With decisions imminent on climate-change legislation and free-trade negotiations in Europe, as well on whether to approve a major U.S. pipeline, the prime minister and his team have been multiplying their foreign trips to boost their case.
They’ve also stepped up criticism of some of the people they describe as “opponents,” including former U.S. vice-president Al Gore and some prominent North American scientists who have published peer-reviewed research about climate change.
“I wouldn’t characterize (the government) as desperate, but it’s pretty clear that opponents are getting desperate,” said Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver Friday, after concluding a trip in Europe.
The latest efforts coincide with warnings from scientists that heat-trapping greenhouse gases have reached unprecedented levels in human history – according to the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California – mainly due to burning fossil fuels such as oil, deforestation and other changes to the planet’s landscape.
Harper is headed to New York next week to promote the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would open the door to more expansion in western Canada’s oilsands industry, estimated by the federal government to be the fastest-growing Canadian source of greenhouse gases, but also representing about two per cent of the country’s economy.
The prime minister’s trip will be the latest of several by federal and Alberta government politicians to the U.S. in recent months to emphasize what they describe as the pipeline’s economic benefits, including thousands of jobs, increasing tax revenues, and improved energy security.
“It’s great that the prime minister will provide his leadership on this very important issue,” Oliver said. “We think that without any doubt, we have the facts on our side. This pipeline will be very positive for both our countries. It will address national security issues.”
The Obama administration has delayed approval of the multi-billion-dollar project proposed by Alberta-based energy company TransCanada, over concerns about environmental risks related to the pipeline route.
Environmental groups and climate change scientists have also said the pipeline opens the door to risky scenarios of energy consumption.
A group of 12 North American climate change and energy experts warned Oliver in a letter this week that his promotion of energy infrastructure and expansion of fossil fuels could put the planet on a pathway of average global warming near four degrees Celsius.
“Yet it is this very dangerous pathway… that you seem to be advocating when promoting Canadian fossil fuel development at home and abroad,” said the group, which included Harvard University applied physics professor David Keith and veteran Ottawa-based climate scientist John Stone, from Carleton University.
In Europe, Oliver said that talks promoting free trade with Canada were progressing, but he warned that the government might launch a legal challenge to proposed European climate change legislation if it maintains a fuel quality directive that could single out the oilsands over their climate-change footprint.
“We don’t want Canada’s reputation to be damaged by a directive that targets the oilsands as a completely different source of energy,” said Oliver. “There are other sources of energy that use venting and flaring that would have the same or higher level of greenhouse gas emissions.”
Harper is also expected to travel to Europe for a summit in Northern Ireland next month of G8 economies, potentially coinciding with the conclusion of Canadian and European free-trade negotiations.
Oliver suggested European politicians would back down on their climate-change proposal because of concerns over its economic impacts.
“Their growth (in Europe) is non-existent or anemic and issues of competition including competition in the refinery industry are really very much top of mind,” Oliver said.
“And so, when you have a directive that won’t achieve the environmental objectives, that will increase costs for the European economy, people are quite concerned and, you know, they want to see it changed.”
Oliver said that his government wanted climate change policies that were “based on reality,” and that he didn’t believe it would be possible for countries to shape a world powered by alternatives to fossil fuels.
The energy and climate change experts say the Harper government is mistaken.
“If Mr. Oliver believes humanity cannot prevent global temperatures rising by 4 degrees Celsius, it would be honest if he admitted this to Canadian voters,” said economist Mark Jaccard, a professor of resource and environmental management at Simon Fraser University.
“I agree with Mr. Oliver that humans will use more energy and that fossil fuels can play a big role. But this cannot involve continuing to increase carbon pollution. The carbon from fossil fuels must go back in the ground or they cannot be developed. The math is simple.”
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: Mike De Souza
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