WORLD ON THE HOT SEAT
Bombshell UN report turns up the heat on politics of climate change
OTTAWA— The politics of climate change just got hotter.
On Sunday night, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) dropped a bombshell report.
If humanity is to avoid the catastrophic extremes of global warming — widespread extinctions and species loss; an Arctic without sea ice; the disappearance of coral reefs; mass displacement from rising oceans and extreme weather — then governments around the world need to ramp up their efforts to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions, the report concludes.
Citing evidence from more than 6,000 scientific references, the report’s 91 authors outline the path to limiting global warming by 1.5 degrees C above pre- industrial temperatures by 2100 — the target set under the 2015 Paris Agreement. Global greenhouse gases will need to fall by about 45 per cent below 2010 levels within the next 12 years, and then reach “net zero” by 2050, the report says. This would require “rapid, farreaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society,” such as transportation, energy use and more, as well as the advent of as yet-unproven means of sucking greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere, the IPCC says.
It’s an astonishing prescription, to be sure — but, here in Canada, many expect the IPCC’s alarm to intensify what is already one of the most divisive political issues of our time: climate change and what to do about it.
“An issue like climate change, as it is now cast in almost apocalyptic possibilities — that can be very emotionally engaging,” said Frank Graves, president of EKOS Research in Ottawa.
“The latest reports on climate change, and just how imminent the risk is, are only going to reinforce what we see as a rising concern with this.”
The IPCC report comes as the Trudeau government grapples with provincial blowback on its plan to curb green house gases by imposing an emissions tax in provinces and territories that don’t have their own, equally strong carbon-pricing schemes in place. Last week, Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister announced he would pull his support for the climate change plan because Ottawa wouldn’t agree to let the province set a $25-per-tonne emission tax without raising it to $50 by 2022, as prescribed by the Trudeau government.
Alberta’s NDP government also said it won’t raise its existing carbon tax on Trudeau’s schedule, after a federal court quashed approval for construction of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion in August. And Ontario joined Saskatchewan’s court challenge of the constitutionality of Ottawa’s carbon price plan, after Premier Doug Ford announced he would scrap the cap-and-trade program set up under the previous Liberal government.
Meanwhile, on the federal level, Andrew Scheer’s Conservative Party rails against the government’s carbon price virtually every day, accusing the Liberals of masking a tax grab in the dishonest garb of environmentalism. Scheer says he will unveil his own climate plan before the next general election, though he’s clear that it won’t include a price on emissions.
“I’ve always believed that meaningful action has been required. And that’s one of the things that’s frustrated me about the Liberal plan of just slapping a carbon tax on and hoping it works,” Scheer said in an interview with the Star on Tuesday from India, where he met with the country’s prime minister to discuss selling more Canadian oil and gas to the subcontinent.
“If anything, their singular focus on one particular proposal has shown that they don’t take it seriously,” Scheer said.
Catherine McKenna, Canada’s environment minister, was not available for an interview Tuesday. But in an emailed statement to the Star, she underscored the urgency to act that the report implies, while boasting about the Liberal government’s efforts to reduce emissions and create jobs.
She also fired right back at Conservatives, whom she frequently accuses of having “no plan” to address global warming.
“Climate action should not be a partisan issue,” she said. “It’s time for Conservative politicians to stop playing games with our kids’ future.”
But the report also inspired criticism of the Liberals from the left, where politicians and climate activists argue the Trudeau government needs to do more to confront what may be a defining challenge of the 21st century. NDP MP Niki Ashton attacked the Liberals for maintaining GHG reduction targets set under Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper, and questioned the government’s decision to purchase the Trans Mountain pipeline for $4.5 billion this summer.
“Our collective future depends on us doing the right thing, right now,” Ashton wrote on Twitter.
Dale Marshall, national program director for the activist organization Environmental Defence, said the IPCC report underscores how Canada’s emissions target of a 30 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 — which Canada is on track to miss, according to government projections — is already inade- quate. The federal carbon tax would also need to be ramped up if Canada is to push harder on stricter emissions reductions called for in the report, Marshall said.
“We’ve been sounding the alarm forever and a lot of people keep pushing the snooze button,” Marshall said.
“If there’s anything that’s going to move the needle, I think this report does it.”
But while Graves said his polling with EKOS suggests a majority of Canadians already rank climate change and the environment amongst their top concerns, he said there is still a solid base of voters receptive to the Conservative attack on the carbon tax.
“The fact that we’re still in that situation in Canada is really discouraging and sad, because if this report makes anything clear, it’s that getting to the limit of 1.5 (degrees’ global warming) is going to be challenging, but it is possible,” said Catherine Abreu, executive director of Climate Action Network Canada.
“The one thing standing in our way is political will.”