ...

But, even with a new left flank in the governing coalition, experts say the chances of making transformative changes are slim, thanks to the European Union’s rules on spending and public ownership. It’ll be a test for how much effectively the Green New Deal can beat back the far right while still confined by what one researcher called the “straitjacket of austerity.” ...

Between 1990 and 2017, Spain’s emissions grew by 17.9%, even as the European Union’s fell on average 23.5% during the same period, according to a bloc-wide report. More vehicles on the road and increased production of electricity and heating drove the spike. Spain is Europe’s second-largest carmaker and biggest importer of liquefied natural gas in the European Union. 

The spike in emissions reflected efforts to rev Spain’s beleaguered economy, which last year grew by 3%, faster than France or Germany. In 2017, 90% of new jobs in the country were temporary, with a third lasting less than three weeks, according to The New York Times. This year, the unemployment hovered at about 14.2% all year. It was the lowest in a decade, and down from a 2013 peak of 27%. But the rate was still more than double the European Union average. 

The Sánchez administration’s efforts have been largely focused on triage. The government started the year with an unprecedented 22% hike to the minimum wage. After Parliament rejected his budget, Sánchez called a snap election in April, where the Green New Deal debuted as a platform issue. 

In November’s election, the issue once again took a backseat. Sánchez pivoted away from climate, pitching the Socialists as the best chance at stability as tensions erupted over Catalonia’s attempted independence vote, Britain’s exit from the European Union and a slowing economy. Podemos veered left, campaigning on structural critiques of the market economy itself, said Riccardo Mastini, an environmental policy researcher at the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

“The Green New Deal sounded like too reformist an idea,” Mastini said. “So they preferred to talk about capitalism as the issue.”

Más País, a new ecosocialist party formed as a green breakaway from Podemos, made the most vibrant appeal to climate voters. But it only won three seats in the Parliament. 

“It’s not easy to see how the green agenda on its own has a real sell to Spaniards,” said Victor Lapuente, a Spanish political expert and professor at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden.

Vox’s official party line, meanwhile, is that anthropogenic climate change is “una tomadura de pelo” ― a term roughly translating to “a joke.” In September, all parties in the Spanish Parliament except Vox voted to declare a state of emergency over the climate crisis. Rocío Monasterio, Vox’s leader in Madrid, celebrated the schism within Podemos that gave rise to Más País as a potential opportunity to peel off left-wing voters. ...

Yet some of the European far-right parties that back Vox are starting to shift away from denialism. Following Green parties’ surge in April’s European parliamentary elections, the far-right Alternative for Germany’s youth wing in Berlin conceded that climate moves “more people than we thought” and urged its party leaders to abandon the “difficult to understand statement that mankind does not influence the climate.”

France’s National Rally vowed in April to make a “Europe of nations” the “world’s first ecological civilization.” Its leader, Marine Le Pen, claimed those “rooted in their home” are “ecologist,” and suggested “nomadic” people “do not care about the environment; they have no homeland,” alluding to Nazi-era blood-and-soil myths about ethnic ties to geography. ...

Vox rode a different political wave to power, surging in polls after taking a hardline stance against Catalonia’s chaotic vote to secede last year, vowing to rein in decentralized Spanish regional governments and crush autonomist movements....

The problem, Adler said, is that “the Spanish government, like the French government, has been unable and unwilling to challenge the restraints on investments” put in place by the European Union. 

The 1992 Maastricht Treaty that established a transnational government on the continent and laid the groundwork for a single currency poses significant hurdles to left-wing Green New Deal proposals like bringing more industries under public ownership. 

Under the rules outlined in the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, member states cannot run a budget deficit exceeding 3% of gross domestic product or rack up a public debt greater than 60% of GDP. With a nearly 98% debt-to-GDP ratio, Spain’s government has little wiggle room to take out loans to pay for the Green New Deal program. 

“If you’re looking for Spain to engage in massive fiscal stimulus through a big Green New Deal, I’m sorry to say that’s not likely to happen,” said Robert Fishman, a political science professor at Carlos III University in Madrid. “It’s not so much because of a lack of commitment on the green and environmental front, but because of the resistance the government will encounter from European institutions.”

