Carney’s climate plan will continue to cost Canadians

From the Fraser Institute

Mark Carney, our next prime minister, has floated a climate policy plan that he says will be better for Canadians than the “divisive [read: widely hated] consumer carbon tax.”

But in reality, Carney’s plan is an exercise in misdirection. Under his plan, instead of paying the “consumer carbon tax” directly and receiving carbon rebates, Canadians will pay more via higher prices for products that flow from Canada’s “large industrial emitters” who Carney plans to saddle with higher carbon taxes, indirectly imposing the consumer carbon tax by passing those costs onto Canadians.

Carney also wants to shift government subsidies to consumer products of so-called “clean technologies.” As Carney told the National Observer, “We’re introducing changes so that if you decide to insulate your home, install a heat pump, or switch to a fuel-efficient car, those companies will pay you—not the taxpayer, not the government, but those companies.” What Carney does not mention is that much of the costs imposed on “those companies” will also be folded into the costs of the products consumers buy, but the cause of rising prices will be less distinguishable and attributable to government action.

Moreover, Carney says he wants to make Canada a “clean energy superpower” and “expand and modernize our energy infrastructure so that we are less dependent on foreign suppliers, and the United States as a customer.” But this too is absurd. Far from being in any way poised to become a “clean energy superpower,” Canada likely won’t meet its own projected electricity demand by 2050 under existing environmental regulations.

For example, to generate the electricity needed through 2050 solely with solar power, Canada would need to build 840 solar-power generation stations the size of Alberta’s Travers Solar Project, which would take about 1,700 construction-years to accomplish. If we went with wind power to meet future demand, Canada would need to build 574 wind-power installations the size of Quebec’s Seigneurie de Beaupre wind-power station, which would take about 1,150 construction years to accomplish. And if we relied solely on hydropower, we’d need to build 134 hydro-power facilities the size of the Site C power station in British Columbia, which would take 938 construction years to accomplish. Finally, if we relied solely on nuclear power, we’d need to construct 16 new nuclear plants the size of Ontario’s Bruce Nuclear Generating Station, taking “only” 112 construction years to accomplish.

Again, Mark Carney’s climate plan is an exercise in misdirection—a rhetorical sleight of hand to convince Canadians that he’ll lighten the burden on taxpayers and shift away from the Trudeau government’s overzealous climate policies of the past decade. But scratch the surface of the Carney plan and you’ll see climate policies that will hit Canadian consumers harder, with likely higher prices for goods and services. As a federal election looms, Canadians should demand from all candidates—no matter their political stripe—a detailed plan to rekindle Canada’s energy sector and truly lighten the load for Canadians and their families.

Related Topics:#FraserInstitute #KennethGreen #MarkCarney CarneyCarbonTax CarneyClimatePlan CarneyEnergyPolicy

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Higher carbon taxes in pipeline MOU are a bad deal for taxpayers

Published on November 28, 2025

Todayville

By Franco Terrazzano

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is criticizing the Memorandum of Understanding between the federal and Alberta governments for including higher carbon taxes.

“Hidden carbon taxes will make it harder for Canadian businesses to compete and will push Canadian entrepreneurs to shift production south of the border,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “Politicians should not be forcing carbon taxes on Canadians with the hope that maybe one day we will get a major project built.

“Politicians should be scrapping all carbon taxes.”

The federal and Alberta governments released a memorandum of understanding. It includes an agreement that the industrial carbon tax “will ramp up to a minimum effective credit price of $130/tonne.”

“It means more than a six times increase in the industrial price on carbon,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said while speaking to the press today.

Carney previously said that by “changing the carbon tax … We are making the large companies pay for everybody.”

A Leger poll shows 70 per cent of Canadians believe businesses pass most or some of the cost of the industrial carbon tax on to consumers. Meanwhile, just nine per cent believe businesses pay most of the cost.

“It doesn’t matter what politicians label their carbon taxes, all carbon taxes make life more expensive and don’t work,” Terrazzano said. “Carbon taxes on refineries make gas more expensive, carbon taxes on utilities make home heating more expensive and carbon taxes on fertilizer plants increase costs for farmers and that makes groceries more expensive.

