Environment Committee on April 2nd, 2009

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I am pleased to be here this morning.

There is something that really strikes me. Currently, we are talking almost exclusively about car emissions even if we know that buildings across Canada use 47% of all the energy consumed. What are we doing at present to reduce waste and increase energy efficiency in buildings that are being renovated, built and maintained?

[Ian Shugart]

Mr. Chair, Mr. Ouellet is quite right. In looking at energy consumption by residential and commercial buildings, the federal government can in cooperation with the provinces and other parties, learn how to build buildings and create standards.

With regard to jurisdiction, at present, we do not have the necessary legislative authority to create standards and regulations across the country, but it is absolutely essential to pursue that objective in cooperation with the provinces, in order to minimize energy losses in that area. The minister indicated that the government was seeking solutions in all sectors that contribute to this situation.

Also, the federal government has responsibilities with regard to its own facilities and, although we do not have any specific data here with us this morning, we are seeking to develop a process to determine what measures the federal government could implement under the Federal Sustainable Development Act, passed by Parliament.

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

I apologize for interrupting you, but I only have five minutes.

I would like to say that I do not agree with you. The federal government is responsible for the National Building Code. It is in force as such in each province. If there were a federal building and energy code, the provinces would also have copied this. It's not because it is an area of provincial jurisdiction that the federal government must therefore withdraw from the creation of a national building code.

In Quebec we have accepted the National Building Code and are copying it. If there were a national building and energy code, we would do the same. Furthermore, you could issue energy efficiency standards, given all the waste, which goes against energy efficiency. You could also issue residential construction standards. You only talked about commercial buildings, and not large institutional facilities.

Why is the federal government doing nothing?

[Ian Shugart]

Mr. Chair, in principle, I am including all buildings in the commercial, institutional and residential sectors. If I am mistaken, I am open to correction. There is in fact a national code. It is a technical code that was developed in partnership with the provinces. I alluded to the federal authority to enforce this national code with regard to municipal blueprints and properties. That is the only distinction I made.

In principle, I fully agree that this is one of the strategies that need to be pursued, in partnership with the provinces. Special attention needs to be given to this sector in order to help reduce greenhouse gases.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you.

Mr. Braid--

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Chair, I have an offer to make to the deputy.

I actually put a request in to the Government of Canada for the list of all the federal buildings that had been retrofitted. I'd be happy to share it with the department. It's a compilation of all the buildings held that would have been retrofitted, including your department.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

That's fine. Okay.

Mr. Braid, the floor is yours.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our departmental officials for being here this morning.

I was hoping to ask this question of the minister. I would still like to pursue this particular question, hoping that one of you can respond and provide an update.

I wanted to touch on our clean energy dialogue. It builds on a historical tradition; parenthetically, I might add that it is a historical tradition of significant progress made by previous Conservative governments through partnership with the American administration. I'm thinking, for example, of the acid rain treaty.

I wanted to ask if you could update us on the progress of this clean energy dialogue. I know that the minister has been to Washington numerous times in the last couple of weeks and months, meeting with members of Congress and with officials of the Obama administration. If one of you could provide us with an update on that dialogue and some of the next steps, it would be greatly appreciated.

[Ian Shugart]

Thank you, Chair.

The clean energy dialogue, as the minister indicated, takes three forms, or is divided into three parts, and really is an expression of a political commitment at the highest levels to pursue collaboration on clean energy. The logic behind it, as it relates to each of the groups, is that in order for any jurisdiction in the world to achieve its objectives on reducing greenhouse gases, it will be important to save energy and use energy more efficiently. It will be necessary to replace, to the extent possible, fossil fuel use with non-emitting sources of energy. Where we continue to use fossil fuels, and I think the way ahead is clear that fossil fuels will continue to be relied on very substantially in the world, it's important to clean the production of those fossil fuels.

So the clean energy R and D component of the clean energy dialogue is oriented to collaboration on work that is being done in both jurisdictions. The Department of Energy in the United States, for example, very similarly to NRCan here in Canada and the National Research Council, is a huge scientific and research and development enterprise. So we anticipate putting together our forces in this area, building on past collaboration between the two governments.

The one on carbon capture and storage is essentially directed at collaborating to deal with this promising technology, which still needs to be ramped up to the scale where it is economic on a commercial basis, and on widespread deployment in Canada with respect to the oil and gas sector, particularly the oil sands, and in the United States with respect to thermal electricity generation. Thermal electricity generation and CCS apply in Canada as well, of course.

Finally, there's the issue of bringing on stream different sources of electricity generation, including renewables, including large-scale nuclear, but also hydro, which, as the minister indicated, is a very substantial area of potential in this country to meet our energy needs and potentially for export to contribute to the American energy needs as well. In that working group, we will be focusing on how one adjusts the grid, expands the grid, makes the grid smarter and able to receive electricity from these sources, and replace the predominance of fossil fuel to the extent achievable.

That's a picture of the work that will be going on as we anticipate in the three groups. Of course, we need to have a concrete agreement with the United States on precisely the modalities of how those three groups in the clean energy dialogue will work, and we are in discussion with them in that regard.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you very much.

Perhaps I could just zero in a bit on what you've described as a promising technology, carbon capture and storage. Are the Americans equally as interested in this particular aspect and approach?

[Ian Shugart]

Very much so, and indeed not the Americans only, I would suggest. There is work going on in other jurisdictions in the world, in the European Union, and I would anticipate increasingly there will be partnerships with some of the major emerging economies that face the same challenges as we do.

[Peter Braid, Conservative, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Excellent.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Your time has expired.

