Canada Plans To Phase Out Coal-Powered Electricity By 2030 (theguardian.com)

Last week, French president Francois Hollande announced that France will shut down all its coal-fired power plants by 2023. This week, Canada's environment minister, Kathleen McKenna, announced that Canada plans to phase out its use of coal-fired electricity by 2030. The Guardian reports: [McKenna] said the goal is to make sure 90% of Canada's electricity comes from sustainable sources by that time -- up from 80% today. The announcement is one of a series of measures Justin Trudeau's Liberal government is rolling out as part of a broader climate change plan. Trudeau also has plans to implement a carbon tax. "Taking traditional coal 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," McKenna said. Four of Canada's 10 provinces still use coal-based electricity. Alberta had been working toward phasing out coal-fired electricity by 2030.

Comments

Re: Great, just what we need...

[MightyMartian]

Yes, Saskatchewan has the last pseudo-skeptic Premier in the country. Of course, the pseudo-skeptics like Postmedia (the Canadian oil industry's advertising branch masquerading as a newspaper chain) is cheering for Trump to kill the US's involvement in the Paris agreement, and naturally insisting "Well, there's no point to Canada fighting climate change, because the US won't".

Meanwhile, the very same newspaper chain is reporting that the Arctic is 20 degrees warmer than normal for this time of year.

I keep thinking that some point really soon the mounting evidence of serious climate shifts will override even the hardest critics, but then again, AGW pseudoskepticism has become a sort of a cult of its own, which follows the same bizarre and idiotic credo of the Creationists, both groups declaring almost every other day "Any day now, that nasty scientific theory I hate is going to be disproven."

Even the Chinese have had enough

[rsilvergun]

See here. So good luck with that. There are limits to the amount of pollution folks will tolerate. China and India have long since reached those limits.

Re:Just switch to Natural Gas

[wchin]

It's actually not a conservative thing. It's that the Republican Party, which is sort-of conservative, is controlled by a few monied elite that have significant fossil fuel interests. Therefore, in the U.S., fossil fuels = conservative cause, but not because it has anything to do with actual conservative ideology.

Re:Great, just what we need...

[barc0001]

> as I write this post, it's snowing heavily outside and there's over a foot of snow on the ground.

So because it's cold somewhere, global warming doesn't exist, excellent logic. Countervailing point: When I moved to Vancouver 30 years ago nobody needed air conditioning and winters saw about 1-2 weeks of snow. The last 10 years there's been annual runs on all stores in the summer where they can't keep air conditioners in stock, and I haven't seen a single flake on the ground in 6 years.

However, as you wrote that post it is also TWENTY DEGREES warmer than it should be in the arctic.

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/north-pole-20-degrees-warmer-than-normal-as-winter-descends

Note, that's also the National Post, the right wing rag of Canada, so if THEY are publishing it, there must be some fire behind that smoke.

Re:Coal in Canada?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, it's called Hydro because in BC, Quebec and Newfoundland/Labrador most of the electricity is Hydroelectric. Alberta and Saskatchewan use primarily coal. Ontario is the only province that uses primarily Nuclear, Hydroelectic and Natural Gas, but their power distribution network is called Hydro One.

There are only 14 coal plants in Canada. 7 of them are in Alberta. 3 in Saskatchewan, 2 in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick has one of everything.

So shutting down the coal plants mostly impacts Alberta, and the fun fact is that Alberta can pretty much "mooch" off BC while it transitions to something else.

This should be a global effort.

[Gravis Zero]

Coal is the least efficient and highest polluting method of power generation in the commercial market and everyone should be trying to eliminate it everywhere on the planet. If there was ever one method of power generation to eliminate, it's coal power.

Re:Coal in Canada?

[Layzej]

Canada's province of Ontario was the first jurisdiction in North America to fully eliminate coal as a source of electricity generation. This had the greenhouse gas reduction equivalent of taking 7 million cars off the road. Not bad for a province of just under 14 million.

Re: Great, just what we need...

[haruchai]

I don't live there, but it sounds like a good thing.

By many measures, Canada and Russia are the biggest "winners" from global warming. They benefit from warmer temps, longer growing seasons, more land in the cultivation zone, etc. So it is a bit ironic that Canada is making commitments to reduce CO2, while America (a big net loser) is backsliding.

A lot of Russia is trapped, frozen methane and an increasing amount of it is thawing and venting. Not a good thing if it increases. Canada has been seeing more & larger forest fires and coupled with the die-off of trees from infestation, wildfires are going to get worse over time.