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/12/03/news/spain-might-be-worlds-m...

It is urgent that we fix the way GHG responsibility is allocated. The premier of Ontario is lciaming we have a low carbon footprint. He can claim this due to the consumed benefit of GHG emitted offshore. As well using a carbon tax that only taxes some sources of carbon as a single strategy risks moving the behaviour from a consumption of taxed carbon to one of untaxed carbon.

Carbon taxes have to get it right and be inclusive and proportional so that the behaviour they encourage is a benefit to the net production of GHG globally rather than a tax avoidance where we artifically reduce what we are accountable while maintianing the GHG that we are responsible for without much change.

As well local carbon emissions are more likely to be for essentials hitting lower income hard while GHG emissions from more luxury items (including foreign vacations) are often not taxed. Why should we allow a flight within Caanda to be taxed while a person flying on a short hop across the border to fly to thousands of km not be taxed. 

Canada needs strategies to reduce the carbon footprint of our country, our citizens, our economy, our investments - on a global basis. Instead, we are encouraging avoidance and ignorance about the real impacts of our lives on the planet.

Not all of these strategies have to cost the economy. Right to repair legislation and longterm warranty requirements save resources and create jobs in repair industries here while potentially making our manufacturing a little more competative making less wasteful products.

Support for artists who make cultural products that consume less carbon encourages investments in other things that add more well-being and jobs to Caanda than another dollarstore of stuff built for sale but not to last.

Items sold with no benefit -- the built for sale rather than use stuff -- should incurr fines. This is adding to consumer as well as environmental protection.

Applying taxes to flights at the airport that leave Canada is essential. So is regulation to prevent airlines carrying more fuel due to filling it up offshore to save money is important as this extra weight increases emissions. Flights landing in Caanda should have enough fuel to get here not calculated to avoid fueling here.

Public transit cna be supported and improved with fares reduced.

Canada needs a different apporach if we want to be honetst about making a difference but many of those policies provide benefits and not just costs.

There is another form of taxpayer subsidy that is not taken into account in these reports on fossil fuel subsidies and its by far the largest, the $260 billion to clean up the contaminated fossil fuel sites - and that's just for Alberta. The sad part of this is that these numbers were provided to  the fossil fuel companies by the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) privately while a much smaller number, $58 billion was being told to the public. Can one say regulatory capture by the fossil fuel industry?

The picture below shows an aerial view of the Alberta Tar Sands.

(Credit: Green Peace)

The cost of cleaning up Alberta’s fossil-fuel industry could be as staggeringly high as $260 billion, according to internal Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) documents obtained by the National Observer, Global News, the Toronto Star, and StarMetro Calgary.

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. ...

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-...

Just months after getting elected, Jason Kenney is asking for federal money to clean up the large number of abandoned fossil fuel wells that Alberta failed to force the fossil fuel industry to restore. In fact both federal and provincial money has been spent on clean up as the article below makes clear. Furthermore, another 1,000 wells is likely to soon be added to the officially 3,406 abandoned wells. But this is only a very tiny fraction of the 93,000 inactive wells that will need clean up at some point. 

 Once again the taxpayer is subsidizing the industry that is pushing the planet toward climatic catastrophe. 

Abandoned oil well equipment, once owned by now defunct Legal Oil and Gas Ltd., on an Alberta farm.SUPPLIED /  POSTMEDIA/FILE

The Kenney government wants Ottawa’s help — and some money as well — to deal with the growing number of abandoned oil and gas wells in the province, while creating jobs in the process. ...

In a letter sent Monday to Finance Minister Bill Morneau, Alberta is seeking federal assistance to “accelerate the reclamation of abandoned oil and gas wells.”

Finance Minister Travis Toews spoke with his federal counterpart Monday and pressed the issue.

“Ultimately, we would like funding from the federal government to assist us as a province in cleaning up our orphan wells,” Toews told reporters at the legislature. “It would create jobs in much-needed regions of the province.” Toews didn’t put a price tag on the request but noted Alberta’s Orphan Well Association is facing a growing backlog of such wells that require downhole wellbore abandonment and surface reclamation, but don’t have an active owner to pick up the bill. ...

