Bill C-30 (39th Parliament, 1st Session) Committee on Feb. 27th, 2007

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

But my question was more specific. Who has to build the pipeline network in Alberta and who has to pay for this network?

[Stephen Kaufman]

Our view is that the entire system for carbon capture and storage, which we call ICON, is not commercial right now. We believe that both the federal and provincial governments, along with industrial companies that would use the system, need to collaborate on having it built.

On who would physically own and operate the pipeline, we haven't come up with any recommendations on that. We emphasize that an entire system like this won't be funded through direct market actions in the foreseeable future, so the government needs to play a role in coming up with some incentives or funding to assist in getting it started.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Are you talking about the federal government, or the provincial government?

[Stephen Kaufman]

We're talking about both governments, and we have had ongoing discussions with both the federal government and the provincial government in Alberta on this subject.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. Lewin, you referred to a 65% target by 2050. This is a long-term target.

First, is this percentage based on data from 1990 or 2003?

[Dr. David Lewin]

We use the base year 2003.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

The year 2003. Do you also have short- and medium-term targets?

[Dr. David Lewin]

Yes, as an industry we've been looking at the short- and mid-term targets. The short-term target, starting around 2010, would be 5%. It would run to 10% by 2020, and then drop dramatically, because that's when our industry capital stock turnover would really begin to take place. There would be a dramatic drop then to probably around 20% or 25%. Then it would decline over the remaining period until 2050 to between 50% and 65%.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Lazar, I listened carefully when you talked about the role of forests, but I question part of this role.

In addition to ensuring the modification, planting or reforestation of the forests that are harvested, will the forestry industry also consider the possibility of encouraging individuals and municipalities to take part in a tree-planting program? Have you already considered contributing by providing plants to communities to increase the forest cover in Canada?

[Avrim Lazar]

The overall forest cover in Canada is now 91%, or what it was at the time of Champlain. We've lost 9% because of cities and farming. The rate of deforestation in Canada, according to the latest UN figures, is zero because we replant for everything we take out--usually two or three seedlings. Sometimes it's natural. But we've managed to sustain Canada's forests.

When you talk about the forestation of urban areas, it's never been our preoccupation. We provide trees here and there in our community building and social relations, but I suppose if the cities wanted us to plant and harvest, we might come.

[The Chair, Conservative, Laurie Hawn]

Your time is up.

I'm going to ask Mr. Jean to take the chair for a couple of minutes.

We'll move on to Mr. Paradis.

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

My first question is for the ICON Group representative or Mr. Keith. In ICON's presentation I see on page 5 of the slides, the potential role of electricity, of hydrocarbon production, and of the mining and manufacturing sectors with regard to CCS.

First, are there any other possible uses with regard to CO2 capture than enhanced oil recovery or storage in deep saline aquiferes or depleted reservoirs? Ultimately, I want to know whether there are any other potential industrial opportunities. I am referring, in particular, to the Eastern region, namely Ontario and Quebec. For example, there is the entire issue of clean CO2, which we are talking about with the power plants.

We see that the targeted infrastructure is mainly located in Alberta but is research being done elsewhere? Are other solutions being considered, elsewhere in Canada, to develop these technologies?

[Stephen Kaufman]

There are maybe two answers to your question. First, the companies that are involved in ICON certainly are not all just pursuing carbon capture and storage alone. All of us are very interested in our own energy costs, so we're working on energy conservation and on new technology for extracting oil and gas that's less energy-intensive, and in some cases on renewables. My company, for example, is involved in wind power, as well as in ethanol and biodiesel. Those are alternatives that are all important parts of “wedges” in what's called a wedge concept for addressing climate change. That will continue.

With respect to your question on the possibility of other ways to do CO₂ reductions in Ontario, we certainly believe there may be some potential to use carbon capture and storage on the large coal-fired power stations in Ontario. They're nearing the end of their life, so you get to the similar debate about whether you would spend a lot of money to retrofit something that's near the end of its life or essentially build brand new facilities, which could be gasification plants, along with carbon capture and storage. That would address the air pollution issue from older-style coal-fired stations as well as make it possible to capture that CO₂ and move it to a secure geologic location.

[Dr. David Keith]

There are many technologies used for reducing CO₂ emissions—efficiency improvements, wind power, and what have you—but on CO₂ storage I want to add two things. One is that it is in principle—and there are some facilities moving towards this in the world—possible to capture CO₂ from a facility that uses biomass, say from a facility that's burning forest waste. Then you've essentially made negative emissions, because in the net, you're taking carbon out of the atmosphere forestry system and putting it deep underground.

That will be done in Berlin quite soon, and I forget the exact start date. There's an IGCC power plant facility in the Netherlands that's now burning a substantial fraction—more than 30% of its fuel is biomass—and they will likely do capture. That will be a negative emissions facility, essentially—directly, not in an economic sense, but directly, physically—offsetting other emissions by being negative.

