(Niagara At Large is posting this expected announcement from a Canadian governent – Stephen Harper’s Conservatives – that always viewed any human involvement in climate change as a joke. NAL believes this decision by the Harper Conservatives to pull out of the international Kyoto talks will be a day that is remembered in imfamy for generations to come.)
From Council of Canadians environmental campaigner, Andrea Harden-Donahue
Canadian Environment Minister Peter Kent Announces Canada is Legally Leaving the Kyoto Protocol
December 12th, 2011.
Council of Canadians environmentalist Andrea Harden-Donahue
I just returned from a media scrum in the foyer outside of our House of Commons (not the House of corporations) where Minister Kent announced Canada will legally leave the Kyoto Protocol.
Kent coached the announcement with plenty of key words about our ongoing commitment to the Durban platform, (the so called real way forward) a fair
dose of fear mongering (as Megan Leslie referred to it) and that we are committed to taking climate change. But they were just that, words, words that hopefully mainstream media won¹t buy this hook line and sinker. While this announcement may not come as a surprise, the reality is it is a big
deal.In a media statement released during Kent¹s speech, the Council of Canadians
responded to today¹s announcement:
³Harper¹s wait-and-see climate policy is just as ridiculous as saying, we¹re
going to wait for that big truck in the next lane to start driving safely
before we start driving safely,² says Maude Barlow, National Chairperson,
Council of Canadians. ³The Harper government has transformed Canada into a
serial laggard on the most pressing issue of our times, addressing climate
change, which is severely damaging our international reputation.²
³While Kyoto is not perfect, at least it is legally binding and has clear
benchmarks,² says Andrea Harden-Donahue, Energy and Climate Campaigner.
³Canada leaving the Kyoto Protocol is not about achieving an agreement that
keeps all polluters accountable, it is about allowing business as usual in
Canada through an unaccountable deal with voluntary emission reduction
targets and more loopholes.²
Following Kent¹s statement to a crowd of media, there were responses from
the NDP and Liberal Environment critics and the leader of the Green party.
Here¹s the scoop:
Kent is lying:
Kent consistently referred to the costs of the Kyoto Protocol multi-billion
dollar payments as a reason for legally exiting the agreement. He stated
that Kyoto would cost $1600.00 for every Canadian family. This is very
misleading, for a couple of reasons. First of all, there are no penalties
that Canada would have to pay for failing to meet an emission target (one of
the flaws of the Kyoto Protocol, it has a lack of teeth). Canada could
continue to be part of the agreement and not meet our emission reduction
targets, but continue to be part of the process including being compelled to
submit progress reports to the UN on the state of our emissions and be part
of a monitoring process. If Canada decided to switch gears and meet our
Kyoto commitments, we would need to purchase carbon credits to meet our 2012 target. These are the costs Kent is referring to.
Secondly, the reason why we would need to purchase credits from carbon
offset programs (which are a sham – we need domestic emission reductions) is
because of years of government inaction on climate change. While Kent tries
to pass this all off on the Liberals (who deserve their fair share) we¹ve
had the Conservatives in power since 2006 and our emissions continue to rise
and the few programmes the Liberals had put in place to reduce emissions,
the Conservatives have cut.
This announcement is really about not wanting to be held accountable to the
monitoring and compliance aspects of the Kyoto Protocol which, despite
Kent¹s shiny portrayals of government action, will demonstrate how far
Canada is lagging behind.
Canada¹s international reputation is in tatters:
Kent insists that Canada is in good standing, that we share our position
that the Durban platform is the way forward with the U.S., Australia, Japan,
Norway amongst other countries (stay tuned for a blog tomorrow about the
Durban platform). He insists that we entered the Durban climate talks in
good faith and have been part of negotiating a promising deal.
To the contrary, Canada¹s reputation is in tatters. Elizabeth May put it
best, ³the Canadian government leading anything related to climate change is
practically a laughing matter at this point.² Having just returned from
Durban, she reports that she had a meeting with UNFCCC Executive Secretary
Christiana Figueres who had the clear understanding from her personal
meetings with Minister Kent that Canada would not legally leave the Kyoto
Protocol. This is just one example of how Canada entered the Durban talks
negotiating in bad faith. We have little credibility anymore. A number of
country delegates openly criticized Canada¹s various cringe-inducing
positions (Kent¹s reference to Oguilt payments¹ is what did me in),
something not frequently seen. This the first time Canada has ever legally
left an international treaty.
