Support strong Canadian climate journalism for 2025
The preferred strategy for fossil fuel-producing countries in the age of decarbonization is becoming more apparent every day. Encourage and enjoy the economic boom of a wholesale greening in their own economy while planning on being one of the last producers standing and exporting the hell out of their fossil fuel reserves and refined products.
Norway has been at this for years, and a recent Globe and Mail editorial tells us their strategy is the way of the future for Canada. “Norway aims to cash in on oil and gas for years to come, including through exports to Europe… But Norway has a green reputation because it’s also committed to sharply reducing emissions across the economy…”
Let’s call this approach that combines greening a domestic economy while increasing exports of fossil fuels the Norwegian model.
The U.S. has grown into the largest oil and natural gas producer on the planet while making substantial decreases in carbon emissions since 2005 (the Paris Agreement base year), achieving a 20 per cent reduction as of 2020. They’ve also emerged as a huge exporter of oil and gas, for example, going from zero crude exports in 2010 to almost four million barrels per day in July of this year. They’ve been very successful in implementing the Norwegian model.
Another example that fits the model is the much-ballyhooed U.S. climate change action bill, the Inflation Reduction Act. It includes large subsidies for electric vehicle (EV) purchases and other tax credit measures designed to decarbonize the U.S. economy. But one of the centrepieces is subsidies for the oil and gas industry to implement carbon sequestering to decarbonize emissions during the production phase while producing products that emit many times more CO2 when consumed. As well, the act opens up access for new drilling on millions of acres of federal lands and offshore areas.
Our PM has also been trying to get Canada to emulate the Norwegian model. He’s bought the ancient Trans Mountain pipeline and is building an overpriced new bitumen pipeline to the West Coast to complement it. He’s also approved major expansions in our offshore oil and gas production, given big tax credits for carbon sequestering for our oilsands industry to greenwash our bitumen, and approved GHG-spewing LNG facilities. Justin Trudeau’s actions say he meant it when he said, “No country would find 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground and leave them there.”
Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault when asked in interviews how he reconciles decarbonizing our domestic economy while promoting the production and exporting of high-carbon material from this country has a response that is basically, “Hey, the UN IPCC doesn’t say we can’t.” Which may remind you of this quote from Stephen Harper about asbestos exports in 2011: “This government will not put Canadian industry in a position where it is discriminated against in a market where it is permitted.”
Despite being such a fossil fuel-friendly administration, the federal Liberals are portrayed as the opposite by Canadian fossil fuel proponents and get no credit with them for these actions.
On the other hand, the Trudeau government has implemented a too-low-to-be-effective carbon tax and taken a Paris target we couldn’t possibly meet in 2030 and doubled down on it. And despite all the green rhetoric, their track record is abysmal; there have been no actual emissions reductions since they took office in 2015 (ignoring 2020 pandemic effects).
To be somewhat fair, after seven years in power, the Trudeau government is finally getting more serious on climate change initiatives, with plans to ramp up the carbon price to where it should be able to influence consumer decisions, implementing a low-carbon fuels standard that could change the way fuels are supplied in this country and having serious talks about a cap on emissions in the oil and gas sector.
Unfortunately for these policies, a recent Ipsos poll found 27 per cent of Canadians don’t worry at all about climate change and another 32 per cent worry “a little,” suggesting well over half of Canadians aren’t that concerned. This suggests aggressive complex policies won’t likely be widely supported by public opinion.
It’s a big opening for new Conservative Party of Canada Leader Pierre Poilievre, and he knows it. He’ll continue the Liberals’ policies of promoting fossil fuel production, but unlike the Liberals, he’ll get credit for it. He’ll also soft pedal domestic climate change action since it isn’t seen as a priority for a large portion of the population.
For those of us who want substantial climate change action in Canada, the last seven years have been a major disappointment and that disappointment seems likely to continue into the future.