According to the Orphan Well Association, there were 3,406 orphan wells slated for abandonment at the beginning of this month, almost a five-fold increase since March 2015.

What’s also disconcerting is the number continues to grow, even as the industry’s annual funding to the association has ramped up to $60 million this year from $15 million five years ago.

However, the failure of petroleum producers such as Lexin Resources Ltd. and Trident Exploration Corp. has added more unwanted wells to the list. Earlier this month, Calgary-based Houston Oil & Gas Ltd. went into receivership, which could potentially bump up the number of orphan wells by more than 1,000. ...

There are also an estimated 93,000 inactive wells in Alberta, meaning they haven’t produced oil or natural gas for six to 12 months. According to the Alberta Energy Regulator, this count has increased by about 11,000 in the past five years due to “company insolvencies, low commodity prices and a maturing producing basin.”

https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/varcoe-alberta-seeks-ottawa...

The just released Ontario auditor general's report blasted the Ford government's climate action plan for not having any chance of coming anywhere near achieving its 2030 greenhouse gas emissions reductions targets, despite Ford's claims otherwise. Ford is probably would love to fire the auditor general, Bonnie Lysyk, if he could, like he did the environmental commissioner, Diane Saxe. 

Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk

The threadbare climate and environment policies of Doug Ford’s Ontario government are insufficient to meet Ontario’s 2030 emission reduction targets and are riddled with errors and omissions, according to the province’s fiscal watchdog.

The Progressive Conservative government calculated some reductions based on green policies it scrapped when it came to power last year, double-counted other savings, and failed to properly estimate costs for more than half of the initiatives in its Made-in-Ontario environment plan, Auditor General of Ontario Bonnie Lysyk said.

“Our audit concluded that the emission-reduction estimates in the plan are not based on sound evidence or sufficient detail,” Lysyk said in her 2019 annual report, which was released on Wednesday. ...

The scathing critique of the replacement environment plan the Ford government first put forward in November last year is part of a wide-ranging four-volume report considering the value-for-money of a range of government policies, including those related to hospitals and health care; the judiciary and prisons; and food, vehicle and workplace safety.

Its sections on climate change and environmental policy are the first reckoning Ford has faced on that file from an independent watchdog since he fired Dianne Saxe, the former Environmental Commissioner of Ontario, and transferred a portion of her mandate to the auditor general’s office on April 1. ...

The report says the environment ministry’s own calculations from last November would only get the province’s globe-warming emissions to 160.9 megatonnes (Mt) by 2030. 

That is well short of the 143.3 Mt target it would need hit to achieve a 30 per cent reduction in emissions from 2005 levels by 2030, its stated policy goal.

But Lysyk’s office in August also asked Ontario’s environment ministry to recalculate its forecast to account for new data, and in response the ministry lowered its projections to say it expected to emit 163.6 Mt in 2030, even further from a target many critics say is not ambitious enough.

The report did not estimate the cost to Ontario of dealing with the effects of climate change, which include more severe and more frequent flooding and other extreme weather that is putting a heavy strain on the insurance industry. 

Global economic losses from climate-related extreme events were estimated at around $10 billion a year in the 1970s and since 2010 have exceeded $100 billion (at constant 2012 currency values), according to a 2015 report commissioned by the Insurance Bureau of Canada. ...

The report was immediately jumped on by climate activists and opposition politicians, with NDP Leader Andrea Horwath saying it showed Ford’s government “is acting like the climate crisis isn’t a problem.” ...

Keith Stewart, Greenpeace Canada’s senior energy strategist, went further, saying that the auditor general had ”unmasked Doug Ford’s so-called climate plan as a fraud.”

The report shows that Ontario’s climate change plan falls apart under serious scrutiny, Environmental Defence’s Sarah Buchanan said, and actually works against serious climate action. ...

The auditor general said the most egregious error in the government’s climate change calculations was an assumption that Ontario vehicle owners would switch in large numbers to electric models despite its slashing of rebates on such purchases and their supporting infrastructure and the ripping up of charging stations at Toronto-area train stations. ...

