Barry Saxifrage
Climate Analyst | Vancouver
About Barry Saxifrage
Barry Saxifrage is Canada's National Observer's resident chart geek and climate analyst. In his visual carbon columns, Saxifrage deconstructs the data behind global warming and Canada's climate targets, as he charts international progress and graphically documents failures by industry and governments. His work is cited frequently by academics and climate publications internationally, including by George Monbiot in The Guardian, Yale Climate Connections, Bill McKibben's New Yorker newsletter, The Times Colonist, and many others. When he's not analyzing the corporate reports of major oil companies or comparing Canada's government's promises against Canada's actual emissions, Saxifrage is an avid soccer player.
Canada’s failure to cut emissions is coming back to bite us
Decades of rising emissions are saddling Canadians with ever-steeper climate targets. And columnist Barry Saxifrage has the receipts.
Canada’s Top 10 emission changes show what’s worked and what’s failed
To paraphrase Winston Churchill, those who fail to learn from their climate polluting history are doomed to repeat it, writes columnist Barry Saxifrage.
Wrong-way Canada emitting more while our G7 peers clean up
Canada is the only G7 nation still emitting far above 1990 levels — and we are still heading in the wrong direction, writes columnist Barry Saxifrage.
High gas prices? Some Canadians are filling up for under 35 cents a ‘litre’
Columnist Barry Saxifrage breaks down how much it costs right now to power a car with gasoline versus electricity in cities across Canada.
How B.C.’s forests became a carbon-spewing liability
British Columbia's valuable carbon sink is gone. Its forests are hemorrhaging CO2. And the wood harvested from the province is now adding fuel to our climate crisis.
Climate snapshot: Driving off the climate cliff in Alberta versus Norway
Same number of new cars. Five times more CO2 to drive them around.
Climate snapshot: Bay du Nord
The International Energy Agency has clearly stated that no new sources of fossil fuels can be developed if humanity wants to keep the climate crisis within the guardrails set in the global Paris Agreement. The oil industry in Canada, however, shows no sign it plans to do what's needed voluntarily.
‘Electrify homes’? Canadians sticking with fossil methane
This is the final article in a three-part series on "Electrify Everything" in Canada. It covers one of our most electrified sectors: Residential buildings.
‘Electrify transport’? Canadians stomp on the gas instead
This is the second article in three-part series on "Electrify Everything" in Canada. It covers our least electrified sector: transportation. (Spoiler alert: Fossil burning is rising hundreds of times faster than electricity use).
‘Electrify everything’? Canada cranks fossil burning instead
The climate crisis requires we "electrify everything." But in Canada, we're cranking up fossil fuel burning instead. Barry Saxifrage takes us on a chart-filled tour of where we are in our climate-required energy transition.