Calling on the Government of Canada To Increase the Price On Pollution

In September, Citizens’ Climate Lobby Canada will be celebrating 10 years since we began lobbying for carbon fee and dividend. We said it early and we said it often and now Canada has a carbon fee and dividend-like policy which became the law of the land on April 1, 2019.

Formally, the law is known as the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act and the carbon pricing policy is known as the Federal Backstop.

It is the centerpiece of Canada’s PanCanadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate Change and without carbon pricing it is doubtful Canada will ever be able to achieve our fair share of reducing GHG emissions. You can convince yourself of this fact by testing various climate policies on simulators available at Climate Interactive and the Pembina Institute.

Pushback for Carbon Pricing

As expected there has been pushback for carbon pricing and this is impeding the enactment of the policies to improve our carbon pricing policy. Most egregious are the claims that Canada’s carbon pricing policy is a tax grab as seen on those annoying half-truth stickers at gas stations mandated by the Ontario government. The stickers show the carbon price rise but fail to show that refund—the Climate Incentive Rebate—whereby most of us come out ahead.

But most recently, Michael Bernstein the Executive Director at Canadians for Clean Prosperity published an OpEd in The Hill Times, The most important climate change policy that no one’s talking about. Like Citizens’ Climate Lobby, Clean Prosperity also supports Canada’s carbon price rising past 2022 with direct rebates to citizens.

Canada needs your help. Can you sign e-petition #e2542? 

We are calling upon the Government of Canada to steadily increase the carbon price to $210 per tonne or more by 2030, and to distribute the carbon pricing revenue to Canadians as cheques or bank deposits.

Instructions:

1. Log in or sign up at the government website https://petitions.ourcommons.ca/
2. Sign the Petition: https://petitions.ourcommons.ca/en/Petition/Details?Petition=e-2542
3. Click the confirmation email 
4. If you don’t get a confirmation email, please sign it again.
5. Note that the petition expires at 10:15 am PDT / 1:15  pm EDT on Tuesday, August 18.

The petition has received a very strong endorsement from Dr. James E. Hansen, one of the world’s leading climate experts. “Dr. Hansen is recognized for speaking truth to power, for identifying ineffectual policies as greenwash, and for outlining actions that the public must take to protect the future of young people and other life on our planet,” according to The Earth Institute staff directory.

Carbon pricing is not the only tool in the emissions-reduction toolbox. But it is the most silver-bullet-ish policy we know. These 10 facts speak for themselves.

References:

1. Policy Insights from the EMF 32 Study on U.S. Carbon Tax Scenarios:
   https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/abs/10.1142/S2010007818400031
2. Economists Statement on Carbon Dividends
   https://clcouncil.org/economists-statement/
3. Fishing for the big one – in Canada by Dr. James Hansen
   http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2020/20200507_Canada.pdf
4. 2020 Parliamentary Budget Report on the redistribution of carbon pricing
   https://www.pbo-dpb.gc.ca/web/default/files/Documents/Reports/RP-1920-024-S/RP-1920-024-S_en.pdf

This post was sourced from a blog piece by Cathy Orlando,  of Citizens’ Climate Lobby Canada.

Related articles:
Carbon Pricing Is the Most Silver Bullet-ish Policy We Know Of
Carbon Pricing Is The Best Tool To Bridge Canada’s 2030 Emissions Gap

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