Calling for action on Climate Change
An influential group of Canadian chief executives says climate change is the "most pressing and daunting" issue the world faces today and business must do its share to fight the problem.
A task force of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives released a report Monday that calls for a national action plan that would see government, business and individuals working in concert to make real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
"We know enough about the science of climate change to recognize that aggressive global action is required," the report said.
It is, of course, hard to tell just how serious people are when they make these kinds of announcements, but it certainly does sound good. What I particularly like is that they are calling for a hard cap and real reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, unlike the Conservatives in Ottawa, who are looking for modest increases in efficiency while allowing overall emissions to increase.
One other point worth noticing:
They acknowledge that market forces alone are unlikely to be enough to do the job and that some kind of government intervention will be necessary.
That's a significant admission for business leaders to make.
A somewhat related story gives some idea as to where the government can make effective policy impact.
The Saskatchewan government has launched a new program aimed at helping people who want to get credit for feeding their own electricity into the power grid.
On Monday, the Crown utility, SaskPower, unveiled details of a new "net metering" program that will give homeowners credits for extra electricity they produce with windmills, solar power cells and other alternative sources.
Under the system, people feeding extra power into the grid will receive credits that are valued at the same rate as the electricity they buy from SaskPower.
That's good news for people like Terry Deck, who generates his own power from two windmills on his acreage near Lumsden.
Until now, SaskPower was only willing to pay people like him half price to sell his power back. Deck said if that changes, so will his operation.
"That definitely changes the economics behind it," he said about the dollar-for-dollar credit system. "Now it makes it more viable for me to actually invest my capital into windmills and solar panels to actually make a change."
This sort of idea is something I'd like to see a lot more of. Letting people generate their own power, and giving them credit for the excess they produce, is an excellent way to drive not only environmentally-friendly power production, but also resilience and self-sufficiency in power generation. All good in my book.