What does this say for Canada¹s democracy?
After all, there was a Parliamentary vote in support of the Kyoto Protocol.
And while Harper has long decried the Kyoto Protocol, as Megan Leslie
highlights, Harper certainly didn¹t campaign on legally leaving the Kyoto
Protocol, it was not part of his platform – so where is his mandate? The
NDP is looking into options to at least have a Parliamentary debate on this
decision. Perhaps civil society needs to look at our options as well.
Enough with the 2 percent.
Just to add, I¹m sick and tired of repetitively hearing about how Canada¹s
emissions are only 2% of global emissions, so why are we getting picked on
about the tar sands (this came up again at today¹s press conference). Let¹s
be clear. 2% is quite a bit for a country like ours, we have one of the
highest per capita emissions rates in the entire world. The tar sands are
set to comprise 11% of our national emissions by 2020 meaning that this
percentage is only going up (and up). And beside, if countries like ours
continue to hide behind these kinds of weak excuses, the UN climate talks
will only continue to stagnate.
(Niagara At Large invites you to share your views below.)
Niagara At Large 
I remember a time in history when Canada and Canadians were considered the good guys in this srewed up world, the voice of civility and reason, that was back when Lester Pearson received the Nobel Prize, back in the mid 1960s, when we tried to keep the warring nations from doing the unthinkable, when survival of our planet and it’s peoples was a top priority, now we don’t even pay lip service to lowering enviromental emmissions and effect standards to minimise global warming. Stephen Harper and his minions deserve The George W Bush Award for denial of global warming, sticking ones head in the sand like an ostrich, is not a persuasive argument.
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Thank you for this post. There’s a saying that each time history repeats itself, the price goes up. We’re making the same mistakes the Sumerians, the Romans and the Easter Islanders made, only it will be far worse now because what we do is on a global, rather than local, scale.
Ronald Wright, in his bestselling book A Short History of Progress, writes: “The most immediate danger posed by climate change is weather instability causing a series of crop failures in the world’s breadbaskets. Droughts, floods, fires, and hurricanes are rising in frequency and severity.” The pollution surges caused by these – and by wars – add to the gyre of destruction. Medical experts worry that nature may swat us with disease: billions of overcrowded primates, many sick, malnourished, and connected by air travel, are a free lunch waiting for a nimble microbe. ‘Mother Nature always comes to the rescue of a society stricken with… overpopulation, and her ministrations are never gentle.'”
What destroyed those earlier civilizations was the depletion of their natural resources. Add a little overpopulation to the mix and the result is not surprising: hunger and disease, followed by chaos and social upheaval. These people believed their cleverness, or their gods, would somehow divert disaster; that everything would somehow work out. They were wrong.
Wright continues: “Things are moving so fast that inaction itself is one of the biggest mistakes. The 10,000-year experiment of the settled life will stand or fall by what we do, and don’t do. The great advantage we have, our best chance for avoiding the fate of past societies, is that we know about those past societies. We can see how and why they went wrong. Now is our last chance to get the future right.”
We’re heading for a big fall. Only our arrogance and greed prevents us from seeing it.
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You’re absolutely right Doug, let’s do our share and meet our Kyoto targets!
Remember when PM Paul Martin addressed Kyoto in Montreal in the fall of 2003, and ‘encouraged’ US President George W to join Kyoto? the next day, the Yanks held a press conference -this was from their Kyoto ‘observers’ at the Montreal conference, even though they were Kyoto members- and noted that while the USA was 16% worse than their Kyoto targets, Canada was 34% worse…. That was where I learned that Canada talks a great talk, but doesn’t walk anywhere.
We could easily meet our Kyoto targets by stopping the production of coal, oil and natural gas – why don’t we? This would immediately raise the cost of all energy everywhere in the world, and help everyone else to meet their targets as well.
It could also bankrupt all of us. Think about how many of your family and friends are Directly employed in the coal, oil and gas sector. Then ask how much Your job depends Indirectly on these people working in the coal, oil and gas sector. Finally, ask how you will heat your home & business, drive your car, etc. when coal, oil and gas prices mushroom and your job disappears … because Canada meets its Kyoto targets.
We’ve had enough trouble with many manufacturing jobs moving out of our country. Do we want to ship out our energy-sector jobs as well?
