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BC VIEWS: 㽶ƵֱClimate action㽶Ƶֱ charade continues

Premier Christy Clark rushed by the Justin Trudeau government to come up with a new greenhouse gas plan
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Environment Minister Mary Polak and Premier Christy Clark announce climate advisory committee at General Fusion

The moving deadline for B.C.㽶Ƶֱs latest bold plan to control Earth㽶Ƶֱs weather with taxes has slid from March into June.

Now that Premier Christy Clark has jetted back from her latest liquefied natural gas sales trip to Korea and Japan, brace yourself for the big reveal of Climate Action 2.0, as the second stage of B.C.㽶Ƶֱs strategy has been termed.

The pending LNG industry is just one problem for this reality-challenged scheme to maintain B.C.㽶Ƶֱs self-declared global climate leadership.

Clark㽶Ƶֱs 㽶ƵֱClimate Leadership Team,㽶Ƶֱ a mix of industry, academic, environmental and aboriginal representatives, was appointed a year ago to make recommendations for the next step. It concluded that B.C. isn㽶Ƶֱt going to reach its 2020 emissions reduction target, even if the government implements the team㽶Ƶֱs recommendation to resume steep increases in the carbon tax starting in 2018.

B.C.㽶Ƶֱs carbon tax and its questionable 㽶Ƶֱcarbon neutral government㽶Ƶֱ program have not reduced the province㽶Ƶֱs greenhouse gas emissions in recent years. They㽶Ƶֱre going up, and it doesn㽶Ƶֱt take a rocket scientist to figure out why.

Tacking seven cents onto the price of a litre of gasoline may have had an effect at a time when fuel prices were high. That and a global recession actually did reduce B.C.㽶Ƶֱs greenhouse gas emissions for a while.

Then Saudi Arabia decided to depress the world price of oil, cancelling any carbon tax effect for people driving up to the pumps in B.C. and stimulating fuel demand around the world.

Now our population and economic growth are rising again, along with carbon emissions. And LNG production and export can only add to that increase.

The urgency to create was so Clark could join Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on a triumphant visit to Paris last winter to work out the latest international climate deal. Trudeau then started to let his own urgent climate crisis deadline slip back.

This routine has been going on since Jean Chrétien signed Canada up for its first fantasy target in Kyoto, Japan almost 20 years ago. And the prospects for Paris don㽶Ƶֱt look much different.

Don㽶Ƶֱt take my word for it. Nicholas Rivers, Canada Research Chair in Climate and Energy Policy at the University of Ottawa, wrote last week of the Paris deal: 㽶ƵֱThese targets essentially require that developed countries such as Canada completely eliminate greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 or shortly after.㽶Ƶֱ

㽶ƵֱCompletely eliminate.㽶Ƶֱ Not only does that mean an end to the oil and gas industry, it means no more air travel, unless somebody comes up with a battery-powered airliner pretty soon.

Note that Rivers is describing the actions expected of developed countries. China has agreed that its steeply rising greenhouse gases will level off 㽶Ƶֱaround 2030,㽶Ƶֱ according to the pathetically one-sided deal negotiated by U.S. President Barack Obama in 2014.

Trudeau has decided that provinces must find their own path to a carbon-free Utopia. Alberta has moved ahead with its own carbon tax, loaded onto the energy industry in the midst of a collapse. Its main effect will likely be to send the Alberta NDP back to the opposition benches.

Ontario is considering a ban on coal for power and natural gas for home heating, plus huge subsidies for electric cars. This should continue the upward spiral of electricity prices in that hapless, mismanaged province, which has already seen runaway subsidies to wind power and cancellation of gas-fired power plants.

Here in pre-election B.C., take everything you hear about healing the planet with a grain of salt.

Tom Fletcher is B.C. legislature reporter and columnist for Black Press. Email: tfletcher@blackpress.ca Twitter: @tomfletcherbc

 





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