Once considered a leader in environmental protection, Canada withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol on Tuesday, thus becoming the first country to renege on its commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions under the world’s only binding climate change agreement.
Under the 1997 accord, Canada committed to reducing its production of greenhouse gasses to 6% below 1990 levels by the end of 2012. Instead, emissions have risen sharply, and are expected to exceed the 2012 target by 30-35 percent.
Kyoto Protocol Participating Nations. Green: Countries that have signed and ratified the treaty (Annex I & II in dark green); Brown = Did not ratify; Red = Withdrew after ratifying.
Signatories to the treaty who fail to meet their emission targets are required to purchase carbon credits to offset the difference. Had Canada not withdrawn by the end of this year, its estimated cost of non-compliance would have been in the range of US$13-14 billion.
Canada’s ability to meet its obligations under Kyoto may well have been doomed from the start, or at least dating back to 2001, when its largest trading partner, the United States, failed to ratify the treaty. With the U.S. accounting for 75 percent of Canadian exports, Canada was reluctant to put itself at a competitive advantage, and failed to take the steps necessary to meet its targets – particularly with regard to exploitation of its vast tar sands.
Canada sits on the world’s largest reserves of bitumen, roughly equal in size to the entire world’s known reserves of conventional oil. Unfortunately, producing oil from oil sands generates 4 times the greenhouse gases of a conventional well; nevertheless, the current conservative Harper government strongly supports oil sands exploitation and the industry is moving forward at a rapid pace.
A report issued this summer by Environment Canada, a government agency, predicted that greenhouse gas emissions from oil sands will triple between 2005 and 2020, from 33 million metric tons to 100 million metric tons. Such growth in emissions will outpace any reductions made elsewhere in the economy, according to the peer-reviewed report.
In other words, not only could Canada not meet its 2012 Kyoto emissions targets, but it is virtually certain to increase — rather than reduce — its greenhouse gas emissions for the foreseeable future.
Nevertheless, Canada has attempted to align its stance with that of the U.S., calling for a new treaty that includes all carbon emitting nations, and pledging in 2009 to cut emissions along the lines of what President Obama volunteered at the COP 15 meetings in Copenhagen: 17 percent by the year 2020, based on 2005 levels. At current levels of emissions growth, however, even that target will be unachievable.
In Canada’s defense, it is responsible for only about 2 percent of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions, and without participation of the major producers such as China, the U.S. and India, it’s impact on the concentration of climate-changing gases is minimal.
Whether bailing out of Kyoto affects Canada’s reputation as a reliable negotiating partner remains to be seen, as does the question of whether other nations in jeopardy of exceeding their emissions targets will now feel free to abandon their commitments.
