Environment Committee on Dec. 4th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Let's just tone it down a bit.

Go ahead, Mr. Mazier.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Again, this is for ISED. The environment committee ordered the government to release the contracts for the $8-billion net zero accelerator fund. When we went to read the contracts, over 360 pages had been completely ripped out.

Who ripped out these pages?

[Francis Bilodeau]

To be clear, no pages were ripped out. Pages were redacted.

We tried to ensure that the committee and Parliament would have all the available information they need to properly hold the government to account and do their work. At the same time, we have obligations that are both legal and contractual, and so, working with the committee, we built an approach that is intended to ensure that you have information in camera.

We obviously have a legal obligation to consult with third parties on the use of this information—

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

You did not answer my question, because there were pages ripped out of the contracts. They were numbered and there were pages ripped out of the contracts—a total of 360.

This is what 360 pages look like. There are 360 pages that were ripped out of these contracts.

Who ripped them out? I saw them. I went and I read through the contracts, and 360 pages had been ripped out. Who ripped them out?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Mr. Mazier, I think this qualifies as a prop, especially since there's nothing written on those pages.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

This is the point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I understand, but it is a prop. I would prefer that we didn't use props.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

This is what it looks like, though, Chair—

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

You made your point about 360 pages, but let's not use props—

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I'll just leave them right here. There they are.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

—because it's going to go sideways if we start using them.

[An hon. member]

[Inaudible—Editor]

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

I don't have to remove them. I guess the truth hurts.

Who ripped the pages out of the contracts?

[Francis Bilodeau]

The department removed information that was deemed commercially confidential in the context of our third party consultations with the recipients.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

It was the department that ripped out the pages.

[Francis Bilodeau]

The department removed information that was deemed commercially confidential by third party recipients.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Did the minister know that these pages had been ripped out?

[Francis Bilodeau]

The minister would have been made aware of the information that is being provided to the committee.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

The minister is purposely ripping pages out of the contracts to hide information from this committee.

[Francis Bilodeau]

The department is meeting its contractual obligations to recipients and its legal obligations vis-à-vis existing statutes to ensure that information that is commercially confidential and could cause prejudice to companies is not released.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

What is the government's emissions reduction target for the $8-billion net zero accelerator fund?

[Francis Bilodeau]

Reports by both the Auditor General and Environment Canada have articulated that the program is expected to meet a reduction of between 19 and 20 megatonnes. It's our anticipation that the program will meet approximately that amount.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

The time's up.

Madame Chatel is next.

[Sophie Chatel, Liberal, Pontiac, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I thank the witnesses for being with us, because it's important to talk about how we're going to shape Canada's economy to be successful on the international stage. We don't want to lag behind.

There is an enormous transformation of all the world's economies. The strategic innovation fund and the net zero accelerator are important funds to kick-start and turn the wheel or the tiller to really steer Canada's industrial sector towards transition and success in the economy of tomorrow.

Mr. Bilodeau, thank you for being with us, as well as all your colleagues. I'd like to ask you a few questions about this global race for clean technologies. Can you explain how the net zero accelerator is helping to position Canada on the international stage?

[Francis Bilodeau]

In my presentation, I talked about the three pillars of the accelerator. The first pillar aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the shorter term, i.e., by 2030. To date, we have invested in three major emitters. We expect there to be a more direct and immediate impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions to meet our 2030 targets.

The second pillar, which focuses on industrial transformation, aims to help industrial sectors make the transformation they need to reduce the greenhouse gas curve.

Finally, the last pillar, which focuses on clean technologies, aims to build the technologies that will enable not only Canada, but the world to have the technologies needed to meet global greenhouse gas reduction targets. In my opening remarks, I actually mentioned the example of Svante, a company that captures greenhouse gases.

There has indeed been significant investment in the battery and electric vehicle ecosystem. In Canada, around 20% of greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation. Globally, transportation is also a major source of emissions. The efforts that will be made to have the technologies to reduce these emissions are crucial to achieving global goals.