Clinton News Record, 2016-12-28, Page 5Wednesday, December 28, 2016 • News Record 5
Coal exports expose Canada's hypocrisy
There's growing consensus
among our political leaders
that Canada needs to wean
itself off coal-fired electric-
ity, but if we're so concerned
about the fuel's greenhouse
gas emissions and effect on
human health, why are we so
keen to ship vast quantities
of the stuff to Asia?
The Port of Vancouver
alone handled more than 38
million metric tonnes of coal
in 2014, 11.5 million tonnes
of which was thermal coal --
the kind burned to produce
power.
Alberta's Rachel Notley
government announced a
year ago that it would shut
down coal-fired power
plants by 2030, a decision
that was recently reinforced
by Justin Trudeau's federal
government, which has
expanded the measure
across the country, insist-
ing plants either close or
install technology that
eliminates their emissions
by that date.
Getty Images
A freighter at the Port of Vancouver DeltaPort and coal terminal. Delta, British Columbia, Canada.
Ontario, which took years power plants a fewyears ago.
to deliver on its vow, finally "Taking traditional coal
shut down its dirty coal-fired power out of our energy
mix and replacing it with
cleaner technologies will
significantly reduce our
greenhouse gas emissions,
improve the health of
Canadians, and benefit
generations for years to
come," federal Environ-
ment Minister Catherine
McKenna said in a news
release.
It remains to be seen how
successful Alberta and other
provinces will be at adopting
renewable or non -emitting
power sources without
ratcheting up consumers'
bills, but surely if Canada is
concerned about climate
change, there's a disconnect
in banning the use of coal at
home, but happily shipping
the material to growing
economies in Asia.
While it's true that if Can-
ada stopped transporting
coal, other nations would fill
the gap, what moral high
ground are we occupying with
such a disjointed position?
Canada, for instance,
curtailed the export of
asbestos because it realized
it wasn't appropriate to sell
a product with negative
health consequences. Med-
ical experts tell us coal has
an adverse impact, too.
A new report estimates a
Canada -wide phase-out of
coal power will prevent
more than 1,000 premature
deaths, 900 hospital admis-
sions or emergency room
visits and nearly $5 billion
in health-care costs by
improving air quality, says
Kim Perrotta, executive
director of the Canadian
Association of Physicians
for the Environment.
It's fine for Canada to
demonstrate leadership in
banning the use of coal-fired
electricity plants, but our
high-minded rhetoric is
stained a little when our
country facilitates the fuel-
ling of operations elsewhere.
It's a bit like a cook selling
food to his customers that he
would never dream of feed-
ing to his own family.
-Postmedia Network
Liberals must tackle website boondoggle
The federal Liberals are
sitting on a project that
could balloon into a billion -
dollar boondoggle. They
need to nip this in the bud
before it flourishes. And fast.
Recent Postmedia stories
have revealed that a project
to redesign government
websites is already massively
over budget and over its
original timeline.
The project was first
approved by Stephen Harp-
er's Conservative govern-
ment in 2013. They awarded
a $1.54 -million contract to
tech company Adobe Sys-
tems Inc. to merge the gov-
ernment's 1,500 different
websites under a common
Canada.ca banner.
A government spokesper-
son recently told Postmedia
the government anticipated
having to issue more con-
tracts to finish the job.
And the project costs have
already ballooned to just
under $10 million.
Here's the big problem
though.
One expert close to the
story estimates just 0.5 per
cent of the work on the pro-
ject has been done.
The deadline's been
pushed back to the end of
2017, but it appears unlikely
it will be finished by then.
A number of experts
agree final project costs
could easily reach $1 bil-
lion. Yup, that's right. A rel-
atively minor web project
that started with a million -
dollar budget could end up
growing into a billion -dol-
lar nightmare.
It's outrageous. Projects
like this need to be bal-
ance public service and
respect for taxpayers. Nei-
ther appears to be a prior-
ity here.
The government's cur-
rent patchwork network of
websites probably should
be rationalized, but surely
not at the cost of tens or
hundreds of millions of
dollars, or even in the worst
case, a billion dollars.
It makes make more
File photo
sense to fix individual
access problems or issues
on a site by site basis and
gradually migrate to a com-
mon government domain
and website.
The Liberals are usu-
ally more than happy to
abandon Conservatives
endeavours.
Yet so far they seem to be
running with this project.
Government spokespeople
are defending it.
That makes it their baby,
and they're now very much
responsible whatever hap-
pens from here on.
The warnings are out
there. But it's hardly too
late to act.
The Liberals need to get
this project under control
and either halt work on a
looming disaster, figure out
an practical and responsi-
ble alternative or go back to
the drawing board.
- Postmedia Network
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