Tuesday, June 18, 2019

Trudeau & Co. Sell Out the Future



Well, that puts an end to any Liberal pretensions of being a progressive party. No progressive would have done what they did today - green light the Trans-Mountain (Trudeau Memorial) pipeline expansion.

It was a rigged process under the Harper government and the Trudeau Liberals weren't to be outdone. They too rigged the process, getting caught red-handed when they ordered department officials to review the proposal and report only to then drag those adjudicators into a room to receive orders that they had better not say no, only "yes" would do.  That's petro-politics, everybody has to get a bit greasy.

The hilarious part is that the announcement came just hours after the House of Commons passed a motion declaring Canada is in a climate emergency. The Tories voted against it, the Liberals waited almost a day to trample all over it.

Meanwhile Dame Cathy says this time, if they're re-elected, the Liberals are going to make an extra effort to meet Stephen Harper's goal of a 30 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 except they're falling behind on meeting even that despite rapidly worsening climate change.

But the Trudeau government is on track to meet the Paris Climate Summit targets - by 2230.
As most people know, countries pledged a 2030 climate target as part of the global Paris Agreement. The Trudeau government pledged to meet a goal already set by Stephen Harper for a 30 per cent reduction from 2005. 
We now have twelve years of data — covering 2005 to 2017. At this half-way point, emissions have only declined by two per cent. 
Sure, that is technically a "downward" trend. But ...it is so foot-draggingly slow that it will take two centuries for Canada to reach its Paris target at that pace.

And it will take nearly a thousand years to reach Canada's 2050 target level. So, grab your calendar and pencil in a "We Did It!" celebration party for the year 2961 AD.
But now these environmentally conscious Liberals are committed to flooding world markets with what they hope will be massive volumes of high-carbon, high-cost, low-value, climate wrecking bitumen.  They figure, however, (figures don't lie but liars figure) that the stuff will be burned offshore so it's not our problem. How hypocritical can Liberals get?

Isn't it funny how our understanding of climate change has grown so much since Harper prescribed that '30 by 2030' target? Isn't it curious how much the climate itself has changed since then. Doesn't that mean those targets are even less meaningful today than when Harper proclaimed them?

Our own research shows that Canada is heating up at twice the average rate of the rest of the planet. And how has that impacted our plans for mitigation and adaptation measures? Mitigation - cutting emissions - remains unchanged and more elusive and, as for adaptation, what adaptation? Dream on.

And, if you need pictures, here's one. It shows how the oil and gas industry emissions have soared from 2005 to 2017 while responsible provinces cut emissions.  And even those figures reflect rigged emissions reporting by the Oil Patch.






7 comments:

Anonymous said...

At what point does cabinet get charged with criminal negligence? Given the stakes involved for the planet and the residents of the West Coast, this decision in my view "shows wanton or reckless disregard for the lives or safety of other persons."

Having hours before declared a climate emergency, the reasonable person doesn't choose to aggravate the emergency. That would be a marked departure from the conduct expected in circumstances where cabinet itself foresees harm from its acts. How many lives have to be lost to fires, floods and environmental poisoning before we see charges laid?

Cap

The Mound of Sound said...


There are some, Cap, who see this sort of thing as a crime against humanity. I am in their ranks.

It is a fundamental tenet of criminal law that a person is deemed to intend the logical and foreseeable consequences of his acts.

If you fire into a crowd and hit Jane, it is no defence to a charge of murder that you didn't specifically target Jane, a stranger. You still fired into a crowd and the logical and foreseeable outcome of that had to be that one or more could be killed. Ergo, murder.

For every person now killed by climate change there are many more who lose their homes, their livelihoods and are forced to migrate or die in place. For particularly vulnerable countries, Guatemala for example, does that rise to the level of ethnic cleansing? Perhaps.

Such is the way of petro-states. For a country with 0.5% of global population we represent 4% of world oil production. Some rank us 6th overall. Another report had us at 4th behind only Russia, the US and Saudi Arabia.

https://financesonline.com/top-10-oil-producing-countries-in-the-world-wheres-the-greatest-petroleum-dominion/

Trailblazer said...

Governments are suing tobacco companies for costs the the health system.
Could we sue oil companies for similar ?

TB

Anonymous said...

Mound, I agree that what's being done in our name is a crime against humanity. But there's a practical problem to getting cabinet charged with that crime - it requires the consent of the AG. And, since the AG, aka the Justice Minister, is himself a member of cabinet I'm sure you can see where this all ends.

Cap

The Mound of Sound said...


TB, suits against oil companies are underway in other countries but none that I've heard of in Canada.

The Mound of Sound said...


Cap, those who are quietly advancing the theory of liability would almost certainly want to rely on the ICC in The Hague.

the salamander said...

.. I want to easily access official documents - transcripts etc. Trudeau et al are OUR 'Public Servants' .. They bought the pipeline on OUR dime, purportedly to - 'grow the economy' - 'create high paying jobs' - 'nation building' - 'increase the value of bitumin'

So.. show me the business case, show me the findings of The Energy Board, show me the overseas demand, show me the environmental plan and related remediation. Please do not omit CO2 or Methane escape, please do not fail to roll in the reality of fracking for natural gas or the last of the 'oil', please do not conflate bitumen with oil.

Though extremely concerned & informed, re the reality of supertankers in our territorial and First Nation marine waters, the risk for eclogical disaster, please square all this with declaring a 'climate change emergency' the day before..

All I see is some sort of horseshit Trumpism level .. piss on my leg, tell me its raining.. and its 'nation building'.. or sunny daze. Tell me how complex the legal issues are.. at what cost for 'outside legal advice' - how many painful years of legal wrangling.. and environmental abuse, how many species & habitat will be sacrificed.. how many 'temporary foreign workers' will be dumped on us.. for those high paying jobs for skilled Canadians..

SHOW ME WHO IS REALLY GETTING THE MONEY ..