Consumers Should Pay?

Ahead of next month's climate change summit in Copenhagen, Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach has been lobbying for what he calls 'realistic' targets. Stelmach means, of course, non existant targets, but he can't be blamed: if Canada were ever to make a serious push to reduce carbon emissions, the oil sands industry would be the first to suffer.

Steven Harper seems to agree with his fellow Albertan. He is standing his ground and refusing to commit to more than 'modest' emissions cuts. He is also doing his best to lower expectations for the Copenhagen Summit, suggesting that Canada's current plan to reduce emssions is not open to renegotiation. Stephen Harper, in other words, has made it clear that Canada will not be a player in Copenhagen.

This is all very unfortunate, because there may acutally be a lot at stake for Canada, especially for Alberta.

Under the current system, carbon emissions are calculated to represent the exact amount of carbon released by each individual country. Canada releases large quantities of carbon into the atmosphere to extract oil, even though most of this oil is consummed abroad, in the US and in Asia. In other words, Canada is blamed for extracting oil that its neighbours consume, and Canada is expected to make its oil more expensive to reflect the environmental cost of extracting it.

What's wrong with that picture? Well, simply that there is very little incentive for countries that use oil to overcome their dependency when they are not themselve bearing the environmental cost.

Say for example, that country A harbours a carbon intensive economy that imports most of its oil from its neighbour, country B. Country B, under the current formula, is classified as an environmental villain that is expected to make its oil expensive to import so that country A will reduce its consumption. Clearly, this is not fair. Why should country B be responsible for encouraging country A to change its practices?

Canada is country B. Many European countries, including Germany, which imports huge quantities of Russian oil, ressemble country A.

A good way to get around that problem would be to include the environmental cost of extracting oil as part of the carbon footprint of the countries that consume it. Thus, United States would be blamed for consuming dirty oil from the Tar Sands, rather than Albertans being blamed for refusing to damage their own industry to reduce american consumption.

In the end, it doesn't matter who pays because the price of dirty oil goes up and consumption logically goes down. But perceptions matter. Alberta shouldn't be blamed for selling its oil at market price, Americans should be blamed for consuming it. If we want to encourage consumers and industries to chance their ways, the burden should lie with them.

Rather than trying to avoid the Copenhagen summit, this is what Harper should be pushing for.