Comments
Disappointment is an understatement of course. It's terrifying. But you've described it well, this Bizarro world brought to us courtesy of "lies and the lying liars that tell them" to quote Al Franken.
Watching talking heads on politics yesterday where Nik Nanos proudly, weirdly presented poll results showing conservatives pulling ahead of the Liberals AFTER watching the few minutes of question period I could tolerate where a smirking, sneering Poilievre attacked the carbon tax as a "triple triple triple tax," repeating his "clever" slogan gleefully THREE more times like the thoroughly obnoxious kid he is with his trademark low-drama sports guy monotone even after Trudeau, clearly the adult in the "conversation" pointed out that slogans won't address the climate change crisis. But conservatives are the people who don't really "believe" climate change is "real." And don't forget that these are the same people of which a disproportionate number believe that somehow, inexplicably, a god, a heaven, and probably a devil actually exist. They are also the party where a disproportionate number are "pro-life."
Trudeau does have a compulsion to leap eagerly to his feet with earnest declarations about being "behind Canadians every step of the way" and annoying as that earnestness apparently is to a growing group of people, that's not really the point is it? Being overly earnest is hardly, like, EVIL. I think he does genuinely care about improving quality of life for more people so is simply the better person, but more importantly he's fronting the far superior political party that got us through the pandemic admirably. His Achilles heel is how much he also happens to love the fight and the gamesmanship of politics.
I don't know how much longer it will take before the better people, the progressive Liberals and NDP seal the deal and admit that what's happening with conservatives at this important juncture is dead serious and dangerous. Because an astonishing number of people seem to have lost perspective entirely, and again, weirdly at a time when it's never been more black and white.
It is indeed about lies and the lying liars that tell them. But more specifically, it is about plutocrats and the lying liars they finance. This nonsense would be a weird little ghetto on the internet frequented by a few crackpots, a Flat Earth Society thing, if there weren't a lot of money behind it.
The economic status quo is becoming less and less tenable for a host of reasons, the main ones being climate change and the fact that highly unequal societies and economies are unstable. As the rich, having largely captured most governments, drive more and more inequality, people start to get pissed off. Some of the rich are well aware that if people get pissed off, and identify the real, obvious culprits for the stuff that's pissing them off, that could lead to major threats to the hyper-wealthy and their wealth. For a long time they put their faith in the political and media establishment whitewashing everything and convincing people they've never had it so good, or the rising tide that lifts all boats is just around the corner, or as those wore thin falling back on the idea that "the economy" is just like that and they'll have to be resigned to things sucking.
But some of those at the top have concluded that that isn't going to be good enough, the anger cannot be appeased. The traditional remedy, fascism, involves finding some scapegoats that aren't rich (or, if they are rich, are only a few very specific rich people--conspiracy theory rather than class analysis) and redirecting the anger at those scapegoats. And since those scapegoats are factually, and fairly obviously, not to blame, the way to convince people of them is to use emotion, repetition (the big lie) and appeal to pre-existing prejudice. That's basically what the modern right is about now, Pierre Poutine--ah, Poilievre--being just one example. But the playbook, the tactics, should not be mistaken for the driver, the cause--the cause is people with a ton of money finding a way to redirect anger and discontent away from themselves, in such a way that even if that anger drives major changes (e.g. to fascist dictatorship) it will not threaten their wealth and power. In the old days they used newspapers, mass membership political parties and so on; now they use bots and paid sock puppets on social media, but the basic approach and the objective are the same.
Alberta Finance Minister Travis Toews’s 2022 provincial budget speech: “Global oil demand is expected to exceed pre-pandemic levels in 2022 and many expect it will continue to increase for the next several decades. Given the increased demand for oil, we have an opportunity and, indeed, a responsibility to maximize production."
Online comment: "The world is forecast to continue using oil for many years to come. Therefore, as long as the world is going to consume oil and gas products, Canada should get a piece of the action."
Online comment: "Every barrel you keep in the ground here promotes Russian and middle eastern oil where they don't give a sh$#t about women being abused or damage to the environment. Going to be a lot of oil used still for a lot of years, choice is which country it comes from Russia/Saudi or Canada..."
