Environment Committee on Nov. 1st, 2018

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Yes, we could do so, but at a much higher cost to the economy than is necessary.

That is the fundamental problem with regulations. Regulations, of course, are of different types, but the primary advantage of a carbon price relative to what we often call command-and-control regulations is that you achieve your outcome at a much lower cost to the economy.

I could tell you about our estimates for that, if you like.

You have probably heard of and perhaps spoken with Mark Jaccard, at Simon Fraser University, who advocates the use of smart regulations, which are flexible regulations. What they're trying to do is be as flexible as a carbon price and as low cost as a carbon price, but even he agrees that they can't quite get there.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Could you send us the written estimates? I'd love to receive a written brief on that side of things.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

I can direct you to a report called “The Way Forward”, from April or May of 2015.

Just to give you the number, if you'd like it, we did a modelling exercise—a very practical modelling exercise, Mr. Fast, but a modelling exercise nonetheless—in which we ran a horse race province by province between—

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

I'm sorry, I really apologize, but I have so many questions that I need to ask you, and I don't—

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Oh, I'm sorry.

[Ed Fast]

I like the horse race. I'd love to hear the horse story.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

If we have time at the end, that will be great.

Can we reach it through being a carbon sink alone, through our forests, our farmlands? Could we achieve our Paris accord pledges just through—

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

I'm not a tree expert, but my strong sense is no. You would probably have to cover Canada 10 times more with trees and other carbon sinks.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Also, trees eventually release that carbon. Many people try to say, though, that we're carbon negative because we're a big, massive carbon sink.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

I think the answer is no on that.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Right.

Could we reach it through straight infrastructure investments alone? Would it be more cost-effective to do it that way, rather than...?

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Those are two different questions. Could you do it? Probably you could not. Would it be cost-effective? Almost certainly the answer is no.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Okay. Can we reach it through emissions standards alone, with once again the cost of doing so?

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Almost certainly we could not. I'll just go with no.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

It's a double negative in and of itself, isn't it?

I guess what I'm trying to get at here is that you have to take a multi-faceted approach in order to achieve our Paris accord target: our investments in transit and innovation, in infrastructure, mitigation through waste water, our emissions controls around methane and vehicle emissions, and finally, putting a price on pollution becomes the cap on top of it all towards moving to achieve our Paris targets.

Would you agree that having a multi-faceted approach, once again, looking at the political reality of just having a price on pollution only, for achieving our Paris targets?

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Let me answer a little carefully.

I think it is true that you probably want to have a multi-faceted approach, but policy-makers should be careful about how much emphasis they place on non-pricing approaches, because they tend to be very expensive.

We wrote a report at the Ecofiscal Commission called “Supporting Carbon Pricing”, which was all about the kinds of non-pricing policies that complement a carbon price. Not all policies do. Some policies just don't work that well to complement a carbon price, and some do it at very high cost, but some do it well. I would encourage policy-makers not to just go for the multi-faceted approach, but to go for the low-cost package.

Our work suggests that a carbon price will be by far the most important element of that overall package.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

At the end of the day, the ultimate cost is that of doing nothing.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Indeed, there is a cost of doing nothing, and there is probably a cost of doing something. We think the cost of doing something is less than the cost of doing nothing.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

If we had done this a generation ago, we wouldn't be having this conversation today.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

A generation is a long time ago.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

We are the “first generation” to know that something could be done and, as the quote ends, we're “the last generation” to have the opportunity to do something about it.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Was that a question?

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Yes.

[Prof. Christopher Ragan]

Sure. How about this? I think this is the generation right now to do something and to put us on a good path, which will change over time, but there's no good argument for delay.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you.