Ottawa praises three provinces set to introduce cap-and-trade system

The federal Conservative government says it is pleased to learn Canada’s three largest provinces are working independently with two U.S. states to introduce a cap-and-trade system that would put a price tag on greenhouse-gas emissions.

But critics say the government is happy only because the provincial action will reduce the pressure for a national cap-and trade program – something that would not play well in Alberta.

It was announced on Tuesday that Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia will join with California and New Mexico, as part of the Western Climate Initiative, to impose a system of caps on large industrial emitters starting as early as January, 2012. Companies that produce more emissions than allowed would be required to buy credits from companies that emit less.

The decision by the three provinces and two states comes a week after a similar plan was abandoned by the U.S. Senate.

“We support the actions taken by all the government’s partners to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions,” Frederic Baril, a spokesman for Canadian Environment Minister Jim Prentice, said Wednesday. “The development of a cap-and-trade system in the context of the Western Climate Initiative represents a positive step forward and it’s not incompatible with our own initiatives.”

Mr. Prentice has talked about introducing a federal system in Canada. But he has also made it clear it will not happen unless the Americans act first. Democrats in the U.S. Senate conceded last week they do not have the numbers to push through a cap-and-trade program on that side of the border.

Linda Duncan, the environment critic for the NDP, says she believes U.S. President Barack Obama can use his administrative power to legislate a cap-and-trade system without the support of Congress. But the initiative is off the table in the United States for now, and it is unclear if it will be revisited.

Critics say the Canadian government’s decision to follow the Americans on environmental issues allows the Conservatives to dodge action on climate change – and the move by the provinces to go it alone on cap-and-trade provides just one more reason for them to stand pat.

“It gets them off the hot seat,” said John Bennett, the executive director of the Sierra Club of Canada, an environmental lobby group. “They have been trying to avoid action on climate change since they got elected.… so they are saying if someone else is doing it we don’t have to, and we don’t have to go back to our base in Alberta and tell them they have to do it.”

David McGuinty, the Liberal environment critic, said the government first decided it would hide behind the Obama regime, and now the provinces are another “shield of convenience.”

“It’s all about putting a price on carbon emissions,” Mr. McGuinty said. “This is the petard in which they have been hoisted because they went so hard against pricing carbon in the last election campaign. If they were to call for a cap-and-trade now, they would be accused of hiking energy prices and taxes.”

Canada and the U.S. will continue to set harmonized emissions standards on a sector-by-sector basis – a process that began this year with proposed regulations to cover vehicles. But the Pembina Institute, another environmental lobby group, will hold a news conference Thursday to release a study that it says shows the regulations may have little or no effect

Author/Source: Gloria Galloway, Globe and Mail
URL: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-praises-three-provinces-set-to-introduce-cap-and-trade-system/article1655271/