Mr. Trudeau, the floor is yours.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Thank you.

To follow up immediately, how interested are we in looking at carbon capture and sequestration around the oil sands project?

[Ian Shugart]

I think this, for Canada, is one of the major applications for CCS, and it is of course a hugely expensive undertaking.

The committee will know that the standards over time, that would be brought in through regulation on the industrial sector, in the out years begin to anticipate that carbon capture and storage will become a technology that will be deployed and will be relied on to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from that sector.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Have there been any successful pilot projects or mini-projects, or even research, indicating...?

I know that when our minister went down to the United States to talk about CCS, it was almost exclusively around, and the agreements were around, coal CCS, which is much less expensive than oil sands CCS. So I'm just wondering; because we're relying so much on the potential of CCS for oil sands development, where are we on practical solutions? I mean, it's lovely to say that we're going to fix it one day, but how realistic are our expectations around that?

[Ian Shugart]

I think this is in some ways going right to the heart of the issue of the convergence of energy and environmental standards. We are short of developing the technology to the point where it can be deployed on a commercial basis. But as with all major technologies that offer the prospect of a step change, we are past the proof-of-concept stage as well. So it is much more than good theory, but it is not yet at the stage where we can develop.

One of the world's largest facilities is actually putting pure CO₂ into the ground in underground caverns at Weyburn, Saskatchewan. It is bringing in CO₂ from the northern tier of the United States. It is being used currently in the area of enhanced oil recovery. I would describe storing carbon in the oil sands as still under development, but it is more than a theory.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

It's more than a theory, but with the costs associated so far, it seems to me that it's not a question of developing the technology; it's a question of figuring out how to make it workable in financial terms. We know that we can spend astronomical amounts to do it. Specifically, have there been any indications that the costs are going to somehow come down so that it becomes actually feasible?

[Ian Shugart]

That is the big challenge. I think, as usually happens, that it comes from a combination of public investment, which is occurring by the federal and Alberta and Saskatchewan governments, and what I might call the engagement of the market through market mechanisms to make it either necessary or advantageous to deploy the technology.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

So there are no indicators yet.

Let me change tacks for a second. I'm looking at the estimates, on page 19. I'm new to this whole thing, so you're going to have to walk me through it, but as I look at the departmental spending trends on page 19, from 2009-10 to 2010-11 to 2011-12 there seems to be a significantly substantial decrease in forecast environmental spending. Why?

[Ian Shugart]

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Trudeau is right that from the point of view of main estimates projections, that is the profile. This is explained virtually entirely on the basis that we in government typically have a number of programs whose funding is booked for a five-year profile. At one point, it runs out. Typically, we as a department have to take the next phase of funding to cabinet. It would then go through the budgetary process.

One of the areas, for example, that tail off in that period is funding for the chemicals management plan. This is a long-term commitment, and though it's funded in five-year tranches, we have every expectation that the renewed funding will occur.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you. Time has expired.

Mr. Woodworth, the floor is yours.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

I was very happy to hear the minister reaffirm the Turning the Corner commitment to targets. I regard them--and I'm glad to hear the minister regards them--as fixed, firm targets, not moving targets. As I saw from the minister's evidence, the only thing that's moving is our progress in reaching those targets.

I know that greenhouse gases are important, and they certainly also attract a lot of publicity. But I'd like to direct my inquiries to another area, to the question of cleaning up contaminated sites. That's a very important aspect of the job the department does. We have a number of known sites across Canada and perhaps others that are not known, some that are under federal jurisdiction and some that are not.

I would be grateful if you could give me an idea of what the role of the department is in relation to contaminated sites and what the budgetary implications are.

[Ian Shugart]

Thank you very much, Chairman. I'd be happy to address that area.

In 2005 the base, if I might put it that way, for federal commitment to cleaning up contaminated sites was established at $3.5 billion. The most recent budget provided funding in the range of $245 million over the next two years to accelerate the expenditure on cleanup of individual contaminated sites.

This works in the following way. There is a list of sites for which the federal government has direct responsibility or for which it has accepted the liability it bears. These are sponsored, if you like, by a number of departments across the Government of Canada. Some of the major ones would be the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Transport Canada, Fisheries and Oceans, and National Defence.

The role of Environment Canada, which we share with the Treasury Board Secretariat, is to provide the administrative coordination for the entire process across the Government of Canada. In the department, we have very few—virtually none to speak of—on the order of those of other major departments, but we are involved in coordinating the process of, first of all, assessment. These things have to be assessed in terms of how best they can be cleaned up—what the procedures are that have to be undertaken, what the engineering tells us about what needs to be removed, how the contaminated materials can be properly disposed of or stored, etc. So the first phase is the engineering and the assessment; the second phase is the actual remediation. All of these sites, at any given time, will be in one or the other of those two phases of activity.

The funding provided in the recent budget is to accelerate the number of sites. They are, in a sense, in a holding pattern on that list of sites across the Government of Canada, and the additional money will allow us to bring more on stream, either for assessment or for remediation.

I understand that about $800 million has been invested already, so just under $1 billion. At the moment, work is under way on 325 projects, all of which involves about 700 sites, and 120 projects have been completed.

This is a very ambitious long-term undertaking by the Government of Canada. It is happening all the time and in this last budget has in fact been accelerated.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Is it possible to project a timeline? You say that the additional funding is to accelerate the inclusion of sites in assessment or remediation. First of all, are you talking about that $245 million, and second, what does it mean in numbers? How many additional sites or projects would you expect that the $245 million will enable you to begin to address in the next two years?