Evidence of meeting #92 for Natural Resources in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was different.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10:40 a.m.
Conservative
Ted Falk Conservative Provencher, MB
I haven't even gone to the stats guys. I wanted to get on record how heavy-handed they are.
10:40 a.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal James Maloney
I don't make the rules, Ted; I just enforce them.
Mr. Whelan, we have a couple of minutes left, and then we have to stop.
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
Nick Whalen Liberal St. John's East, NL
Thank you.
In terms of the emissions data, since it's a hot topic, there are lots of different vehicles on the road burning fuel, and you know how much fuel, because that's accurately recorded. What type of confidence interval can you give us on how much greenhouse gases? It's not really that you're accurate, but how accurate are you? It seems to me that we're getting carbon dioxide and some mix of carbon monoxide, which ultimately degrades and it's all greenhouse gases. How accurate can you be based on your knowledge of the complex system that Mr. Falk described?
10:40 a.m.
Director General, Science and Risk Assessment, Department of the Environment
On the historical data, we're looking at gathering information about actual emissions, and we model where we need to, but essentially we're gathering information about what was actually emitted from those sectors that were captured.
In terms of the degree of confidence, because we look at it every year and we're constantly revising to make sure that we've captured all of the information that is available, the level of confidence improves with every year, I guess you could say, but I can't give you a number.
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
Nick Whalen Liberal St. John's East, NL
Mr. Peterson, when somebody says there's 100 million tonnes of CO2 this year, is that 100 million tonnes plus or minus 2%, plus or minus 10%, or plus or minus 20%? You're the stats guy, and if you don't know, can your department provide the answer? It seems to me that it's a number plus or minus some percentage, and that's what we have to live with.
10:40 a.m.
Director General, Agriculture, Energy, Environment and Transportation Statistics, Statistics Canada
It'll be hard for us to assess the quality of data that we don't produce, but we'd be happy to provide information on quality indicators relating to the energy statistics that feed into the work of my colleagues.
10:45 a.m.
Liberal
Nick Whalen Liberal St. John's East, NL
Well, this is great. If we had the types of data this study is hoping to elicit out of government, would that improve the accuracy of, or would there be a possibility that could improve the accuracy and the confidence in, the ultimate data on which government is making its decision?
10:45 a.m.
Director General, Agriculture, Energy, Environment and Transportation Statistics, Statistics Canada
That's a complex question. There are many factors that will affect the accuracy of the data that....
10:45 a.m.
Liberal
10:45 a.m.
Director General, Agriculture, Energy, Environment and Transportation Statistics, Statistics Canada
Essentially, the quality of the data that we're going to release will largely be a result of the data that feed into the system. In general, the higher the response rate, if we have more respondents, the better the quality of the data. The more timely we can get the information that we need, then the less we have to impute from missing data.
Data quality is a very multidimensional concept and we'd be happy to share with the committee how we deal with data quality, but it's not as simple as saying, if A then B.
10:45 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal James Maloney
Thank you. We're going to have to stop there.
To our witnesses, we appreciate your taking the time to join us today. We don't have enough time to get into everything, unfortunately, but that was very helpful.
The meeting is adjourned.