NB: i haven’t even asked what You are doing to run your business & family by helping us meet our Kyoto targets – shave you stopped driving to the grocery store? to interviews? installed wind & solar (and stop whining about the high price – it’s dropping but still expensive)? We won’t need to mine coal, oil and gas if we simply stop comsuming!
-w-
If Durban succeeds in replacing Kyoto by getting Everyone to commit to reduce/eliminate the pollution from coal, oil and gas by 2015, Canada will have done a great deed. America, China, Brasil and India need to be committed to cutting fossil fuel pollution or we’ll just lose a major trade war to these countries … ‘fuelled’ by Kyoto.
My beef with the Harper government is that they have Never explained the above results of Canada meeting our Kyoto targets, so that we can collectively decide what to do. Instead, they seem to have sided with the IPCC’s Global Warming crew, who cheated in Climategate 1 & 2 by falsifying statistics to meet their academic and political objectives, rather than reporting the numbers objectively for the world to evaluate. As a result, there’s Still a major debate in the scientific community as to whether our current Climate Change is Anthropogenic Global Warming, or merely part of cyclical changes in Earth’s extremely complex ecosystem.
=> http://www.ClimateDebateDaily.com
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AND WE KEEP ELECTING THESE IDIOTS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHO IS AT FAULT HERE ???????????
NOT TOO HARD TO FIGURE OUT !!!!!!!!
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What I see this is not so much a reflection on democracy as the Conservative Party machine. I know from experience when I ran last time in St. Patrick’s Ward in St. Catharines and the local member went door to door in such a determined effort to defeat me. They stand for bad positions on the environment, such as constructing the mid-peninsula expressway, slashing across Niagara. This episode is just another unhappy example. One thing however, I say for the Conservatives is that they understand the importance of elections and the need for people to get involved. It is important that others show similar resolve.
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Canada’s position on KYOTO is shameful.
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I’m not at all surprised with “Bush lite” Harper at the controls. None of our politicians have lived up to their Kyoto commitments. Money is more important. The claims about paying penalties are bogus. Was the environment an issue in the last provincial or federal election? No. Completely under the radar. Loss of jobs if we cut emissions? Not if they are diverted to the clean energy sector. Why aren’t we leaders in the crucial development of clean energy? We used to be leaders for the good causes in this country. Now we are followers…of big business and the US plutocracy. Shame!
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Let’s see if I get this right. The KYOTO Implementation Act was passed by the House Of Commons in 2007, and was given royal assent. According to E.May, not only have we ended commitments under an international treaty,but we are also in violation of demestic law. Our international reputation is severely damaged, and we’re not seen as a trustworthy partner.
Meanwhile, there are huge plumes of methane (20 times more powerful than CO2), 1,000 metres in diameter, currently gushing GHG toxins into the atmosphere above the East Siberian Arctic Shelf.
But all is well. A new tar sands project was announced last week, and, more important, Justin Bieber and his girlfriend are getting along just fine.
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correction: domestic law
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Lorne, I’m sorry, but there is no valid debate anymore about human-caused global warming. It is scientific fact, despite the huge disinformation campaign out there that might lead some to think otherwise.
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The debate is not over. Kent announced intentions, nothing more, nothing less. The process has not yet begun.
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The Conservatives have set us back so far, the international community is laughing at us. We have become an international embarrassment.
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Kyoto was an attempt by the UN for developed nations to pay reparations for being, successful, democratic, technologically advanced and coincidentally being the first to emit more CO2 into the atmosphere. That is based on the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.
The argument made is an assumption of the inherent danger of the increases of CO2 causing the earth’s temperatures to correspondingly increase in the next century by anywhere from 1 to 3 degrees C..
Those projections are based on computer models, that incidentally, ignore the radiant effects of the sun and the effects of the oceans. Why, because they simply do not understand enough about those contributors nor does climate science appear to care. The result of the modelling has fit the hypotheses, ergo, we are in imminent danger of self destruction. Since 1998, in spite of claims to the contrary, we have not seen any significant increases in global temperatures. Why, we don’t know.
So when somebody states with absolute certainty the science is settled it is pure balderdash. Are there concerns about pollution, of course. This is more about social engineering based on a science experiment rather than following the development of sound science to lead to better understanding of what is actually happening.
I am neither ashamed or embarrassed by that.
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All I’m hearing in the media is “Country ‘A’ isn’t doing it so why should we”.
