Category: Canada

Anything related to Canada or Canadians

Divestment and “The Toronto Principle”

An article in The Harvard Crimson focused on the recent report of the president’s divestment committee at U of T:

Last December, a committee at the University of Toronto released a report on the issue of divestment, drawing a clear line by aligning itself with the needs of the Paris agreement. It recommended that the university not finance companies whose “actions blatantly disregard the international effort to limit the rise in average global temperatures to not more than one and a half degrees Celsius above pre-industrial averages by 2050…These are fossil fuels companies whose actions are irreconcilable with achieving internationally agreed goals.”

Hopefully, this principle will be re-affirmed when President Gertler makes the final decision. We expect that at the end of March.

PhD proposal progress

I have come across a lot of exciting material for my PhD project in the last few weeks. Documents like the papal encyclical Laudato Si raise interesting questions about the connections between the faith community’s involvement in the effort against climate change, anti-capitalism, and the moral contemplation of the environment. For instance, there are interesting parallels between this theological interpretation of biodiversity loss and ‘deep’ ecology in which nature is considered valuable for its own sake and not only for human purposes.

Another encouraging development is the universal enthusiasm for the project. I have discussed it with experts in faith and aboriginal communities, people at Massey College, committee members and potential supervisors, people at parties, environmentalists, journalists, and civil servants. People are sometimes skeptical about whether it will prove logistically feasible to talk to so many people and follow the routes of two phantom pipelines, but nobody has argued that the project is not worth trying.

Once the Community Response to the ad hoc committee on divestment’s report has been assembled, my top priority will be the creation of a major new version of my proposal for circulation to committee members and potential supervisors.

U of T ad hoc committee recommends divestment

The presidential committee at the University of Toronto just recommended divestment!

They lay out criteria for excluding stocks based on their climate change impact and “recommend… that the University of Toronto instruct its investment managers to divest immediately” from such holdings.

They specifically identify ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, the Peabody Energy Corporation, Arch Coal Inc., Alpha Natural Resources LLC, Cloud Peak Energy, and the Westmoreland Coal Company for divestment.

Look for more information on this in the hours ahead from UofT350.org and Toronto350.org.

Responses to the Paris Agreement

A bit of what I have seen online so far:

My quick take: there is lots to be disappointed about in this agreement. Targets aren’t legally binding. Indeed, the agreement text seems far too aspirational in many places. I can’t help but feel that an international agreement on trade or defence would include more concrete measures for effective implementation. It’s also objectionable that the agreement seeks to prohibit people harmed by climate change from suing those who are causing it for damages.

Even if fully implemented, this text doesn’t do nearly enough to prevent catastrophic climate change. That being said, having an agreement endorsed by so many parties — and which does include mechanisms for increasing ambition over time — makes me a bit more hopeful that this problem can ultimately be resolved.

Alberta’s 2015 climate plan

There’s a mass of news coverage and punditry about Alberta’s newly-announced pre-Paris climate change plan:

To me, this seems like a useful step forward: an acknowledgement that Alberta must act to curb climate pollution and that fossil fuel expansion cannot continue forever.

That said, this is all happening late. We should have stopped expansion decades ago and by this point jurisdictions like Canada with high GDP per capita and very high GHG pollution per capita should be on the downslope of cutting back aggressively.

Keystone XL rejected

From today’s announcement from Barack Obama:

Today, we’re continuing to lead by example. Because ultimately, if we’re going to prevent large parts of this Earth from becoming not only inhospitable but uninhabitable in our lifetimes, we’re going to have to keep some fossil fuels in the ground rather than burn them and release more dangerous pollution into the sky.

As long as I’m President of the United States, America is going to hold ourselves to the same high standards to which we hold the rest of the world. And three weeks from now, I look forward to joining my fellow world leaders in Paris, where we’ve got to come together around an ambitious framework to protect the one planet that we’ve got while we still can.

If we want to prevent the worst effects of climate change before it’s too late, the time to act is now. Not later. Not someday. Right here, right now. And I’m optimistic about what we can accomplish together. I’m optimistic because our own country proves, every day — one step at a time — that not only do we have the power to combat this threat, we can do it while creating new jobs, while growing our economy, while saving money, while helping consumers, and most of all, leaving our kids a cleaner, safer planet at the same time.

This action is a major statement about the need to transition away from fossil fuels and avoid developing them in their most damaging form. It will surely add even more energy to efforts to block other bitumen sands pipelines and otherwise drive the transition to a climate-safe global economy.

Contemplating the Climate Welcome

If I can pull it off in the midst of gathering grading, I am tempted to go to Ottawa for three days to participate in most of the Climate Welcome which is being organized for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau:

The Climate Welcome protest, organized by 350.org Canada, is modeled on the 2011 Tar Sands Action sit-ins at the White House that led to the arrests of over 1,200 people and helped elevate the Keystone XL pipeline as the largest environmental fight in a generation.

See also: Trudeau’s big test in Paris: oil industry profits or real action on climate change?

It’s a bit odd to see it billed as “organized by 350.org Canada”, since I don’t think that is really an organization so much as one 350.org employee with a Twitter account and Facebook page. If it’s going to be another “grassroots movement to solve the climate crisis”, they are going to need some members and an organizational structure. If that’s starting to happen in Ottawa tomorrow, it could be reason enough to be present.