Federal approval of lax regulations for big polluters fails to spur clean energy future New Brunswickers want

Attention News Editors: The Conservation Council of New Brunswick’s Louise Comeau, Director of  Climate Change and Energy Solutions, made the following statement with respect to the Government of Canada’s approval today of New Brunswick’s proposed regulations for heavy polluters.

“The Government of Canada has let New Brunswickers down by approving weak regulations that let Irving Oil, NB Power and the province’s other heavy industrial polluters off the hook for taking serious climate action. 

The federal approval is the result of a benchmark assessment process that is weak, allowing approval of provincial industrial regulations with emissions reductions lower than that required under the federal system.

The federal benchmark needs fixing no later than 2022 to ensure New Brunswick’s biggest polluters do their share in making cuts to emissions and that provincial reductions meet or exceed federal requirements.

With droughts, wildfires and heat waves increasing, we need to do better. We need to rise to the challenge of climate change and that means ensuring pollution is not free, closing regulation loopholes, and pursuing a clean energy future that does not generate dangerous nuclear waste in communities at home and around the world.

Because of today’s approval, New Brunswick risks being unprepared for the deeper greenhouse gas emissions reductions needed to stave off the overheating of the planet. Canada and New Brunswick need to be on track to at least 60 per cent reductions over the next 10 years. Today’s approval does nothing to spur preparations for a carbon-free economy.

Canada needs to set a new target for 2030; it needs a plan for getting there that cleans up electricity and transportation systems, makes buildings efficient and puts agriculture and forestry on sustainable tracks.”

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For more information, contact:

Jon MacNeill, Communications Director, Conservation Council of New Brunswick; 238-3539; jon.macneill@conservationcouncil.ca

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