I guess Canada can never step up to the plate and be a leader on the world stage.
I have no problems paying more for hydro if it means clean/green energy. I support what the Ontario Liberals are doing with their green energy plan. It might not be perfect but it’s better then what either the PC’s or NDP have suggested.
Canadian’s don’t realize how lucky they are when it comes to gas prices. IMO $1.19 (where it’s at right now) is far too cheap.
Daily I hear people whine (including a local morning radio personality) about the cost of gas, yet the ridiculous price of groceries is pushed off to the side.
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Ryan:
I sell Renewable Energy, so you know that I believe in a cleaner environment, however the Cost of energy is one of the main drivers of whether Ontario companies can afford to stay here and give us jobs.
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Back to Dan’s comments on Wright’s book, which is excellent. Collectively, humans often have dinosaur mindsets, incapable of changing fast enough. This leads to the demise of peoples. We also have faults of arrogance and greed. Our shameful KYOTO position reflects all three. To make matters worse, we are currently being governed by myopic technocrats who just don’t see the big picture (or profess not to see it) . We need leaders at the helm, not courtiers to business. Trudeau’s opinion of “Environment Minister” Kent is laudable. (Too bad Trudeau junior isn’t leading this country.) I am ashamed and embarrassed by our country’s current federal “leadership” .
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I’m heartened to see this discussion; there are many good points made here, on all sides of the question. @Lorne White. The economic issue of course predominates; understandably, since good jobs are getting more and more scare. Nevertheless, the tar sands are a double-edged sword when it comes to jobs, because there is a direct connection between the development of this resource in Alberta, and the death of manufacturing in Ontario. “Petrostates” like Canada, that rely heavily on exporting nonrenewable resources without providing residents with good value-added jobs (i.e. refining bitumen), are notable for high employment and an ever-increasing income gap. Our tar sands help keep our dollar high, which is a death-knell for manufacturing. The tar-sands also eat up government subsidies that might instead go to supporting small and medium-sized entreprenurial companies within Canada — companies that might make us a nation of innovators who produce goods that other countries want to buy. The arguments against tar sands development are economic as well as environmental.
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I agree with Fiona on the economic front, except I’d also include NAFTA as having a huge impact on the flight of manufacturing jobs.
On the environmental front, I’d say that, as a country, our averarching concern should be environmental in this case. The Tar Sands are a ticking time bomb for the planet. According to the Suzuki site, 300,000 people per year are dying because of the effects of Climate Change.
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1. I recently watched a PBS programme about FTA & NAFTA, which showed an Illinois city where a successful USA company had gone under after FTA. laying off ~500 workers. On the other side of town was a paint factory which added ~1000 workers because they could now sell into Mexico.
Overall, the doc noted that there were 600,000 More people employed in the USA than before FTA – but many in different jobs in different companies. (Sounds a bit like buggy-whip workers after the invention of the automobile, eh?!)
2. Climate Change has always existed on Earth. Have you heard of he report of a British Army officer c.1850, crossing the Prairies: “It’s far too dry here to ever be settled.” Only 2 decades later, the CPR was begun, and 4-5 decades later, free land was offered to settlers to come to Canada – they became ‘the Bread Basket of the World’. However, that officer’s observation cycled back in the 1930’s when the Climate Changed and created the Dirty Thirties on the Prairies.
Al Gore, Suzuki and the IPCC don’t talk about Climate Change but about “Anthropogenic Global Warming” – climate change caused by humans, and specifically by Human-created CO2, which they tout as the primary greenhouse gas.
However, in 2009, the Climate Gate scandal revealed that we need to ‘follow the money’ with academics/scientists as well as with corporations. Their e-mail trail shows that they doctored facts, statistics and reports in order to support their own theories. While I’m delighted to breathe cleaner air (asthma), drink cleaner water, and eat cleaner food by Not burning fossil fuels, the Science of the causes of Climate Change has Not been settled.
Here’s an article showing that the IPCC scientists are about to be sued for their falsehoods:
“Lord Monckton to pursue fraud charges against Climategate scientists”
http://climatedepot.com/a/14156/Fmr-Thatcher-advisor-Lord-Monckton-to-pursue-fraud-charges-against-Climategate-scientists-Will-present-to-police-the-case-for-numerous-specific-instances-of-scientific-or-economic-fraud
Note that he presents his case calmly, without ‘ad hominem’ attacks on the scientists involved, nor by simply declaring that ‘the science is settled’, when it was actually so Corrupted that we still don’t know what causes Climate to Change. If you’d like to look at the Many scientists from around the world who are Still debating AGW and CC, please try The Guardian’s:
http://www.ClimateDebateDaily.com
and re-assess your own opinions.