“The hidden carbon tax on business is the worst of all worlds: Higher prices and fewer Canadian jobs.”

Alberta

Carney forces Alberta to pay a steep price for the West Coast Pipeline MOU

Published on November 27, 2025

Todayville

From the Fraser Institute

By Kenneth P. Green

The stiffer carbon tax will make Alberta’s oil sector more expensive and thus less competitive at a time when many analysts expect a surge in oil production. The costs of mandated carbon capture will similarly increase costs in the oilsands and make the province less cost competitive.

As we enter the final days of 2025, a “deal” has been struck between Carney government and the Alberta government over the province’s ability to produce and interprovincially transport its massive oil reserves (the world’s 4th-largest). The agreement is a step forward and likely a net positive for Alberta and its citizens. However, it’s not a second- or even third-best option, but rather a fourth-best option.

The agreement is deeply rooted in the development of a particular technology—the Pathways carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS) project, in exchange for relief from the counterproductive regulations and rules put in place by the Trudeau government. That relief, however, is attached to a requirement that Alberta commit to significant spending and support for Ottawa’s activist industrial policies. Also, on the critical issue of a new pipeline from Alberta to British Columbia’s coast, there are commitments but nothing approaching a guarantee.

Specifically, the agreement—or Memorandum of Understanding (MOU)—between the two parties gives Alberta exemptions from certain federal environmental laws and offers the prospect of a potential pathway to a new oil pipeline to the B.C. coast. The federal cap on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the oil and gas sector will not be instituted; Alberta will be exempt from the federal “Clean Electricity Regulations”; a path to a million-barrel-per day pipeline to the BC coast for export to Asia will be facilitated and established as a priority of both governments, and the B.C. tanker ban may be adjusted to allow for limited oil transportation. Alberta’s energy sector will also likely gain some relief from the “greenwashing” speech controls emplaced by the Trudeau government.

In exchange, Alberta has agreed to implement a stricter (higher) industrial carbon-pricing regime; contribute to new infrastructure for electricity transmission to both B.C. and Saskatchewan; support through tax measures the building of a massive “sovereign” data centre; significantly increase collaboration and profit-sharing with Alberta’s Indigenous peoples; and support the massive multibillion-dollar Pathways project. Underpinning the entire MOU is an explicit agreement by Alberta with the federal government’s “net-zero 2050” GHG emissions agenda.

The MOU is probably good for Alberta and Canada’s oil industry. However, Alberta’s oil sector will be required to go to significantly greater—and much more expensive—lengths than it has in the past to meet the MOU’s conditions so Ottawa supports a west coast pipeline.

The stiffer carbon tax will make Alberta’s oil sector more expensive and thus less competitive at a time when many analysts expect a surge in oil production. The costs of mandated carbon capture will similarly increase costs in the oilsands and make the province less cost competitive. There’s additional complexity with respect to carbon capture since it’s very feasibility at the scale and time-frame stipulated in the MOU is questionable, as the historical experience with carbon capture, utilization and storage for storing GHG gases sustainably has not been promising.

These additional costs and requirements are why the agreement is the not the best possible solution. The ideal would have been for the federal government to genuinely review existing laws and regulations on a cost-benefit basis to help achieve its goal to become an “energy superpower.” If that had been done, the government would have eliminated a host of Trudeau-era regulations and laws, or at least massively overhauled them.

Instead, the Carney government, and now with the Alberta government, has chosen workarounds and special exemptions to the laws and regulations that still apply to everyone else.

Again, it’s very likely the MOU will benefit Alberta and the rest of the country economically. It’s no panacea, however, and will leave Alberta’s oil sector (and Alberta energy consumers) on the hook to pay more for the right to move its export products across Canada to reach other non-U.S. markets. It also forces Alberta to align itself with Ottawa’s activist industrial policy—picking winning and losing technologies in the oil-production marketplace, and cementing them in place for decades. A very mixed bag indeed.