Evidence of meeting #126 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was things.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Senior Energy Strategist, Greenpeace Canada
I think one of the ways is that you could try to work this into agreements like the UNFCCC. There are mechanisms that deal with this. One of them is, or could be, ITMOs.
Conservative
Senior Energy Strategist, Greenpeace Canada
ITMOs are the tradeable emissions allowances, the internationally traded mitigation options.
In terms of national emissions, these are relatively, or usually, at the margin. If we actually had that work toward a global carbon pricing system, for instance, or even had a system of carbon tariffs, we would be accounting for this and rewarding those people who are lower carbon producers.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
But we wouldn't at all, though, right? It's not at all marginal. I'm on the foreign affairs committee normally, and I was part of a trip to Inuvik recently. We met with leaders in Inuvik who expressed frustration about the fact that they're sitting on a whole bunch of natural gas that they see as a great opportunity for production and export.
Now if we could develop our natural gas resources in the north, if we could be exporting more of that to partners in Asia, that would quite clearly, I think, have positive consequences in terms of reducing global emissions, but it might also involve significant development of a non-renewable resource in Canada.
I don't know for sure, but I suspect that your organization might be skeptical of the proposition of developing more of our energy resources in the north, but if they're developed for export and are displacing less-clean sources of fuel, isn't that positive in terms of responding to the global challenge at a global level?
Senior Energy Strategist, Greenpeace Canada
I would say that if you want to increase those objectives, the best thing would be to reduce consumption here to free that up, rather than invest in new, expensive infrastructure to extend the life of fossil fuels.
The real question in Asia—again, there's a lot of research on this—is that it's not actually clear that natural gas exports to Asia at this moment would displace coal or displace renewables. There's a lot of action being taken to reduce coal in Asia, so it might or it might not. We don't know. We don't currently work those types of things into agreements—i.e., “You can only buy this stuff if you promise that it will help reduce coal.”
This is why, from an accounting perspective, I think there are some numbers you know you can track, and a bunch you can make educated guesses on, but if you have an international system, everyone's going to try to make those educated guesses to their own benefit. If we were going to do that for natural gas exports, we should probably do the opposite for high-carbon oil, for instance.
Mr. John Aldag (Cloverdale—Langley City, Lib.)
We're out of time, sir.
We'll move to Mr. Fisher for six minutes.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks very much, folks, for being here.
Ms. Turcotte, I heard you talk about scientists and Nobel Prize winners supporting a price on pollution, and then you look at the United States and see that large oil companies, such as Exxon, support putting a price on pollution. In fact, Exxon has been quoted saying that pricing pollution “is one policy option being considered by policymakers that offers the best prospects for progress at the lowest economic cost to society”.
I think it was Tyler who was saying earlier that many industries are recognizing the importance of environmental responsibility, doing good things and, hopefully, also seeing the opportunities in and the cost savings of making these changes.
Three times, you used a phrase that I really liked: increased ambition. Along with pricing pollution, what other measures should we take to ensure a timely switch to a low-carbon economy or, as you would say, to increase our ambition?
Director, Federal Policy, Pembina Institute
I would say that the Canadian companies that are benefiting from the shift to a cleaner economy and this transition to clean energy are just quietly working away right now and making sure that they're the ones that have the best technologies to export into these markets. This clean-tech sector in Canada is burgeoning. I think something like carbon pricing is definitely making sure that there's a demand in Canada for their products. Canada can further support this sector, I think, by helping to showcase them internationally through those trade missions.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Okay. Moving on with that same tack about the clean-tech companies and our current government investing in clean tech, we know that developing countries feel the effects of climate change worse than many others.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
With so much climate financing available through private and public funding to finance the clean technology effort, it should also be seen, as I said earlier, as a huge opportunity. Over the past four years, more than $61 billion U.S. has been climate-financed across the world.
You talked about burgeoning clean tech. My riding is Dartmouth—Coal Harbour, and I will tell you that there is a burgeoning clean-tech industry there that is growing by leaps and bounds. Are Canadian companies specifically benefiting from the global climate finance opportunities?
Director, Federal Policy, Pembina Institute
I would say that this connects us to the last question we received. Energy needs in developing countries are growing. How do we want to respond to those needs? Ultimately, the planet has a carbon budget that we need to respect to limit our temperature rise to 1.5°.
I would argue that there's a huge opportunity to leapfrog technologies in these countries and make sure that countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America have the cleanest grids possible and that they buy those smart grid technologies from Canadian companies. That can include renewable energy technologies, the solar panel, the storage, the batteries and the IT equipment that goes along with making a grid smarter.