That's another opportunity in general. It's a higher-cost opportunity, partly because most of the forest resources are smaller, but it's something to think about for the future.

[Avrim Lazar]

Let me add one quick word. In terms of volume, the availability of biomass as a renewable fuel is massively larger than all the others, such as wind or solar. Right now we're six times all the others combined, and we could probably double our capacity. In terms of renewable possibilities, the energy that can come out of biomass is huge for Canada, and under-exploited.

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Keith, earlier, you were asked a question about the safety of CO2 capture and storage technology, particularly with regard to leaks. At the end of your answer, you mentioned that the technology itself seemed safe but that it was rather at the local level that problems may occur. Some experts will say that leaks could occur.

So, what kinds of technologies exist to fix any leaks, should any occur? What are the challenges? What do we need to focus on to improve the effectiveness of this technology, if necessary?

[Dr. David Keith]

First of all, I think all responsible experts will agree that there's risk of leakage and local risk—health hazards—for humans. There's no question. That's true of essentially any large-scale energy technology.

The comment about regulation is that a well-regulated system can have very low local risks and a poorly regulated system can have big risks, just as with any other technology.

[The Chair, Conservative, Laurie Hawn]

Thank you very much.

We'll move on to Mr. Holland for five minutes, please.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Let me begin with a discussion of Kyoto.

Mr. Keith, you were saying that Kyoto stood in the way. I agree that we have to move to action, and that's certainly where the committee has to go. I think it's important as well that we acknowledge in this process that where we are today, in terms of the international debate on climate change, is in no small part thanks to Kyoto, to the fact that there are international standards by which all of us are now being measured, including ourselves, and that we're in a situation where if we're behind, we have something to be measured against and something to strive towards.

I completely agree with your conclusion that we have to move towards action. I don't dispute that at all. But I think at the same time we need to acknowledge that Kyoto and hopefully its successor agreements—and indeed international agreements—to reduce climate change and benchmarks are incredibly critical.

I'm sure you agree with me on that. I just wanted to make sure we were speaking the same language in that regard.

[Dr. David Keith]

Absolutely. The overarching agreement is the Framework Convention on Climate Change, not Kyoto. That entered into force and was ratified essentially globally. Kyoto is a particular protocol that sets out a particular numerical target under the framework convention.

I think Canada has a moral and legal obligation under the framework convention to begin to make serious efforts to reduce emissions. I think it's not plausible that we're going to actually hit our Kyoto target without buying a lot of offsets, and we have to have a real conversation about whether that makes sense.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Okay, fair enough.

Mr. Lazar, this is a hard question to put to you, but you're the only person who's come in front of us who has really a responsibility for forests. If you can't answer the question, I understand. First of all, I commend you and your members on the actions you've taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

But I want to talk specifically about urban forestry. Again, I don't know whether you can speak to this, but it's something the committee hasn't heard, to this point. There have been a lot of discussions about what could be done in urban areas with trees, and specifically how they could help reduce carbon dioxide, but also in urban areas reduce heating costs or stop erosion.

I don't know whether you're aware of what's been going on in that regard, or of organizations such as Tree Canada that have been promoting an urban forestry agenda. Could you speak to it, given that you're one of the only people we've had in front of us who deals with trees?

[Avrim Lazar]

Sure. Planting urban trees is like any other climate change measure. You get two types of benefits: you get the greenhouse gas reduction—in this case, very modest storage, because there are only so many trees you can fit in a city—but you get the co-benefits of green spaces, erosion control, a bit of nature, a bit of habitat. If meeting our climate change aspirations inspires us to use all the space we can in cities to plant trees and related pieces of nature, it's the right thing to do.

I will comment on Tree Canada, because it's a superb organization that has been encouraging the planting of trees in urban areas. They call them the lungs of the cities, and anything any parliamentarians can do to encourage their continued funding I think would be a very positive move. It's a great organization and it's going in the right direction.

As a solution for our gazillion megatonnes of carbon dioxide? No.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

No, and I wouldn't hold it out as that. I just think this is the only opportunity I've had to get on the record that this is something we should be looking at.

[Avrim Lazar]

Tree Canada is great. We should all support it, from both sides.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

And again, you would agree also, because of the ability to actually reduce heating costs by means of the shade the trees provide.

This is again to Mr. Keith, and I appreciate the comments about 100 years and talking about the stability of this technology over that period of time. I haven't heard a lot of discussion about the much longer time horizon—I mean 500 years or 1,000 years.

Obviously, there are deep concerns that at some point this could find ways of releasing itself into the atmosphere. What are the longer-term risks, beyond, say, the 100 years we've looked at, where the technology may be able to hold up? Where are we 500 or 1,000 years out from now in the sense that that carbon is still being stored and not finding ways to release itself into the atmosphere?