| The Alberta government is fighting the federal government’s plans to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA).
Unde the act, the federal government can establish caps on emissions of pollutants considered to be toxic to the environment or human health, and industry members who don’t meet the targets can face financial penalties.
The federal government is still reviewing public input on the proposaland hasn’t made a decision yet on whether to implement it. The provincial government opposes the idea.
Robert Moyles, spokesperson for Alberta Environment, says Alberta already has a plan in place to deal with climate change – the Climate Change and Emissions Management Act. Moyles says the province is also working on specific regulations that will govern GHG emissions.
"The environment is provincial jurisdiction. It’s shared really, but we believe Alberta is in the best position to regulate its own industry," says Moyles.
Under the Climate Change and Emissions Management Act, the provincial government focuses on reducing GHG intensity (emissions related to GDP) rather than overall reductions.
"It’s a way of balancing economic productivity with emissions reductions," says Moyles. "Kyoto’s targets and timelines are not realistic."
Stephen Hazell, conservation director of the Sierra Club of Canada, says Alberta’s climate change plan isn’t adequate.
"The real problem is the absolute amount of greenhouse gas emissions being emitted into the atmosphere must be reduced. It’s just madness otherwise," says Hazell.
"What’s likely to happen in Alberta is, with tar sands development, you’re going to see gigantic increases in greenhouse gas emissions over the next 10 to 20 years…. If Alberta itself was not going to be affected by climate change in the future, then you might well say, ‘OK we’re incredibly selfish and we’re just going to go out and develop our tar sands because we don’t care what happens to the rest of the world because it’s not going to bother us,’ but that’s not the case."
He points out that Alberta is already experiencing droughts and there are concerns about water shortages as river flows become lower. He argues that the federal government plan is "the right way to go."
"It’s important that we have the regulations that apply nationally. We have international commitments under the Kyoto Protocol. We have to be seen to be meeting our commitments," says Hazell.
Moyles says the province does acknowledge climate change and will create legislation that has "compliance mechanisms" for industries that don’t achieve Alberta targets.
"We would work to our own targets and we set those out well before Canada signed on to Kyoto. It’s up to the federal government to determine how they live up to agreements that they’ve signed," says Moyles.
A recent report released by the David Suzuki Foundation noted that Alberta is the number one GHG emitter in the country. The provincial climate change plan will allow GHG emissions to increase by 33 per cent above 1990 levels by 2020. Under Kyoto, Canada is required to reduce GHG emissions by six per cent below 1990 levels between 2008 and 2012. The report also noted that GHG emissions from the oil and gas industry rose by 33 per cent between 1990 and 2003.
Matthew Bramley, director of the Pembina Institute’s climate change program, says it’s "essential" that GHG emissions get added to CEPA.
"The federal government has gone ahead and said it wants to set mandatory greenhouse gas targets for large industry and it’s said that CEPA is its preferred legislation to use to do that," says Bramley. "If greenhouse gases are not added to CEPA very soon, essentially the federal Kyoto plan collapses."
A spokesperson for Environment Canada told Fast Forward the federal government isn’t commenting on the issue because it’s still reviewing public feedback on the proposed amendment to CEPA. |
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