Greenhouse gases dropping: report
still the fastest-growing source of the emissions in Canada
Canada’s annual heattrapping greenhouse gases continue to level off or decline in most sectors of the economy, outside of Alberta’s oilpatch, says the latest annual inventory report submitted by the federal government to the United Nations.
The submission, which covers annual emissions across the Canadian economy from 2011, revealed a 0.14 per cent increase in emissions to about 702 million tonnes. But the levels remain about five per cent below 2005 levels, because of structural changes in the Canadian economy that is moving from producing goods to providing services, as well as some federal and provincial policies, the report said.
“Under the previous Liberal government, greenhouse gas emissions actually increased by a staggering 30 per cent,” Environment Minister Peter Kent told Postmedia News in an email.
“We were the first government in Canadian history to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
The statistics and analysis is mandatory under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, an international treaty that came into force in 1994 to prevent greenhouse gases from caus- ing dangerous interference with the atmosphere.
The government report, prepared by Environment Canada, noted that the country’s average temperatures were 1.5 degrees C above average in 2011, which makes it more likely to observe impacts such as rising sea levels and increasing extreme weather events that could intensify in the future.
“In some regions, the impacts could be devastating, while other regions could benefit from climate change,” the report said. “The impacts will depend on the form and magnitude of the change and, in the case of adverse effects, the ability of natural and human systems to adapt to the changes. In Canada, the impact of climate change may be felt in extreme weather events, the reduction of fresh water resources, increased risk and severity of forest fires and pest infestations, a reduction in arctic ice and an acceleration of glacial melting.”
The emissions contributing to those changes in Canada were stabilizing or declining in some sectors due to a mix of federal and provincial policies, including On- tario’s efforts to phase out coal-fired electricity plants and federal fueleconomy standards for vehicles that were spearheaded by the Obama administration in the United States.
But oilsands companies exploiting Alberta’s natural bitumen deposits, which require large amounts of energy and water to extract heavy oil, continue to be the fastest-growing source of greenhouse gases in the country, standing in the way of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s target to lower annual emissions by 17 per cent below 2005 levels by 2020. A report released by Environment Canada in August estimated Canada was on pace to be about 20 per cent above that target in 2020.
The oilsands sector also now represents about eight per cent of Canada’s overall annual emissions.
The report said Canada had the largest growth in emissions among G8 countries over the past two decades. It is also among the top sources of greenhouse gases in the world, representing about two per cent of global emissions, and one of the highest sources of greenhouse gases per person.
The oilsands industry has seen its greenhouse gas emissions grow from 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent gases in 1990 to 55 million tonnes in 2011, and Kent has pledged to introduce new regulations by the middle of this year for the oil and gas sector after years of government commitments that were subsequently delayed. Oilsands industrial activities now represent about eight per cent of Canada’s overall emissions, but they have reduced emissions per barrel of oil produced by about 26 per cent since 1990 because of new technologies as well as exporting some emissions to the U.S. for some refining and upgrading activities.
Other figures from the report show that Alberta’s industrial facilities are responsible for 48 per cent of all industrial emissions in the country in 2011, followed by Ontario at 19 per cent, Saskatchewan at nine per cent, Quebec at eight per cent, British Columbia at six per cent, and the other provinces and territories combining for about 10 per cent of industrial emissions.
The oilsands industry’s emissions continued to be higher than those from all of the cars or lightduty vehicles on Canadian roads in 2011, but all passenger vehicles combined, including sport utility vehicles, were responsible for 88 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions for the year.
The statistics also show that annual transportation emissions, including civil aviation, were stable in recent years, but increased to 170 megatonnes from 128 megatonnes from 1990 to 2011.