Matthew Bramley — Aug 31, 2010
Yesterday the InterAcademy Council (IAC), a collaboration among the world's leading national science academies, issued its report on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) — the UN body mandated by governments to conduct regular, comprehensive assessments of the science of climate change.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had asked the IAC to conduct an independent review of IPCC processes and procedures after it emerged that the last major IPCC report contained a few errors in the section that projects future impacts of climate change. As numerous distinguished scientists have pointed out, these errors have no effect on the overwhelming evidence that the world is warming, that greenhouse gases from human activities are mostly to blame, and that we face severe global impacts if we don't act urgently to cut emissions. Yesterday's IAC report does not change that picture.
PJ Partington — Aug 25, 2010
Earlier this year, we published a backgrounder assessing recent controversies and claims surrounding the integrity of climate science. There have been several new developments since then, so we thought it would be useful to summarize the main ones.
In line with the earlier investigations summarized in our backgrounder, the more recent reviews find that the allegations made about the "climategate" stolen e-mails affair or errors in volume II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report (IPCC AR4) are either baseless or have no bearing on the case for urgent reductions in greenhouse gas pollution.
Julia Kilpatrick — Jul 30, 2010
There's good news and there's bad news behind the federal government's recently announced plan to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from new personal vehicles.
The good news is that these regulations represent a step toward addressing a key source of Canada's climate change pollution, since about 12 per cent of national GHG emissions come from personal vehicles. The bad news is, there appear to be enough loopholes in the regulations to prevent them from making much of a difference.
Chris Severson-Baker — Jul 22, 2010
In 2002, the Alberta body that regulates energy agreed to let a power company build a new coal-fired power plant outside Edmonton, with one key environmental condition: the company would make good on a voluntary commitment to cut the plant's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in half.
At the time, the power company's voluntary commitment represented an uncommon display of corporate leadership and environmental responsibility. For the company, it simply made good business sense: the power sector believed that the province was set to unveil tough new climate change regulations, and since coal is a much higher-polluting energy source than alternatives such as natural gas, the company could undercut objections to using coal by promising to reduce the plant's net emissions (through purchasing offsets) to a level comparable to natural gas power generation. This solution removed one of the obvious reasons to block the use of a high-polluting source of energy, while positioning the company as a leader in the industry — it seemed like a win-win.
Cherise Burda — Jul 06, 2010
It's now officially a smog summer in Toronto. Riding my bike to work this week, I can feel it searing my lungs. But I'm not the only one suffering - behind their rolled-up windows, solitary drivers look frustrated, stalled in construction and bumper-to-bumper congestion.
It's an appropriate time for the Toronto City Summit Alliance to release its brave and ambitious report aimed at reducing traffic congestion and funding transit in the GTA (greater Toronto area).
Clare Demerse — Jun 29, 2010
Despite the Harper government's decision to downplay climate and energy issues at the G20 summit, there was no way to avoid a discussion of phasing out fossil fuel subsides. That's because leaders at the previous G20 summit, held in Pittsburgh in September 2009, decided to phase out these subsidies "over the medium term" - and specifically asked ministers to prepare implementation plans and timetables for discussion in Toronto.
Clare Demerse — Jun 26, 2010
We're now halfway through Canada's weekend of summits, with the G8 over and the G20 just getting started. For those of us looking for progress on climate change, the meetings are off to a rocky start.
This year's G8 declaration contains just four paragraphs on climate change, out of a total of 43. Unfortunately, they contain virtually nothing beyond what's already in the 2009 G8 declaration from Italy and the December 2009 Copenhagen Accord.
The best that can be said about the Muskoka declaration is that it didn't move backward from last year - but it didn't move forward either. With Canada in charge, the G8 missed an important opportunity to make progress on addressing climate change.
Clare Demerse — Jun 24, 2010
Heading into this weekend's high-profile G8 and G20 summits, the main climate story in Canada had been Prime Minister Stephen Harper's decision to downplay the role of climate change on the leaders' agendas.
But with just a day before the summits get underway, Environment Minister Jim Prentice has added some promising news to Canada's international climate story, thanks to the long-awaited announcement of the government's contribution to "fast start" climate financing.
Jesse Row — Jun 08, 2010
A few weeks ago, the Government of Canada released draft regulations that would require gasoline to contain five per cent ethanol, on average, starting in September this year. The main reason for doing this, it stated, is to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and Canadians' impact on the climate. As any good energy and environmental policy organization should do, we took our own look at the climate implications of these regulations.
Matthew Bramley — Jun 03, 2010
Yesterday afternoon, Environment Canada very quietly posted on its website the annual Climate Change Plan required by the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act. This is an important document because it's the only place where the government provides a full list of its measures to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and estimates the emission reductions from each measure.
