The provincial government has released its British Columbia's Climate Leadership Plan.
If it was this government's first step in addressing climate change, it might have received applause but this government has been engaged in climate plans for a long time. As a consequence, the plan is a disappointment and has certainly been panned by a number of groups, including members of the government's own Climate Leadership Team.
The plan sounds good on paper with promises to "launch a strategy to reduce upstream methane emissions by 45 per cent" and "expand the Clean Energy Vehicle program to support new vehicle incentives and infrastructure" but for the most part it doesn't really deliver on these promises.
Indeed, it is a very Vancouver/Victoria centric plan.
For example, the 10-year transportation plan will "invest in infrastructure to reduce congestion," "create new rapid transit lines" and "shift more public transit to low carbon fuels."
I don't mean to be picky but with the exception of the Ferry/Highway 16 intersection at 4:30 p.m., Prince George doesn't suffer from traffic congestion nor do we need "rapid transit lines."
The same is true throughout much of the province.
In the Lower Mainland, they need these and since it is a provincial plan, it could be argued the B.C. Liberals are doing the right thing. However, it could also be argued they are also doing exactly the wrong thing.
Generally speaking, as long as it is easier to drive than take public transit, people will drive. Any policy which does not address the need to get more vehicles off the road is not helping solve the underlying issue.
More rapid transit lines would be good but these lines are incredibly expensive to build and they only solve the environmental problem if people are willing to give up their cars for the ride.
Realistically, if the government is truly interested in limiting emissions, it needs to find a way to reduce the number of carbon powered vehicles on the road. Or more accurately, reduce the number of vehicles on the roads, period.
It can't simply be about changing all of the vehicles over to electric. The energy costs would be prohibitive if everyone in B.C. drove an electric car.
We would need three Site C dams to pick up the increased load.
Encouraging the use of methane as a source of fuel is a good stop-gap policy and there are some incredibly resourceful companies in B.C. working towards making the switch relatively easy.
However, while methane is cleaner than gasoline, it is far from a zero emission solution. It is, at best, a short term solution to a long term problem.
Indeed, without bringing Site C and other additional electrical generating capacity on-line, none of the electrical vehicle solutions will be "zero emission" as B.C. Hydro will be buying power off the grid from other jurisdictions.
Zero emissions from a vehicle's tail pipe only means zero emissions if the electricity is sourced from a hydro dam or other sustainable generating sources.
The plan also points out "our forests also offer incredible potential for storing carbon..." and proposes to "rehabilitate under-productive forests," "recover more wood fibre" and "avoid emissions from burning slash."
Yes, trees are a good at capturing carbon dioxide. After all, a tree or any other plant is made of carbon dioxide from the air and water from the soil.
However, a tree is only a carbon sink if it is never, ever going to be cut down and converted to other uses. From a sustainability perspective, it is hard to imagine how this might be achieved.
It is even harder to imagine in Prince George which depends heavily upon the forest industry for its economic base.
As to recovering more wood fibre and avoiding the burning of slash, this isn't really solving the problem if the excess fibre gets used in the production of pellets or consumed in a co-generation power plant. In either case - burning slash or burning pellets - the process produces carbon dioxide.
The difference is we get the heat value out of the latter while we lose forest nutrients at the same time.
The economics of heat is difficult to balance. Using heat from wood makes sense if it is displacing heat generated by the combustion of other carbon fuel sources. But the return-on-investment is very long term as carbon dioxide has a very long half-life in the atmosphere.
In any case, the government now appears to be taking a very long term view of climate change.
The plan is no longer about meeting our 2020 targets because we will not. Instead we are shooting for 2050 and by that time, climate change won't be this leadership's problem.
