TALK is cheap. Since 1997 Canada has signed five global climate deals pledging to lower its greenhouse-gas emissions. However, it has never implemented a national climate plan. Instead, its ten provinces and three territories have mostly been free to do their own thing.
Provinces rich in hydropower, such as Quebec and Ontario, made big strides, and British Columbia (BC) even introduced a carbon tax. However, big fossil-fuel producers such as Alberta sat on their hands. The results were predictably disappointing. In 1990, the base year for the Kyoto accord, national emissions were 613m tonnes. By 2014 they had risen to 732m tonnes, the world’s ninth-highest total. Canada withdrew from Kyoto in 2011 after deciding that its targets were unattainable.
But following nearly two decades of inaction, Canada may have reached a turning point. On December 9th Justin Trudeau, the prime minister, and 11 of 13 provincial and territorial leaders announced that they had agreed on a national climate framework. The deal combines disparate provincial efforts, and overlays them with two federal imperatives: by 2018 each province must have in place either a...Continue reading
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