“Scrap the cap.” That’s the new battle cry out of Alberta, following Monday’s announcement by federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault of regulations that would force upstream oil and gas operations to cut carbon emissions to 35 per cent below 2019 levels, sometime between 2030 and 2032.
According to Guilbeault, said operations contributed 31 per cent of Canada’s total emissions in 2022, and he wants the industry to do its “fair share” to reduce them.
The plan faces fierce opposition from Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, who deems it a federal overreach that would require a production cut of one-million barrels of oil a day, crush Alberta’s economy and cost every Canadian family upwards of $419 a month by 2030.
Smith accused Guilbeault of having a “deranged vendetta against Alberta,” and promised a constitutional challenge and a motion under the province’s sovereignty act, which enables it to push back against harmful federal policies.
But Smith’s fury isn’t just provincial posturing. This clash highlights a deeper issue: a federal government and a prime minister obsessed with virtue-signalling, shaming and ideological purity that ignores the struggles of average people.
First, there’s language. On X and in informational videos, Guilbault is now referring to greenhouse gas emissions as “pollution,” which brings to mind environmental contaminants that cause things like acid rain and smog, which are detrimental to human health. While Guilbault’s cap isn’t going to make the air, land or water any cleaner, his language could trick people into thinking it will, and boost support for his plan.
Then there’s the spinning of just how much CO2 our country actually emits. In 2005, when Canada’s population was 32 million, we produced 1.8 per cent of the world’s emissions. Yet in 2021, with a population of 38 million, Canada produced 1.4 per cent of global emissions. And from 2019 to 2022, emissions from the oil and gas sector alone fell by four per cent. So you’d think the government would congratulate Canadians and the industry for how well we’re doing.
Instead, Environment Canada’s website tut-tuts that “Canada has the second-highest GHG emission per capita rate among the top 10 emitting countries” and that we’re “the 12th largest emitter in the world.” Yeah, right behind fellow oil producers Saudi Arabia and Iran, which unlike Canada, increased CO2 emissions over the same period. It also conveniently downplays the fact that Canada’s per capita emissions have decreased, as well.
Meanwhile, who’s the number 1 producer of C02? China, which spews out a whopping 27.9 per cent of global emissions, up from 18.4 per cent in 2005. Funny that we don’t see Guilbault lecturing Beijing about its dismal record.
But perhaps that’s not surprising from a man who boasted that he “never needed to have a car” — before he became a cabinet minister, that is. After that, Guilbault started driving his government vehicle more than 3,000 kilometres a month. Guess it’s a little cold to bike to work in Ottawa after November.
Guilbault’s emissions cap is the latest sign of a government that’s out of touch with Canadians outside its ideological bubble. Piling on heavy-handed regulations will stifle investment and burden consumers who are already weighed down by years of high inflation and runaway living costs.
The cap will cripple the oil and natural gas industry, which accounts for 3.2 per cent of Canada’s GDP and employs 150,000 people directly and a further 300,000 indirectly. And it will further alienate western Canadians at a time when national unity is already fractured. It’s time not just to scrap the cap, but the government that came up with it.
National Post
Tasha Kheiriddin is Postmedia’s national politics columnist.