The right move
The Trudeau government has taken important steps to assert Canadian leadership on environmental issues after years of neglect under the Harper government.
It played a key role in negotiating the landmark Paris Agreement on climate change and in October, it announced it will impose a national price on carbon starting in 2018. Now, it plans to phase out almost all use of coal to generate electricity by 2030, a move that will cut greenhouse gas emissions while producing significant health benefits from cleaner air.
The usual suspects are grumbling, but the government deserves credit for pressing ahead on an issue that is arguably the most important this country, and all countries, must face: climate change.
The plan to get rid of coal essentially involves speeding up a plan developed under the Conservatives in 2012. It will require the four provinces that still have coal-fired electricity plants to shut them down, install carbon-capture technology or achieve equivalent emission reductions elsewhere.
The government says that will have the same greenhouse-gas effect as taking 1.3 million cars off the road and will ensure that 90 per cent of Canada’s power sources are sustainable (up from 80 per cent now). And health groups say eliminating coal burning will prevent more than 1,000 premature deaths and save billions in health costs.
Only Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall is griping and he is mostly isolated on this issue, now that Alberta is moving in a more environmentally responsible direction under its NDP government. It would be too much to expect every province to just fall in line.
Other critics say phasing out coal risks putting Canada badly out of step with the United States once Donald Trump is installed in the White House.
It’s true Trump has pledged to dump the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, which he calls a “war on coal.” That won him support in coal country, but it’s far from clear that Trump can actually deliver on his promise to revive the industry and the communities that depend on it.
The fact is coal has been a dying industry for decades as utilities abandon it for cheaper, cleaner-burning natural gas and renewable alternatives. There used to be a quarter of a million coal mining jobs in the U.S.; now there are just over 50,000. Even Trump can’t do much to prop up an industry in such terminal decline.
In the face of all this, the Trudeau government’s plan makes eminent sense. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be trade-offs and the provinces will have to make sure it doesn’t lead to sharply higher electricity prices.
For that, they should learn from the mistakes of Ontario. This province did away with coal-fired plants several years ago and moved boldly towards greener energy. But it’s now all too apparent that the government made a lot of mistakes along the way and the Liberals are paying a high political price — as Premier Kathleen Wynne ruefully acknowledged over the weekend.
All governments must walk a fine line: Take effective action on the environment without alienating the public. The federal government has made a good start on the first part. The second part, as Ontario is finding out, is bound to be more tricky.