Ford’s environment ministry had assumed the number of electric vehicles in Ontario would jump from 41,000 in 2019 to 1.3 million by 2030, reducing emissions by 2.6 Mt, “but had no policy mechanisms to drive this uptake,” the report said. ...

The report also pointed out major policy changes that did not comply with the province’s Environmental Bill of Rights, including the repeal of cap and trade without public consultation. Ford’s government had argued that the Ontario election last year amounted to a “substantial equivalent” to that consultation, an argument the Ontario Divisional Court rejected in October. ...

Her report also said the provincial environment ministry was being undermined by actions taken in other parts of the government that were not adequately taking into account the environmental impacts of their decisions.

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/12/04/news/ontario-auditor-general...

There  were 500,000 protesters at the climate strike in Madrid led by Greta Thunberg on Friday where the UN COP 25 climate change conference was being held. 

As Greta Thunberg and other activists spoke at a rally, an estimated 500,000 people took part in a climate justice protest in Madrid on Friday, December 6, 2019. (Photo: @GretaThunberg)

Before taking part in a 500,000-strong climate march in Madrid, teen activist Greta Thunberg spoke plainly yet forcefully Friday about the impact the global climate strike movement has had thus far and reiterated the demand of the climate justice movement for global leaders to act with the urgency the planet's ecological emergency mandates.

Speaking to reporters at the cultural center La Casa Encendida in Madrid, Spain—where COP 25 is underway—Thunberg called herself "just... a climate activist—a small part of a big movement" that needs even more activists to effect change. ...

"I sincerely hope that the COP 25 will lead to something concrete and that will lead to also an increase in awareness among people in general." She said she hopes that those in power "grasp the urgency of the climate crisis because right now it doesn't seem like they are. I know that we will do everything we can to make sure that this is something that cannot be ignored anymore, that they cannot just hide away anymore," Thunberg said. Some world leaders "are afraid of change," she said, but the status quo must be disrupted.

"Some people want everything to continue like now, and change is what we young people are bringing. And that's why they are trying to silence us. But that is just proof that we are having an impact, that our voices are being heard," Thunberg said, and is the reason powerful opponents "try so desperately to silence us." ...

Thunberg suggested that COP 25 may be viewed "as a kind of middle year," with next year's COP 26 seen as "the big event. But we cannot afford middle years," the Swedish teen said. "We cannot afford more days going by without real action being taken." COP 25, said Thunberg, mustn't be brushed off "because every chance we get to improve the situation we must take." ...

"We have been striking now for over a year and still, basically, nothing has happened," said Thunberg. "The climate crisis is still being ignored by those in power and we cannot go on like this. It is not a sustainable solution that children skip school." The strikers, Thunberg said, "don't want to continue. We would love some action from the people in power... because people are suffering and dying from the climate and ecological emergency today and we cannot wait any longer."

A lot has been achieved, added Thunberg. "We have have raised public awareness and we have created opinion and that is a big step in the right direction. But of course it's nowhere near enough. The CO2 emissions aren't reducing. They are in fact increasing," Thunberg continued, "so of course there is no victory because the only thing we want to see is real action and real action has not been happening. So of course we have achieved a lot," she added, "but if you look at it from a certain point of view we have achieved nothing."

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/12/06/even-500000-march-madrid-gr...

Canadian young people, including Canadian UN COP 25 Climate Change Conference youth delegate Lea Ilardo, demanded Canadian political leaders take immediate action on climate change. 

Lea Ilardo, a student from Canada, speaks at the Fridays for Future press conference at COP 25 in Madrid, Spain, on Dec. 4. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Young climate strikers are sending a clear message to Canadian leaders who are attending the COP25 climate conference in Madrid, Spain, this week: Act now. In an open letter from various branches of Climate Strike Canada, youth are urging leaders to commit to reducing emissions by 60 per cent (instead of 30 per cent) below 2005 levels by 2030.

“Ladies and gentlemen, you are the last people in a position of power to have the possibility to allow us to avoid an unprecedented global catastrophe,” the letter reads. “Please be bold.”

Lea Ilardo is representing Canadian youth at the two-week conference, which started on Monday. She’s part of a group that is meeting daily with the Canadian delegation to follow the negotiations as they happen. ...

