Abby L. Harvey
GHG Monitor
5/22/2015
Canada has pledged to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions 30 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 in its Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) submitted to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change late last week. The INDCs are public commitments made by countries stating what they intend to do to combat the global issue of climate change. The UNFCCC had asked countries to submit these plans by the end of March, well ahead of the 21st Conference of the Parties to be held in Paris in December, at which time a new international climate agreement is hoped to be reached. Canada is the 38th country to submit an INDC. “This target is ambitious but achievable. It represents a substantial reduction from Canada’s business-as-usual emissions. Canada has already undertaken decisive actions domestically to reduce our emissions, and is committed to doing more in concert with all major emitters. Reaching this ambitious target will require new policies in additional sectors and coordinated continental action in integrated sectors,” Canada’s pledge states.
Environmental Groups Criticize Pledge
The Canadian announcement, however, has been met with criticism by some environmental groups, who say the target is not nearly as ambitious as the government states. The INDC, groups have charged, lags behind other commitments already announced, such as the U.S. commitment to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions 26-28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025 and the European Union’s commitment to a 40 percent domestic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2030. In an analysis released this week, the World Resources Institute notes the disparity between the Canadian INDC and the INDCs of other developed countries. “While analysis finds that no major economy is yet doing enough to reduce emissions, there are significant differences between INDCs announced to date. According to WRI estimates, the EU and U.S. proposals aim to reduce GHG emissions between 2020 and 2030 by approximately 2.8 percent per year. Canada’s is significantly less ambitious at 1.7 percent per year.”
Further, WRI notes, the means by which the countries intend to reach their target reductions makes the Canadian contribution appear even less stringent. “The EU and the United States will achieve their targets without using international market mechanisms, while Canada has indicated it may use such mechanisms – to an unstated extent – to meet its goal. This means that Canada’s reductions undertaken domestically may not reach the level of its stated target,” the group’s analysis says.
Another concern raised by environmental groups is that Canada has done little to meet such targets in the past. “Given Canada’s history of setting climate targets while failing to implement regulations to meet them, today’s announcement doesn’t mean much without a credible plan of action to back it up,” Amin Asadollahi, oilsands director at the Pembina Institute, said in a statement following the announcement. “Today’s announcement must be matched with stringent new policies and regulations, and with a plan to coordinate action with the provinces to ensure the efforts of some jurisdictions to cut greenhouse gas pollution are not undone by the growth of emissions elsewhere.”
