Canada's Environment and Climate Change Minister Catherine McKenna hopes to drum up clean technology business for Canadian companies during a trade mission she is leading to China from Dec. 5-8.
"I’m really excited about my trade mission to China," McKenna told reporters in Ottawa on Friday. "They need solutions and it’s a $23 trillion opportunity. Canada needs to be there. I’m certainly going to be there with Canadian business leaders from a variety of different sectors ranging from the mining sector to carbon capture and storage to renewables."
McKenna's description of the whopping $23 trillion opportunity was based on an estimate from the International Finance Corporation (IFC), a division of the World Bank Group that offers financial services for economic development.
A clean technology business delegation will join her on the trip, McKenna's office said in a statement. The Canadian minister will also attend high level meetings with her counterparts and serve as the international executive vice chair at a meeting of the China Council on Environmental Cooperation and Development, her office added.
The IFC found that these investments opportunities were generated after the international community agreed on the Paris Agreement on climate change in 2015, a pact that just came into force this fall. The estimate was based on national climate change goals and promises from 21 emerging-market economies that represent nearly half of all global emissions. For Asian countries like China, the report found that there were $16 trillion worth of investment opportunities for green buildings.
McKenna said that she and her business delegation would also be trying to promote recent Saskatchewan investments in technology for coal power plants that capture carbon pollution in the air and then bury it underground.
"Everyone understands that we need all solutions when it comes to tackling climate change," Mckenna said. "I’ve had great discussions with my Chinese counterpart on the climate file. We’ve worked extremely closely together and so we certainly want to continue showing leadership on that file."
She added that Chinese leaders were looking for solutions across the board to tackle both climate change and their concerns about air quality.
"They are looking at renewables and they have taken very significant steps when it comes to renewables whether it’s wind or solar," she said. "Nuclear is a possible option. I think it’s really just saying 'look at Canada.' We’ve got solutions here. We have really great business leaders that are willing to work with the Chinese, with the Chinese government, with Chinese companies because it’s good for both of us."
Comments
Trade missions to China? Recall when Jean Cretien's government went to china?
The first trip was 1996. Then in 2001, dear Jean Chrétien went again on a really big junket with around 600 business "leaders," eight provincial premiers, three territorial leaders, Minister for International Trade Pierre Pettigrew and Secretary of State Rey Pagtakhan.
We were promised lots of jobs for regular Canadians. How'd that work out?
Regular Canadian working stiffs--the folks who pay taxes--footed the bill for the junkets and had their good paying jobs off-shored.
We must be clear: after 40 years of neo-liberalism (de-regulation, financialization, union-busting, tax breaks for corporations and the 1%, public enterprises sold off to private interests, etc.) the system is not delivering the goods to ordinary Canadians.
This junket? They are trying to sell it as a wonderful opportunity for Canada but the track record of successive Canadian governments says otherwise.
You've nailed it. Sadly, we get to watch Trump to the south of us, try to double down on policies that created the problems which led to his election. They won't work, but then, when they've trashed the last rivers and aquifers they depend on, they can always form a refugee conga line to Canada.
In the last analysis, its fossil fuels that are intent on making fossils of the lot of us...and as quickly as possible.
Neo-liberalism has worked hard in this regard. If we don't shut it down soon, their trade junkets are going to take place across scorched earth zones. Luckily, they have those private jets! And lots of cool rhetoric coming out of the mouths of pretty rich kids...about sunny ways. Solar panels?? Not so much.
If we've got so many solutions how come we are not using them instead of planning to pump as much dirty petroleum products as possible before we start to go green. Go green here Minister. NOW!!
Yes. And let Canadians do it, not Chinese billionaires. The idea that foreign investment comes into your country to do good is about as deluded as it gets. But those of us addicted to easy money, and too busy counting our future assets to understand dispute mechanisms designed to protect those foreign investors should Canadians want to pass a law that hurts the investors bottom line........can be gulled.
Again and again and again. Addiction works that way.
How many damn trips does this government need to make to China on our dime?
Trudeau and the family were just there at the end of August. Was that trip just sight seeing, that Mckenna and her entourage have to go again 3 months later?
How many trips to the trough does it take?
She's joking, right? Is anyone in that government aware of how hypocritical it looks to be claiming they'll help sell green technology when their own energy policies are now helping to push the Paris Climate Agreement into oblivion?