Pipeline Reforms ‘Great Step’ but Don’t Account for Most Emissions, Say Climate Critics
Does ignoring downstream impacts export Canada’s responsibilities?
Canada’s minister of the environment and climate change Catherine McKenna at the COP21 climate summit in Paris, France in December. Photo by Mychaylo Prystupa.
The Trudeau government’s newly announced reforms to pipeline environmental assessments still fail to consider the impact of almost 90 per cent of resulting greenhouse gas emissions, climate experts have told The Tyee.
The government announced a new interim assessment regime Wednesday, saying it will restore public confidence in much-criticized National Energy Board reviews.
The major change will see a pipeline’s upstream emissions included in the assessment. For a pipeline from Alberta’s oil sands, for example, the greenhouse gases produced in mining and processing the bitumen will be included in the environmental assessment review.
But critics say government will still not be considering the much greater downstream emissions as pipeline products are processed and burned in vehicles, factories and power plants.
A recent analysis by Simon Fraser University climate economist Mark Jaccard found these emissions represented up to 89 per cent of greenhouse gases from the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
University of British Columbia climate policy expert Kathryn Harrison says Ottawa is effectively exporting the climate change problem to other countries by ignoring downstream emissions.
Analysis of the full greenhouse gas impact of Trans Mountain pipeline expansion pipeline shows 89 per cent is in the downstream GHG impacts overseas in refining and combusting. Source: Mark Jaccard and Associates.
Harrison said under international reporting norms the downstream greenhouse gas emissions are the responsibility of the end-user country. “But the fact is, we’re contributing to that, and we’re making money from it.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