“The youth really has been waking up for a year and so this is really like the COP that youth is going to be following,” said Alienor Rougeot, a university student who has been leading the climate strikes in Toronto.

“The fact that we’ve been in the streets increases the pressure and maybe just gives leaders … the legitimacy to be bolder,” she added.

https://www.cbc.ca/kidsnews/post/please-be-bold-message-from-youth-clima...

Baby Yoda uses reusable alternatives, you should too.

A report released yesterday by the International Union for Conservation of Nature at the United Nations COP 25 Climate Change Conference in Madrid warns that oxygen levels in the oceans has declined due to climate change. This is creating dead zones in the ocean where little or nothing survives and is a particular threat to large marine life, which require more oxygen. 

Dead sardines in Redondo Beach, Calif.Credit...Noaki Schwartz/Associated Press

Oxygen in the oceans is being lost at an unprecedented rate, with “dead zones” proliferating and hundreds more areas showing oxygen dangerously depleted, as a result of the climate emergency and intensive farming, experts have warned.

Sharks, tuna, marlin and other large fish species were at particular risk, scientists said, with many vital ecosystems in danger of collapse. Dead zones – where oxygen is effectively absent – have quadrupled in extent in the last half-century, and there are also at least 700 areas where oxygen is at dangerously low levels, up from 45 when research was undertaken in the 1960s.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature presented the findings on Saturday at the UN climate conference in Madrid, where governments are halfway through tense negotiations aimed at tackling the climate crisis. ...

Grethel Aguilar, the acting director general of the IUCN, said the health of the oceans should be a key consideration for the talks. “As the warming ocean loses oxygen, the delicate balance of marine life is thrown into disarray,” she said. “The potentially dire effects on fisheries and vulnerable coastal communities mean that the decisions made at the conference are even more crucial.”

All fish need dissolved oxygen, but the biggest species are particularly vulnerable to depleted oxygen levels because they need much more to survive. Evidence shows that depleted levels are forcing them to move towards the surface and to shallow areas of sea, where they are more vulnerable to fishing.

Some ocean areas are naturally lower in oxygen than others, but these are even more susceptible to damage when their oxygen levels are depleted further, the report’s authors said. Species that can more easily tolerate low oxygen levels, such as jellyfish, some squid and marine microbes, can flourish at the expense of fish, upsetting the balance of ecosystems. The natural oceanic cycles of phosphorus and nitrogen are also at risk. ...

Low oxygen levels are also associated with global heating, because the warmer water holds less oxygen and the heating causes stratification, so there is less of the vital mixing of oxygen-rich and oxygen-poor layers. Oceans are expected to lose about 3-4% of their oxygen by the end of this century, but the impact will be much greater in the levels closest to the surface, where many species are concentrated, and in the mid to high latitudes.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/07/oceans-losing-oxygen...

The United Nations COP25 Climate Change Conference was supposed to have been held in Santiago Chile but was transferred to Madrid because of the protests about Chilean inequality that led to excessive use of force in their suppression. Those protests also had a close relationship with climate change as the following article which Maisa Rojas, Director of Chile’s Centre for Climate and Resilience Research, discusses below. The global warming crisis cannot be solved unless everyone around the world is involved. 

 ‘We should be meeting in Santiago.’ Environmental protesters in Santiago, Chile. Their banner reads: ‘From Santiago to Madrid, the world has woken up to the climate crisis.’

On 18 October 2019, the president of Chile declared a state of emergencyand instituted a curfew to quell three days of public unrest that started because of an increase in metro fares. The outbreak of anger was summed up by the message, “This is not about 30 pesos, it is about 30 years”, referring to discontent lasting three decades, which appeared on walls across the city and on social media. The protests ultimately led to COP25’s move to Madrid. 

The movement they spawned continues to this day. Its demands are wide-ranging: better pensions, education, health, a minimum wage; but also water rights and action on environmental degradation. What they have in common is their roots in a profoundly unequal society that can be traced back to Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship. The economic framework he instituted has hardly changed since the return of democracy in the 90s.