Cherise Burda — May 31, 2010
Do you know your Walk Score? No, it's not a fitness test. Walk Score measures the "walkability" of your neighbourhood. Canada's biggest cities may be getting more walkable at heart but their outer regions are not.
Clare Demerse — May 26, 2010
Today's newspapers carry reports of a fascinating government briefing note that advised Canada's Minister of Finance to cut back on federal tax breaks to fossil fuel producers. The question now is whether ministers are listening.
Clare Demerse — May 20, 2010
Canada ranks sixth among the G8 countries on its readiness to compete in the low-carbon economy of the future, according to a new report from the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy (NRTEE).
The NRTEE, an independent advisory group to the Minister of the Environment, has put together a set of 15 indicators to track countries' ability to make the successful transition to a low-carbon economy. Their rankings cover federal policies, but also include provincial government initiatives, the private sector, and other institutions (for example, the number of MBA programs in sustainability) — so the score is for Canada as a country, rather than simply for our federal government's performance.
PJ Partington — May 13, 2010
It's no secret that Canada's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are much higher today than they were in 1990. By 2008, the latest year with data available, Canada's emissions were 24 per cent higher than in 1990. We're often told the fault lies with our growing economy and growing population. We do, after all, have a strong economy and one of the highest rates of population growth in the G8. Our emissions growth is certainly the highest in the G8.
But it turns out that the real story behind Canada's big jump in pollution is a little more complicated. The national numbers are masking some huge provincial variations.
PJ Partington — May 07, 2010
This week's issue of the highly respected research journal Science features a strong defence of climate science signed by 255 members of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. The letter, "Climate Change and the Integrity of Science", is well worth reading in full — but here are some highlights.
On certainty and policy:
All citizens should understand some basic scientific facts. There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions; science never absolutely proves anything. When someone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutely certain before taking any action, it is the same as saying society should never take action. For a problem as potentially catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our planet.
Matthew Bramley — Apr 27, 2010
Action to cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the United States suffered a setback over the weekend, when it emerged that plans to unveil a bipartisan Senate climate and energy bill on Monday had been postponed. Does this spell delays for Canada too? We don't think it should.
PJ Partington — Apr 19, 2010
Well folks, the numbers are in and it's a blow out! In 2008, Canada's emissions dropped 2.1 per cent from their all-time high of 750 million tonnes the year before. Fantastic news! And, if you believe last week's press release from Environment Minister Jim Prentice, we have mostly the federal government's clever policies to thank.
The release attributes the decline in emissions to "Canada's efforts to use greater amounts of clean energy power generation, which is part of the Government's efforts to target greenhouse gas production."
Sounds great, but a few key details are missing from that picture.
Matthew Bramley — Apr 15, 2010
While the Harper government continues to stall on creating a credible plan to meet its national greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions target, opposition parties are moving forward with a motion and legislation calling for serious federal action on climate change.
On Wednesday, the House of Commons debated and passed a motion introduced by Liberal MP David McGuinty. The motion challenges the Conservative government's lack of "commitment to principled environmental policy backed by action," and stresses the urgent need for such leadership to address climate change.
Julia Kilpatrick — Apr 14, 2010
A rigorous scientific inquiry conducted by an international panel of experts has reaffirmed the integrity of climate science conducted by the CRU, the small research group at the centre of the stolen emails controversy. The review was led by Lord Oxburgh, the former chair of the UK House of Lords science and technology select committee, and panel members were recommended by the Royal Society (the UK's national academy of science). The review concluded:
"We saw no evidence of any deliberate scientific malpractice in any of the work of the Climatic Research Unit and had it been there we believe that it is likely that we would have detected it. Rather we found a small group of dedicated if slightly disorganised researchers who were ill-prepared for being the focus of public attention."
PJ Partington — Apr 06, 2010
"The integrity of climate research has taken a very public battering in recent months. Scientists must now emphasize the science, while acknowledging that they are in a street fight."
So begins a recent editorial in Nature, one of the world's most respected multidisciplinary scientific journals. We couldn't have said it better.
Download our backgrounder on the recent climate science controversies.
While the evidence of human-caused climate change (and its serious consequences) has only continued to strengthen since the publication of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report in 2007, recent events have attracted media attention to what Nature refers to as a "re-energized community of global-warming deniers." And in this arena, they warn, it is not by any means an even fight:
"Most researchers find themselves completely out of their league in this kind of battle because it's only superficially about the science. The real goal is to stoke the angry fires of talk radio, cable news, the blogosphere and the like, all of which feed off of contrarian story lines and seldom make the time to assess facts and weigh evidence. Civility, honesty, fact and perspective are irrelevant."