I took all my friends to watch “An Inconvenient Truth” when it first appeared c2004, read “The Weather Makers” and actively promoted AGW privately and politically, until a few friends
– showed me some of the quandaries in the AGW arguments,
– discussed the lack of ethics in carbon trading,
– noted that there are pollen samples in the Wainfleet Marsh over the past 9,000 years showing plants from much warmer climes when humans burned No fossil fuels, and
– explained that academics are under great pressure to ‘publish or perish’ and often promote their theories long after proven wrong (eg. doctors failed to wash their hands between operations c1850 in denial of the demonstrated relationship between infection and bacteria).
My friends were right and I was wrong – we do Not know what causes Climate Change, and should always be intelligently sceptical (‘follow the money’) when evaluating cause and effect in Any issue.
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The suggestion that we, as lay people, know more about AGW than an international consensus of qualified scientists (with peer-reviewed articles), is silly, if not arrogant.
Petro interests like to muddy the waters, which is both selfish and tragic. To save ourselves and the planet, neo-liberalism/globalism will have to end or be radically altered, and many vested interests aren’t willing to do that. This neo-liberalism/globalism and the fear of having to reject it, is the foundation of much of te “denier” industry. And it is an industry. Lobbyists are paid a fortune to propogate their misinformation. Meanwhile, Environment Canada is facing continued, aggressive cuts, and the federal government censors their reports to the press.
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Mark:
What’s your opinion about the Lord Monckton article?
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There is some good news. I just read that what’s left of the steel industry in Hamilton wants to fill empty factories with wind turbine manufacturing. A “blue/green” alliance. I hope it works.
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Lorne, I’m choosing not to get into a debate about AGW because I trust the results of the IPCC, as well as other credible sources (i.e James Hansen). I’m not qualified to critique or assess articles dealing with matters of science, so I don’t. I’m sure there are many “denier” articles out there (including Lord Monckton’s) that sound very convincing, but I avoid reading them. I DO, however, commend you for your work in the alternate energy field.
I just scanned the URL for the Monckton article, and I will add that the well-financed denier industry often launches “baseless” lawsuits to get press and muddy the waters. A friend of mine was threatened with such a lawsuit.
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Mark , I agree that we need to beware of Vested Interests, but Academics are vested in the research grants paid to them by various institutions.
Lord Monckton’s point is that he believes that the IPCC scientists actually LIED by corrupting the statistical reports they used to support their AGW conclusions. (There were similar ‘scientific’ reports used by the tobacco industry, and many others over the past decades.)
Again, we still need to clean up Air, Water and Soil, and to reduce conspicuous consumption, but the debate over the causes of Climate Change rages on.
PS. Do you have the URL about the Methane plume? That scares me, since CH4 is far more a greenhouse gas than H20 than CO2.
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I have no problem with removing subsidies for oil companies. They don’t need any above and beyond write-offs available to all businesses in Canada. I also have problems tightening the pollution standards and toughening the reclamation efforts for the oil sands. The fact is oil whether we like it not is going to be with us for some time.
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And Harper has removed some of those subsidies, on a declining basis over 10 years so that the oil companies can plan ahead and not simply withdraw en masse (as happened with the National Energy Policy after 1980).
Has Harper removed enough subsidies? Do we have enough investigative-journalists left to do the deep research?
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Lorne,
If you google East Siberian Arctic Shelf and Methane plumes, you should find it. Apparently the sea bed is shallow enough so that the methane does not have time to convert to CO2 before it reaches the surface.
I agree with John that we should remove subsidies for oil companies. Another interesting and encouraging point is that TransCanada (pipeline manufacturer etc.) is investing heavily in solar.
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Correction to my last post (not enough caffeine apparently) It should read I have NO problems tightening the pollution standards and toughening the reclamation efforts for the oil sands. Mark please read “The Delinquent Teenager” by Donna Laframboise. She’s a Canadian journalist who has done a factual expose on the IPCC. It is disturbing to say the least. If you can come back and state you trust the IPCC, I will be shocked. these characters make Bernie Madoff look like an angel.
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