But why did this violence and rage explode so suddenly? Chile ranks as one of the most unequal countries among the OECD nations according to the Gini index (the most widely used measure of inequality). The latest survey by the Chilean government shows that the richest 10% of the Chilean population has 39 times more income than the poorest 10% – worse than it was in 2015. ...

At first glance, other than disrupting a climate summit, this kind of social unrest doesn’t seem to have much to do with the climate crisis. But look again. 

We know that climate change acts as an amplifier of social inequality, disproportionately affecting the most vulnerable. Think for example about heatwaves, of which we saw several this year. The impacts of such extreme events are experienced very differently depending on whether you have access to air conditioning or whether you have a park or green space close by. The ability to recover from the impact of a tropical storm also depends on your access to insurance or finance, and to natural resources such as water.

In Chile, just a month before the social crisis exploded, we saw the first internal displacement as a result of the climate crisis. A 10-year-long drought has resulted in many small-scale and subsistence animal farmers losing their livelihoods. In the same areas, competition for water is fierce between local people and agriculture, particularly avocado producers. So as the impacts of the climate crisis become more intense, we can expect more displacement and more unrest. Not just in Chile but around the world.

But it’s not just the direct effects of climate change that have the potential to cause social instability. The way we respond to those effects – if done without care and consent – can threaten even more social turbulence.

In order to achieve the Paris Agreement goal – limiting warming to 1.5C – the global community needs transformations that are unprecedented in scale and scope. Only recently we heard from the UN that, to reach this target, the world needs to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases every year by about 7%. Part of the work that needs to be accomplished by this climate meeting and the next one, which will be held in Glasgow in 2020, is that countries must become much more ambitious about their commitments.

Can we implement these transformations without addressing all the other social challenges that our countries face? Clearly not. The Chilean crisis illustrates this very vividly, highlighting the great social, economic and environmental obstacles ahead of us. Climate emergency plus growing inequality is a recipe for chaos.

We can see what happens when those whose social demands have been ignored are asked to contribute to the climate effort: the gilets jaunes (yellow vests)movement in France grew up in response to rising fuel prices. Protests in Ecuador, over an end to fuel subsidies, brought the capital Quito to a standstill and forced the government to back down. These, along with events in Santiago, demonstrate that we need to pay attention to social and cultural impacts, too. ... 

The good news is that addressing social issues alongside the climate crisis has the potential to generate powerful, long-lasting solutions. In Chile, one of the measures to achieve carbon neutrality is phasing out coal power plants. The closures come with a host of benefits, from better air quality to – eventually – cheaper energy. Those who work in the industry, however, are naturally concerned about their employment rights. If the government can support the community through the transition, they will emerge into a better, cleaner and safer future. In other words, making sure “no one is left behind” is key.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/08/un-conference-glob...

CBC reports that Jason Kenney said in the Canadian Club he wants Alberta to be the place in the world that removes the last barrel of oil taken from the ground. Of course he received a large round of applause in the elitist Canadian Club. However, this mentality will leave Alberta in the same position as the buggy whip industry as automobiles appeared on the scene. Those oil producers who do not start transitioning away from oil will be left with the debris of abandoned and shut-down oil wells eventually. There already are "estimated 93,000 inactive wells in Alberta" (https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/columnists/varcoe-alberta-seeks-ottawa...).According to the  Alberta Energy Regulator (AER), "Cleaning up the Alberta oilpatch could cost an estimated $260 billion, internal regulatory documents warn". Since only "The government, meanwhile, has only collected $1.6 billion in liability security from companies", the taxpayer is on the hook for nearly all the clean costs (https://globalnews.ca/news/4617664/cleaning-up-albertas-oilpatch-could-c...). In fact, Kenney is asking for federal tax money for the clean up, arguing it will provide jobs for laid-off oil workers. 

The staggering financial liabilities for the energy industry’s mining waste and graveyard of spent facilities were spelled out by a high-ranking official of the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) i

Instead Kenney also described five demands to help expand the Alberta oil industry, many of them involving taxpayer subsidies of course.  

The Trudeau Liberals government said it is considering exempting new oilsands developments from a federal review if Kenney maintains a cap on emissions. Since any provincial review under Kenney would end in an automatic go-ahead, this would be a license to produce significantly more oil.