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
Thank you.
Tyler, how are the effects of climate change specifically affecting your industry?
Interim Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
This fall has been a challenging one for grain farmers across the country—
Liberal
Darren Fisher Liberal Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS
You said you were part of the solution and not part of the problem, so....
Interim Executive Director, Grain Growers of Canada
We are, and we look forward to working with government.
Earlier, there was talk about Nobel Prize winners. Last week, the World Food Prize was handed out. It's a prize created by Dr. Norman Borlaug, who is considered the father of the green revolution. He won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work to create new varieties of wheat that were more resistant to lodging. It helped feed millions of people around the world and had a significant negative impact on starvation.
There's a community of people doing really important research to look at how we reduce the impacts of climate change on agriculture. These are people who are carrying on that tradition of Dr. Borlaug and are using new technologies to make crops that are more resistant to drought or to flooding and better able to manage the increased pest pressures that we see as our climate has changed over the years.
It's really important for governments to keep up with the work that our scientists are doing by putting the right frameworks in place so that farmers can have access to these new technologies and can help mitigate the impacts that climate change will have on them.
Liberal
William Amos Liberal Pontiac, QC
I'll gladly take advantage of that and ask a question to our friends at Pembina and Greenpeace.
I think we just heard a piece of the Conservative Party's climate plan, which was to suggest that we ought to be drilling in the western Arctic to achieve global benefits. Would you agree with that kind of idea that we need to be drilling in deep-water areas of the Arctic in order to get to our international targets?
Director, Federal Policy, Pembina Institute
I would say in terms of exploiting its oil and gas and natural resources, Canada needs to demonstrate how it does so in a way that is consistent with meeting its own target under Paris. There's an opportunity to make sure that we evaluate projects in terms of their climate impact through Bill C-69. We look forward to making sure that projects are well evaluated and take these concerns into consideration.
Mr. John Aldag (Cloverdale—Langley City, Lib.)
Thanks, everybody.
Just looking at the time, we're going to be at our last question, which would go to Mr. Stetski for three minutes. If there's agreement, we could add three six-minute rounds: one for Mr. Stetski, one for the Liberals, one for the Conservatives, and then give Wayne his three-minute concluding spot at the end of that. That will take us 21 minutes, which would be near the end of our allotted time before an agreement.
Mr. John Aldag (Cloverdale—Langley City, Lib.)
It would be Mr. Stetski for six minutes, then over to the Liberals for six minutes, to the Conservatives for six minutes, and then back to the NDP for three.
Mr. John Aldag (Cloverdale—Langley City, Lib.)
We have Mr. Stetski for six minutes.
Kootenay—Columbia, NDP
Thank you.
I want to go back a bit to transitioning from fossil fuel to a green energy economy. I will ask if you have some really good papers or research on practical ways to do this transition. If you could send them to the committee, that would be appreciated. I'd like to hear from you on that because we hear about that all the time. We need to transition. Some people say we need to stop fossil fuels or any additional growth today. Others say we need a time to do it. I certainly support the need to move to green energy over time.
Perhaps we'll start with Greenpeace. Have you seen, and do you have any practical recommendations on how we actually transition from fossil fuels to green energy?
Senior Energy Strategist, Greenpeace Canada
There's a pretty decent model in Alberta with the approach to coal where they've set up coal phase-out dates. They said they're going to shut down the coal plants and come up with an agreement with the companies involved to manage that economically for them, but they're also providing support to the communities that mine coal and the workers there to make sure they don't bear a disproportionate impact of this policy decision.
Canada's also part of a global effort to work on transition for coal workers, which is also a good thing. Certainly from the Greenpeace perspective we're saying we shouldn't have new fossil fuel megaprojects. That might not be every single project, every stop, but certainly on these massive projects we need that money desperately for the alternative. We need to avoid what the International Energy Agency calls “carbon lock-in”, where you build big, new things and then you want to run it to the end of its life, and that's often 40 to 50 years. If you read the IPCC report, you see we have to be at net-zero emissions globally by 2050. Building something now that's going to come online in 2025 and operate for 50 years doesn't make sense. You're creating a stranded asset. You're building a white elephant.
The IPCC was very clear. We have the technology. We have the economic means. We just have to get the policy in place to make that rapid transition. They have some good suggestions in their reports. I can also share some other academic research with the committee. We're seeing this at the smallest scale in Alberta. Look at how that works, make sure it's working for the communities, assess that, and then expand that model outwards to other fossil fuel sectors to make sure that communities and workers are protected as we do a planned, rapid transition off of fossil fuels and on to green energy.