Ontario unveils climate change plan, including fund to pay polluters to reduce emissions

[New Person]

Ontario Premier Doug Ford's government will, sometime in the next 10 days, release its climate change plan, and there are strong signs it will be modelled on Australia's system for reducing carbon emissions.

That worries climate change activists, because Australia's greenhouse gas emissions have actually been on the rise since 2015.

• Doug Ford joins forces with Andrew Scheer as carbon tax fight heats up
• New climate change plan coming this fall, says PC government

The centrepiece of Australia's climate change policy is its Emissions Reduction Fund, a $2.2-billion taxpayer-funded pool that pays companies to reduce their carbon emissions and pays farmers or landowners to take actions that offset emissions, such as planting trees or practising less resource-intensive agriculture.

In essence, it's the reverse of cap-and-trade: instead of making industry pay to emit greenhouse gases (GHGs), the Australian government pays companies to reduce or offset their GHGs.

Australia's emissions reduction fund was created by a conservative government, which came to power largely by campaigning to scrap the carbon pricing scheme of the left-of-centre party that was previously in government. Sound familiar, Ontario?


Amir Attaran is senior lawyer with the group Ecojustice, which is taking on the Ford government in court over its climate change policies. (CBC)
That's not the only reason Ford is expected to borrow from Australia. The Progressive Conservatives' election platform "Plan for the People" promised specifically to create an emissions reduction fund. Also, Environment Minister Rod Phillips in a recent speech mentioned the Australian system as a potential model.

"We're looking at jurisdictions around the world," Phillips said in an interview at Queen's Park this week. "We'll bring a plan forward. That plan will have a number of facets to it, it'll have [GHG reduction] targets that we'll be committed to meeting, but it will not have a carbon tax."

• What Trudeau's carbon tax plan will mean for Ontarians
• Ontario slapped with lawsuit over cancelling cap-and-trade

Australia's program has its critics, particularly because of statistics that show emissions have risen each year since the program was created. A key reason why: the Australian authorities have raised the limits on GHG emissions for many heavy industrial polluters, neutralizing the emission reductions that the government (and taxpayers) paid to achieve.

"When you hear the Ford government say that they're going to have an Australia plan, translate those words in your head — what it means is they have a plan to increase emissions," said Amir Attaran, senior lawyer for the group Ecojustice, which is fighting Ontario's recent environmental moves in court.

"If they follow Australia's model, there is no chance in hell that emissions will go down," Attaran said Tuesday in an interview from Ottawa.

Mark Cameron, executive director of Canadians for Clean Prosperity, a pro-business group that supports carbon pricing, says there is some evidence that the Australian type of system can actually work to reduce emissions. However, he says it is not as efficient as a carbon tax or cap-and-trade.


In August, former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, left, and Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg abandoned plans to legislate to limit greenhouse gas emissions to head off a revolt by conservative lawmakers in the House of Representatives, where Turnbull's conservative coalition held only a single-seat majority. (Rod McGuirk/Associated Press)
"It essentially involves government paying directly instead of the market encouraging people to reduce emissions on their own," said Cameron in an interview Tuesday from Ottawa.

Given that the Ford government says it's cash strapped, where would it come up with the money for such a fund to pay companies? It turns out there's nearly $1 billion sitting unspent that was raised through the previous Liberal government's cap-and-trade program — money that must, by law, be spent on initiatives to reduce carbon emissions.

• Ford government "gutted" climate change programs, says environment commissioner
• Federal carbon tax 'nothing more than a complete scam,' says Ford

By threatening to "come down hard" on what he calls "polluters," Ford himself has hinted that the climate change plan will in some way target large industrial emitters such as steel and cement plants. That could involve setting an annual limit on each factory's carbon emissions and charging a fee for every tonne it emits above that amount.

It's a system that gets support from Ford's fellow anti-carbon-tax crusader Jason Kenney, the leader of Alberta's opposition United Conservative Party. But Ontario's Green Party is not as enthusiastic.

"If this government wants to come in with the heavy hand of regulation to drive down emissions, that would achieve it," Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said in an interview at Queen's Park this week.

"But it would do it at a higher cost and that cost will eventually get passed on to people."

The shortcoming of that model is that heavy industry is only responsible for about one-quarter of Ontario's carbon footprint. Driving our vehicles and heating our homes and workplaces each account for more greenhouse gases. It's not clear what the Ford government will do to try to bring down emissions in those sectors.

