These rules, of course, govern the tax treatment, which is often aligned with accounting treatments, but that's not necessarily the case. If in the future accounting standards are developed that are inconsistent, these rules will still be what they are and govern the tax consequences, which we consider to be appropriate in the circumstances.
I said that there were no existing clear rules on how to tax these emission allowances that are purchased, sold, and used to satisfy obligations under these regimes, but it wasn't completely the Wild West. There were different interpretations of how, under the general principles in our tax system, they ought to be taxed. One of those theories, and a basis upon which I understand some taxpayers filed or people thought was the correct answer, was actually to treat them as inventory, which is what we have here.
I understand they could also have arguably been treated as eligible capital property. That is the class of property akin to depreciable property, soon to become a new class of depreciable capital property, but that's probably not the appropriate treatment, for a number of reasons. It's intended to apply to property with enduring value, whereas the emissions allowance is for one-use property. Often you'd imagine capital property declining in value, where that's not necessarily going to be the case for emissions allowances.
There were different theories of how it should be taxed, and this provides certainty by legislating that the inventory approach, which we consider to be the best approach, is the one to be used.
Also, you can see in the coming-into-force rule that there's an election that would allow taxpayers who either have been filing on the basis that it is inventory or who could be subject to double taxation to elect to have the rules apply retroactively to them. In the case that they determine that this is a benefit and this is how we've been considering them, it helps us out in avoiding double taxation. People can actually elect to have it apply back a number of years, so it's not a whole new system that's kind of made up ad hoc. Rather, it's legislating what we consider to be the appropriate approach to taxation.