When our decision-makers see green

Have our decision-makers all started to see life in green at the same time?

Over the past few weeks, we have in any case witnessed an astonishing number of announcements with an environmental flavor.

It is too early to say that we are facing a real shift. And given the magnitude of the problems, we must reaffirm that our environmental actions are still far from sufficient. One only has to read the latest IPCC report to be convinced.

It remains that by reading the newspapers for two or three weeks, we see that the environment is resolutely present on the radar screen of the authorities. It is gratifying and it must be underlined.

Among the list of encouraging signs, the most important obviously comes from Ottawa, where the last budget promised unprecedented sums for green technologies.

Meanwhile, Laval, Gatineau and Victoriaville have just adopted ambitious climate plans supported by Quebec with tens of millions.

In Quebec, there are plans to transform automobile traffic lanes and parking spaces into four-season bicycle paths. This is all the more encouraging as the initiative is not greeted with a volley of green wood. We do hear some opposition, but it seems less lively than when Valérie Plante was planning the implementation of the Réseau express vélo (REV) in Saint-Denis (which ultimately turned out to be a great success).

In Montreal, restaurants and merchants are now offering returnable containers to their customers since several single-use plastic items have been banned¹.

The Legault government has (finally!) increased water charges. Hydro-Québec has (finally!) announced that it wants to increase its energy efficiency targets. Énergir now promises to supply renewable natural gas, therefore produced from organic matter, to all its new customers.

And the 1^er April, the price on carbon imposed by the federal government continued to rise to reach $65 per tonne (this charge does not apply in Quebec, however, which has its own carbon market). The Trudeau government has even just acted to complicate the life of a future government that would like to abolish this necessary tax.².

All sorts of things can be blamed on the measures announced. Several are indeed imperfect and it is important to point this out.

The federal budget, for example, uses the phrase “carbon sequestration” 13 times, a risky technology that has never been proven and that holds out the mirage of clean oil. Its federal support will rain millions in subsidies on oil companies that should instead be weaned from public funds.

On the other hand, the expression “energy efficiency” appears only once in the budget, even though it is the very first stage of the energy transition.

Yet there is an industry to be created there: in the United States, in 2020, the energy efficiency sector employed four times as many people as the renewable energy sector, according to the United States Department of Energy^⁠3.

Énergir’s decision to supply its new customers only with renewable natural gas is interesting. We have already denounced in these screens the fact that we continue to install new heating systems running on fossil fuels in Quebec. However, one can wonder whether this gas should not be directed as a priority to sectors that are more difficult to electrify.

In Montreal, banning plastic cups, glasses, straws, utensils and coffee stirrers will not precipitate the plastics industry into bankruptcy. The volume of plastic involved is very limited and some manufacturers have already found ways to circumvent the regulations with other materials such as polylactic acid, which is impossible to recycle and compost in our current facilities.

Despite these downsides, we see that there is movement and it feels good. Especially since we are seeing a ripple effect which, we hope, will snowball.

If Justin Trudeau released 83 billion Canadian dollars to support clean energy, it is because south of the border, Joe Biden promised 369 billion US in his Inflation Reduction Act.

François Delorme, who teaches economics at the University of Sherbrooke, responds to those who find that the Canadian response is timid compared to American spending that these amounts represent 3% of GDP in Canada compared to 1.4% in UNITED STATES.

It is also interesting to observe that the mayor of Quebec Bruno Marchand justified the new bike paths he wants to build in his city by talking about those he saw in Copenhagen and by brandishing the success of the REV in Montreal.

This emulation is only good.

We also like to see our elected officials intervene to increase water charges or ban certain plastic objects. This prepares our administrations to fight for the environment.

The theory of small steps does not rally everyone. But if we must be wary of jovialism, we must also avoid cynicism. Advances on which we can build are springing up here and there. We must applaud them and work to ensure that specific initiatives multiply until they become the norm.