Canada is halfway toward meeting its 2020 target set out in the Copenhagen Accord for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 17 percent from the 2005 levels, Environment Minister Peter Kent announced on Wednesday.
Last year, Canada was one-quarter of the way toward reaching that goal.
The jump this year is the result of the federal government's " realistic, sector-by-sector approach to greenhouse gas regulations that is reducing emissions, while continuing to create jobs and encouraging economic growth," Kent said at a news conference.
As a signatory to the non-binding 2009 Copenhagen Accord, Canada is committed to reducing GHG emissions to 607 million tonnes, or 607 megatons, eight years from now.
However, under the current progress, Canada's emissions are expected to drop to 720 megatons by 2020, meaning the government will have to find ways to cut emissions by an additional 113 megatons.
In its second annual Report on Emissions Trends released on Wednesday, Environment Canada included for the first time projections based on land-use change and forestry. This is expected to contribute to a reduction of 25 megatons of GHG emissions by 2020.
Kent said the government has taken action on two of Canada's major sources of emissions -- electricity and transportation.
Ottawa is expected to soon release final regulations for the coal-fired electricity sector, which aim to reduce GHG emissions by 31 megatons between 2005 and 2020. The regulations are scheduled to come into effect in 2015.
In October 2010, the Canadian government also announced final emission-reduction regulations for automobiles and light trucks for the 2011-2016 model years. Kent said the government is working on "even more stringent" regulations for the 2017 model year and beyond.
Cars and light trucks account for about 12 percent of Canada's total GHG emissions.
This past April, the government proposed regulations for heavy- duty vehicles, including large pick-up trucks, tractors, cement and garbage trucks, and buses, for the 2014 model year and beyond. At the time, Kent said the initiative would result in a three- megaton reduction in GHG emissions from these vehicles.
The minister said future regulations will not be based on precise targets, but rather on "best performance standards."
For example, the oil sands industries have indicated that they would like to reduce their emissions to the same levels that conventional oil and gas operations use, said Kent.
But environmental groups said most of the credit for reducing emissions should go to the Canadian provinces, such as Quebec, which created a cap-and-trade system to limit the amount of GHG emissions industrial sectors can generate, and British Columbia, which has implemented a carbon tax.
Ottawa has rejected both approaches, and has yet to introduce regulations for the oil industry -- the largest source of emissions growth whose annual GHG output is expected to rise by 45 megatons between 2005 and 2020 due to a surge in oil sands production.
The Canadian government is a "puppet for polluters" and "has done little more over the last year than act as a lobby arm for the tar sands," said Christian Holtz, executive director of Climate Action Network Canada.
"When it comes to federal policies, little to no progress has been made towards their weak goals," Holtz said. "Sadly, the government faces the nearly insurmountable challenge of meeting their own goals."
Only relying on sector-by-sector regulations "will be too slow and too inflexible to meaningfully close the gap" between the direction in which Canada's GHG emissions are headed and the federal government's commitment to reduce climate pollution, added P. J. Partington, a policy analyst with the climate change program of the Pembina Institute, a non-profit think tank that promotes sustainable energy.
Canada's support of oil sands development and its withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol, an international environmental treaty aimed at reducing greenhouse gases levels by the end of 2012, in December 2011 have drawn criticism from environmental groups.
Kent, who announced the withdrawal, said it is impossible for Canada to meet its targets under the accord by the time it expires, and that it doesn't make economic sense to pay the monetary penalties -- up to 14 billion Canadian dollars -- for failing to live up to its obligations under the accord.
Countries that are signed on to the accord have said Canada's decision to withdraw from Kyoto weakens the entire accord, and sets a bad example for other countries struggling to meet their commitments to reduce emissions.
