From The Pembina Institute, this commentary on new figures released (very quietly) by the Canadian government on this country’s rising greenhouse gas emissions:
Yesterday afternoon, Environment Canada very quietly posted on its website the annual Climate Change Plan r equired by the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act. This is an important document because it’s the only place where the government provides a full list of its measures to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and estimates the emission reductions from each measure.
The plan reveals the following:
The government now expects Canada’s emissions to continue rising every year from 2009 to 2012, even with federal measures in place (p. 34). Six years after taking office, the government will still not have achieved absolute reductions in Canada’s emissions, despite having proclaimed in 2007 that it would be “Turning the Corner” and getting emissions to decline “as early as 2010 and no later than 2012.”
Click here to read the full article.
Meanwhile, Geoffrey Simpson blasted the Harper government’s performance on climate change in the Globe and Mail today, calling Canada a “climate change miscreant”:
Try as it might, the government could not put lipstick on a pig. The numbers were there, stark and depressing, in an annual report required by all signatories to the original Kyoto Protocol. The bottom line: The world is right to consider Canada a climate-change miscreant.
On Canadian soil, two world leaders have recently urged Canada to do more. Mexican President Felipe Calderon and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon both made that pitch, implicitly criticizing Canada’s bad record. Their critiques are rooted in recent history, stretching back to the Liberal governments of Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin. The critiques remain valid today, which is why Canada has no credibility whatsoever internationally on the climate-change file.
According to the government’s own numbers, actual emissions will grow in absolute terms in every year from 2009 to 2012…Click here to read the full story.
Our country is capable of so much more than we are doing right now. Canada, under Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, led on addressing the depletion of the ozone layer and stopping acid rain. There is no reason a Conservative government should oppose “conserving” essential things like our environment – unless they are so deeply in the pocket of the oil patch that they can’t see the light of day, or a brighter greener future for Canadians.
Bill C311 continues its journey through the senate, with the partisan debate indicating that the Conservatives, who outnumber the other senators, could scuttle the will of the elected House of Commons. Please take the time to call or email Conservative senators today, to let them know, for the sake of the planet and our children, Bill C311 needs to pass. For contact info and sample letters, go to the “How to Contact Senators re: Bill C311” page.
Meanwhile, if you are feeling in the mood for some dark humour, check out this recent posting from “The Onion” on a new eco-friendly cigarette that helps climate change by “killing off the number one threat to Mother Earth”. Click here to see the article.