Ontario is already two-thirds of the way toward meeting Ottawa's 2030 target (reducing emissions by 30 per cent from the baseline of 2005). The bulk of those reductions came from shutting down all of the province's coal-fired power plants

 

[New Person]

福特版碳计划的要出炉了？

 

[soysauce]

保党又输了。没计划还能多混点选票，有计划不是变相承认气候变暖吗？控制排放，最好的计划就是碳税，今年获诺贝尔奖的经济政策。

 

[ccc]

继续忽悠吧。

 

[c8848]

刚才在tehweathernetwok看到以下评论
https://www.theweathernetwork.com/n...fties-nunavut-winter-forecast-preview/117248/

 

[New Person]

Ontario Premier Doug Ford's government will, sometime in the next 10 days, release its climate change plan, and there are strong signs it will be modelled on Australia's system for reducing carbon emissions.

That worries climate change activists, because Australia's greenhouse gas emissions have actually been on the rise since 2015.

• Doug Ford joins forces with Andrew Scheer as carbon tax fight heats up
• New climate change plan coming this fall, says PC government

The centrepiece of Australia's climate change policy is its Emissions Reduction Fund, a $2.2-billion taxpayer-funded pool that pays companies to reduce their carbon emissions and pays farmers or landowners to take actions that offset emissions, such as planting trees or practising less resource-intensive agriculture.

In essence, it's the reverse of cap-and-trade: instead of making industry pay to emit greenhouse gases (GHGs), the Australian government pays companies to reduce or offset their GHGs.

Australia's emissions reduction fund was created by a conservative government, which came to power largely by campaigning to scrap the carbon pricing scheme of the left-of-centre party that was previously in government. Sound familiar, Ontario?


Amir Attaran is senior lawyer with the group Ecojustice, which is taking on the Ford government in court over its climate change policies. (CBC)
That's not the only reason Ford is expected to borrow from Australia. The Progressive Conservatives' election platform "Plan for the People" promised specifically to create an emissions reduction fund. Also, Environment Minister Rod Phillips in a recent speech mentioned the Australian system as a potential model.

"We're looking at jurisdictions around the world," Phillips said in an interview at Queen's Park this week. "We'll bring a plan forward. That plan will have a number of facets to it, it'll have [GHG reduction] targets that we'll be committed to meeting, but it will not have a carbon tax."

• What Trudeau's carbon tax plan will mean for Ontarians
• Ontario slapped with lawsuit over cancelling cap-and-trade

Australia's program has its critics, particularly because of statistics that show emissions have risen each year since the program was created. A key reason why: the Australian authorities have raised the limits on GHG emissions for many heavy industrial polluters, neutralizing the emission reductions that the government (and taxpayers) paid to achieve.

"When you hear the Ford government say that they're going to have an Australia plan, translate those words in your head — what it means is they have a plan to increase emissions," said Amir Attaran, senior lawyer for the group Ecojustice, which is fighting Ontario's recent environmental moves in court.

"If they follow Australia's model, there is no chance in hell that emissions will go down," Attaran said Tuesday in an interview from Ottawa.

Mark Cameron, executive director of Canadians for Clean Prosperity, a pro-business group that supports carbon pricing, says there is some evidence that the Australian type of system can actually work to reduce emissions. However, he says it is not as efficient as a carbon tax or cap-and-trade.


In August, former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, left, and Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg abandoned plans to legislate to limit greenhouse gas emissions to head off a revolt by conservative lawmakers in the House of Representatives, where Turnbull's conservative coalition held only a single-seat majority. (Rod McGuirk/Associated Press)
"It essentially involves government paying directly instead of the market encouraging people to reduce emissions on their own," said Cameron in an interview Tuesday from Ottawa.

Given that the Ford government says it's cash strapped, where would it come up with the money for such a fund to pay companies? It turns out there's nearly $1 billion sitting unspent that was raised through the previous Liberal government's cap-and-trade program — money that must, by law, be spent on initiatives to reduce carbon emissions.

• Ford government "gutted" climate change programs, says environment commissioner
• Federal carbon tax 'nothing more than a complete scam,' says Ford

By threatening to "come down hard" on what he calls "polluters," Ford himself has hinted that the climate change plan will in some way target large industrial emitters such as steel and cement plants. That could involve setting an annual limit on each factory's carbon emissions and charging a fee for every tonne it emits above that amount.