I.e., as long as the world is consuming hydrocarbons, Canada may as well be one of the suppliers.
As long as the world is sprinting for the climate cliff, Canada may as well join the race.
The fossil-fuel trap.
Some call it the Norwegian model. Others call it the drug-dealer argument: "If addicts don't buy from me, they'll just buy from the guy down the street." Oddly enough, that argument doesn't fly in court.
A prescription for climate disaster.
"Now, you can still make the argument that the production would have happened somewhere else. And that leads us to the general issue that climate change is a global collective action problem. We can always ensure that we will fail if we say "If I act to try to save us, others will just compensate." By that logic, we all go to hell together."
(Mark Jaccard, SFU energy economist, February 21, 2018)
In a carbon-constrained world, AB's high-carbon, energy- and water-intensive, low-value, sour heavy crude should be near the bottom of the list to meet demand.
Even using the industry's gross under-estimates, Canada's oilpatch is the fourth most carbon-intensive on the planet, behind Algeria, Venezuela, and Cameroon. Canada's rating is nearly twice the global average.
Rystad Energy: "Among the top 10 oil and gas producing countries, Canada had the highest CO2 emission intensity per barrel of oil equivalent."
Canada's average crude carbon intensity is more than twice the global average. Almost double Iran. Nearly triple Russia. More than triple the U.S. 4x Saudi Arabia and Qatar. 5.5x Norway and the UAE.
“Hey, the UN IPCC doesn’t say we can’t.”
Actually, the IPCC has been crystal clear on this point.
The 2018 IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C warns that the world must nearly halve GHG emissions by 2030 and eliminate them by 2050 to keep warming below the danger limit of 1.5 C.
The IEA's Net-Zero by 2050 report prescribes no new investment in fossil fuels after 2021 to limit global warming to 1.5 C.
No science-based climate plan includes doubling down on fossil fuels.
*
Belot: "Unfortunately for these policies, a recent Ipsos poll found 27% of Canadians don’t worry at all about climate change and another 32% worry 'a little,' suggesting well over half of Canadians aren’t that concerned. This suggests aggressive complex policies won’t likely be widely supported by public opinion."
Hence the need for climate leadership. Woefully lacking in Ottawa.
A climate leader persuades the public that climate action is in their best interest. Instead, Trudeau explains why building oilsands export pipelines is in our best interest. Why it's in our best interest to fail on climate.
Unfortunately, Trudeau has been very persuasive on that point.
Yeah, again, all true, but what is YOUR solution at this point in time?
Don't vote for failure.
Send the Liberals a message:
"We will vote for you if you take climate change seriously and stop propping up the O&G industry. Until then, no thanks. We are not buying what you are selling. We will not vote for climate disaster."
Vote for the status quo, and the status quo is what you get.
If progressives continue to reward the Liberals with their vote, the Liberals have no reason to change. If the Liberals can count on the progressive vote, they will take continue to take progressive voters for granted.
The only leverage voters have over political parties is their vote (and donations of time and money). If you want change, you have to vote for it.
Hopes that the Liberals will change their minds if progressives keep voting for them are empty — wishful thinking. No evidence that the Liberals offer any prospect but long-term failure on the climate file.
Hopes that the Liberals will change course are unfounded. Why would they change when progressives continue to vote for them? A vote for Trudeau's Liberals rewards them for past failure — and guarantees future failure.
Doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results… If progressives continue to reward the Liberals with their vote, the Liberals have no reason to change. If the Liberals can count on the progressive vote, they will take continue to take progressive voters for granted.
Progressives should not support any party or politicians who lead us over the climate cliff.
Agreed. There are more than two parties here and we can vote for the least worst - but we shouldn't, of course, wait for an election to tell the Liberals that they're pathetic on the climate file. Those who actually know what's happening have a very strong reason to act on that knowledge.