Speaking at a lunchtime reception in Ottawa, Kenney said for decades Alberta has been an outsized contributor to the Canadian economy and the federal treasury, and now it's time for Ottawa to lend some support by implementing a five-point plan Kenney has dubbed the "fair deal for Alberta." ...

Chief among Kenney's demands is a promise to set a "firm, fixed and fast deadline" for the completion of the Trans Mountain expansion pipeline project. The expansion, which will nearly triple the amount of Alberta oil moving to the B.C. coast. ...

Kenney is also formally asking the federal Liberal government to lift a cap on fiscal stabilization program that helps provinces facing a short-term cash crunch. The program, which is administered by Finance Minister Bill Morneau, provides financial assistance to any province faced with a year-over-year decline in its non-resource revenues greater than five per cent. However, the money available to eligible provinces is capped at $60 per resident — something Kenney said is inadequate given the size of the budget deficit the province is facing after oil prices cratered. ...

The third demand is for Ottawa to repeal Bill C-48, which forbids crude-laden ships from docking at ports in the B.C. north. He said the legislation unfairly targets Alberta and severely limits pipeline export capacity.

Kenney is also seeking a "substantial amendment" to Bill C-69. He said his principal concern is with the legislation "projects list," the criteria Ottawa uses to determine which proposed natural resources developments should go through a federal environmental review. Under the legislation passed in the last Parliament, Kenney said, the Liberal government has created a "bureaucratic morass". ...

Kenney wants Ottawa to exempt some projects that fall under provincial jurisdiction — most importantly oilsands projects in Alberta — from a mandatory federal review. The federal government has said it would consider exempting new oilsands developments if Kenney maintains a cap on emissions from the sector. ...

The fourth demand is for Ottawa to expand flow-through shares, a financial instrument used by resources companies to raise capital, so that firms can raise more money to build developments like carbon capture projects or to help pay for the decommissioning of spent oil and gas wells.

Lastly, Kenney wants Ottawa to accept Alberta's methane reduction regulations. The province has said its plan to curb methane from the oilpatch is just as effective as, but less costly than what the federal government has proposed to impose on the province.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/jason-kenney-ottawa-visit-five-point-pl...

Volkswagen could enter plea in charges for faking emissions tests

quote:

"At the hearing, the parties will submit for the court's consideration a proposed plea resolution and seek its approval," the statement said. "The details of the proposed plea resolution will be presented at the hearing."

Environment Canada officials published notice of the charges Monday, but said they won't comment further because the matter is before the courts.

Environment Canada's investigation, launched in September 2015, was repeatedly criticized by environmental experts and lawyers for taking too long.

The company pleaded guilty in U.S. court in 2017 for violating American laws and was fined $4.3 billion. In 2018, German prosecutors fined the company one-billion euros for the emissions cheating case, which some dubbed "dieselgate" because it involved Volkswagen's diesel engines.

Several Volkswagen executives and managers involved in the deception were charged in the U.S. and Germany, and some have already been sent to prison.

In total, the elaborate scheme has cost the company more than US$30 billion in legal fines and civic lawsuits as well as compensation to customers who returned the affected cars for refunds or exchanges.

Greta Thunberg has won Time's Person of the Year Award, reflecting the growing impact of young people's demand for quick and strong action on global warming. 

"She became the biggest voice on the biggest issue facing the planet this year, coming from essentially nowhere to lead a worldwide movement," Time editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal told the show, adding that Thunberg is the magazine's youngest choice ever to be named Person of the Year. ...

Her initiative to strike galvanized students to protest against climate change throughout Europe and that momentum quickly fanned across the globe, becoming the “Fridays For Future" movement.

Her solo protest, Fensenthal noted, eventually prompted millions of people in 150 countries "to act on behalf of the planet."

He also said that Thunberg "represents a broader generational shift in the culture" — with youth standing up for what they believe in — from Hong Kong to Chile.

"Young people are demanding change, and urgently," Felsenthal said. "She embodies youth activism."

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/greta-thunberg-time-s-2019-person-y...