It's a system that gets support from Ford's fellow anti-carbon-tax crusader Jason Kenney, the leader of Alberta's opposition United Conservative Party. But Ontario's Green Party is not as enthusiastic.

"If this government wants to come in with the heavy hand of regulation to drive down emissions, that would achieve it," Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said in an interview at Queen's Park this week.

"But it would do it at a higher cost and that cost will eventually get passed on to people."

The shortcoming of that model is that heavy industry is only responsible for about one-quarter of Ontario's carbon footprint. Driving our vehicles and heating our homes and workplaces each account for more greenhouse gases. It's not clear what the Ford government will do to try to bring down emissions in those sectors.

Ontario is already two-thirds of the way toward meeting Ottawa's 2030 target (reducing emissions by 30 per cent from the baseline of 2005). The bulk of those reductions came from shutting down all of the province's coal-fired power plants

这是真的吗？如果是真的，这等于把减排的主动权拱手交给排放户。作为排放户，如果我不高兴，我可以拒绝减排。如果我高兴减排，你们纳税人得给我发奖金。多美的事啊！
这还不如学川普，根本不承认什么气候变化，爱排多少排多少，大家一起干。

 

[New Person]

这是真的吗？如果是真的，这等于把减排的主动权拱手交给排放户。作为排放户，如果我不高兴，我可以拒绝减排。如果我高兴减排，你们纳税人得给我发奖金。多美的事啊！
这还不如学川普，根本不承认什么气候变化，爱排多少排多少，大家一起干。

真的来了.
Ontario unveils climate change plan, including fund to pay polluters to reduce emissions
The Ontario government unveiled its plan to combat climate change Thursday, which includes a fun that will be used to pay big polluters to reduce emissions.

The regime, called the "Preserving and Protecting our Environment for Future Generations: A Made-In-Ontario Environment Plan," aims to keep the province working toward meeting the emissions-reduction targets as agreed to in the Paris Accord. That international agreement, which Canada is a signatory to, calls for the reduction of emissions by 30 per cent of 2005 levels by 2030.

So far, Ontario has reduced emissions by 22 per cent, Environment Minister Rod Phillips told a news conference Thursday afternoon at a conservation area in Nobleton, Ont. just north of Toronto.

A major plank of the new plan is the Ontario Carbon Trust, which the Ontario government will commit some $400 million to over four years, to work in conjunction with the private sector on developing clean technologies.

Other features of the plan include measures to monitor sewage and pollution in provincial waterways, conserving land and green space and reducing litter in the province's communities.

"It's a plan that represents a clean break from the status quo, and it's a plan that balances a healthy environment and a healthy economy," Phillips said.

 

[New Person]

更加详细的：
The Ontario government unveiled its plan to combat climate change Thursday, including a fund that commits public money to entice companies to reduce emissions.

The regime, called the Preserving and Protecting our Environment for Future Generations: A Made-In-Ontario Environment Plan, aims to keep the province working toward meeting the emissions-reduction targets agreed to in the Paris Accord. That international agreement, which Canada has signed, calls for the reduction of emissions by 30 per cent of 2005 levels by 2030.

Ontario has reduced emissions by 22 per cent, Environment Minister Rod Phillips told a news conference Thursday afternoon at a conservation area in Nobleton, Ont., just north of Toronto.

A major plank of the new plan is the Ontario Carbon Trust, to which the Ontario government will commit some $400 million over four years, to work with the private sector on developing clean technologies to reduce emissions.

The trust includes a $50 million "reverse auction," which will allow businesses to send in proposals for emission-reduction projects and bid on government contracts that will be awarded based on the lowest-cost reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

The government hopes its investment in helping companies to reduce their carbon footprint will "unlock" more than $1 billion of private capital for the same purpose.

Other features of the plan include measures to ensure "transparent, real-time" monitoring of waste and stormwater in provincial waterways, conserving land and green space and reducing litter in the province's communities.

"It's a plan that represents a clean break from the status quo, and it's a plan that balances a healthy environment and a healthy economy," Phillips said.

The province will also engage in an Ontario-wide assessment of the impacts of climate change to determine how it's affecting businesses, families and communities in order to find further solutions, and will consult stakeholders to develop performance standards for larger emitters.

In response to Thursday's announcement, Ontario Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said: "We need a climate plan, not a litter-reduction plan. This is not a climate plan."

 

[New Person]

政府出点小钱，让排放大户主动出大钱，想法不错，几年后再看效果。