30 Fairmont Park Lane S
Lethbridge, AB
T1K 7H7
Phone: (403) 328-1804
Saturday, February 10, 2007
The Editor
The Lethbridge Herald
P.O. Box 670
Lethbridge, AB, T1J 3Z7
Dear Editor,
The opposition parties are great at making mischief – but not sense. (“Federal opposition parties unite to pass pro-Kyoto motion”, 07/02/06, A1)
I’m one who believes the Kyoto target is achievable only if we buy credits from emission reduction projects outside Canada. About a billon tonnes of these will be needed between 2008 and 2012. My expert colleagues Rick Hyndman and Jason Myers, from the National Climate Change Process, are currently estimating these will cost about $25 billion dollars from 2008 to 2012. We don’t really know yet what they will cost - but we can be quite sure any massive injection of Canadian money into the market will help drive the price up. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. The cost would need to be much higher to discourage emissions.
On top of the huge cost, buying credits will not even reduce emissions - let alone “offset them. Procuring credits will allow for increasing emissions in Canada. Canadian money will be transferred to countries like China to be applied to small “green” projects. Consultants, carbon accountants and carbon credit traders will prosper. China’s energy use and industrial expansion will still proceed on a massive scale. The overall effect will be to raise emissions - and atmospheric greenhouse gases.
There are still substantial doubts about predictions of catastrophe from greenhouse gas caused global warming. Rushing ahead of the alleged problem to dump Canadian money into unproven schemes to control it brings us to the height of foolishness. Canada can get off the Kyoto bandwagon and return to common sense. It’s time for Canadians to speak their mind and reject the prophets of apocalypse who claim to represent them.
Yours truly,
Duane Pendergast