Canada Emissions Cap Facts
Help spread the truth with Canada emissions cap facts!
At the end of the day the most important person in countering misinformation about climate change is you! When people try to come to conclusions about a climate issue they ask the people around them what they think – or tell them what they are already thinking.
No matter what’s in the news your one to one conversations with those around you will always have the biggest impact. So speak with family and friends about climate change and the cap on emissions in Canada and short circuit misinformation people in your life may be receiving via social media and the fossil fuel industry.
Here’s how to talk about the cap with those around you and at the holiday table with those you love. You can help spread the word!
Quick Canada Emissions Cap Facts
- The emissions cap is NOT a carbon tax: Without an effective cap on the oil and gas sector other sectors and Canadians would need to carry the weight of reducing their emissions to offset the emissions of the oil and gas industry. An emissions cap is about fairness – it’s about making the oil and gas industry do the same work the rest of us are doing to cut our emissions.
- The emissions cap is NOT controversial: Two recent independent polls found a majority of Albertans support a cap on emissions. 7 out of 10 Canadians also support the cap. 89% of Canadians also back tougher methane regulations according to a recent survey.
- The emission cap is NOT a production cap: The oil and gas industry said previously they could meet the emissions targets in this cap, this holds them to that promise.
- Canada needs an emissions cap: The commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development of the Office of the Auditor General of Canada has concluded that “the federal government is set to miss its 2030 target to cut carbon emissions by at least 40 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030” and that the emission cap needs to be implemented soon.
- The International Energy Agency is calling for a 60 per cent reduction in oil and gas emissions by 2030 to avoid the worst climate catastrophes.
- The oil and gas industry was consulted on the cap: In February alone, oil and gas industry lobbyists met with federal government officials at least 91 times.
- The cap is more than fair: The oil and gas sector, while only 5% of Canada’s economy, is Canada’s most polluting sector causing 27% of national emissions.
- The cap does not make inflation worse but oil and gas industry profits are: The oil and gas sector has also seen huge profits while Canadians by contrast are facing hard economic times: “Of every dollar of inflation over the last two years in Canada, 25 cents of that has gone to oil and gas and mining extraction profits.” Average world incomes will drop by almost a fifth within the next 26 years as a result of the climate crisis, and the costs of damage will be six times higher than the price of limiting global heating to 2C.
- LNG should NOT be given special treatment under the emissions cap: Producing and transporting LNG releases methane, even a small amount of which can make it as bad a greenhouse gas emitter as coal or worse. There’s also no evidence LNG exports would significantly reduce coal use elsewhere.
- The emissions cap saves lives: This year tens of thousands of Canadians were forced to evacuate because of wildfires, and Indigenous communities were particularly affected. A fair cap on emissions from oil and gas, at the same level as Canada’s national climate target (45% below 2005 levels by 2030), would avoid the premature deaths of approximately 4,860 people in Canada over a decade, and come with economic benefit of CAD $45.1 billion, according to a new analysis from the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE), this is before considering the climate change and non-fatal impacts of the air pollution prevented by a strong cap.
- With wildfires and floods and heat waves now upon us, does what we do on climate change even matter anymore? The impacts we are seeing are bad – and we need to brace for what is to come. But activism up until today has stopped emissions that would have already pushed us past tipping points. Every bit of climate pollution we stop helps stop damage from getting even worse.
- I know good people who work in the oil and gas industry, many of them are concerned about the cap: Oil and gas workers and their families need to be supported as we transition to cleaner energy. As the global demand for fossil fuels declines, we need rules that both deal with climate change that hurts us all and create opportunities for people affected by the change in how we generate and use energy. The President of the Canadian Labour Congress welcomed the announcement of the framework and Canada’s Building Trade Union has also come out in favour of the proposed cap on emissions.
