BEYOND KYOTO AND KEYSTONE

Robin V. Sears

It's time for 's absolutists on energy, the economy and the environment to lay down their rhetorical arms. It’s time to find a path forward that works for all Canadians, argues Contributing Writer Robin Sears, in a look back at the journey from Kyoto to the Keystone XL pipeline and a preview of the issues that lie ahead.

Il est temps pour nos absolutistes des questions énergétiques, économiques et environnementales de ranger leur arsenal rhétorique, tout comme il nous faut sans délai tracer une voie qui rassemblera tous les Canadiens, plaide notre collaborateur Robin Sears, qui refait le parcours de Kyoto au projet de pipeline Keystone XL et donne un aperçu des enjeux à venir.

hen political rhetoric reduces complex policy even the most distinguished statesmen. This set of decisions to light switch choices, the outcome is issues, often grouped under the umbrella of culture wars, W usually poisonous or paralyzing. Good/bad has pushed politicians to govern as if the slogan were choices in government are always rare, and in times of fis- policy — or worse, to be paralyzed by fear of voter retri- cal austerity the choices are always more nuanced. There is bution into permanent inaction. Health care reform, the no good or bad choice in deciding whether to cut spending war on drugs and religious schools are on the Canadian on nurses, soldiers or highway maintenance. If partisanship list. Americans would add abortion, gun ownership, makes it painful to do the right thing, most governments immigration, taxes and constitutional fundamentalism. simply move on and leave the issue for the next budget, Now we are adding energy and environmental policy to election or mandate. the list. The best politicians have always survived being trapped There are no partisan virgins in this demonization by their sloganeering by the short memories and perennial game. To every left eco-activist’s bellow that “tar sands kill,” weakness of voters for comforting political fictions. The there is matching nonsense by propagandists on the other powerful red, white and blue hues of a New Jerusalem or a side making the nonsensical claim that “my bitumen has Strong New America are, after all, so much more compelling greater ethical virtue than yours!” than the sombre pastels of our own lives. Who wouldn’t be excited by the promise of “secure jobs in a strong Canada” his rhetorical tyranny of threat and insult has two when your private choices are whether to pay the cable bill T predictable outcomes: governments are more or the credit card this month? tempted to kick the can down the road on tough issues Slogans have rallied partisans since they were carved as a next mandate priority, viz. the Keystone XL post- onto chariot fronts. Shouting “Ethical oil!” and “Ban ponement by the Obama administration, putting off a tankers!” moves votes today just as effectively as “The Old decision until after the presidential election in Flag, the Old Policy, the Old Leader!”— the party slogan for November. And in today’s tough budget climate, they John A. Macdonald’s last campaign in 1891. Slogans create can claim that fiscal priorities mean that addressing any compelling heroes and villains, reducing complexity to a divisive issue will need to be postponed a while longer. battle cry. Effective political leaders know the difference The second impact is that covering your back requires between campaigning and governing. They don’t confuse escalating the demonizing rhetoric, with the right and bumper stickers for policy, instead building the logical, or at left each denouncing the radicalism of their opponents. least the rhetorical, bridge between overheated campaign The Canadian government’s somewhat bizarre claim of rhetoric and governing. “foreign radicals” interfering in the Northern Gateway For several decades in most of the Western democra- pipeline debate is only the most recent example. Given cies we have been making that path from rough politics that Liberals and New Democrats regularly accuse the to good policy on some issues exceedingly slippery for government of a variety of equally dubious radicalisms

34 OPTIONS POLITIQUES FÉVRIER 2012 Beyond Kyoto and Keystone as well, one can understand the one week of bad press for having A Canadian scientist who should widening circle of disillusioned vot- finally abandoned Kyoto, he was have known better said in response ers who dismiss all politicians’ abu- probably right. Add the usual col- to a reporter’s question last year that sive language and stop listening or lapse that environmental concerns it was “absolutely certain” that cli- voting. endure in the middle of a recession mate change will obliterate ice floes If a policy choice has a long-term and it probably is true that from the Ungava Bay in Canada’s horizon and the impact of failing to Canadians have at least parked their North, destroying the habitat of the act is not visible before the next elec- climate change anxieties. polar bears who now inhabit the tion, the temptation for advisers in But it is the environmental move- region, “within 30 years.” Really? this political culture of insult and ment that has once again badly When meteorologists cannot precise- caricature is to say, “Next mandate, I flubbed the politics of an issue. Pascal’s ly predict weather patterns 30 hours think, sir.” So unmaintained bridges eternal bon mot about absolutists — les into the future, let alone days, cli- eventually do fall down, and long- extrêmes se touchent — echoes power- mate scientists can offer certitude ignored First Nations poverty finally fully here. But the absolutists on the over decades! It is small wonder that the reaction of too many Climate change politicians strain credulity in claiming that a Canadians to these com- government’s promise to give up carbon addiction is the peting dogmas is to say, same as doing it. They slide further in public credibility when “Sorry, not interested…” Then there is the they mask the failure of the Kyoto, Copenhagen and Durban hypocrisy of national conferences to achieve real reductions in greenhouse gas politicians and internation- (GHG) emissions with new deadlines, new deliverables and al bureaucrats about bind- diplomatic double-talk. ing agreements. Smokers know that promising to does explode on the evening news, right are winning this battle by suc- give up smoking is easy; doing it, not and the fish stocks do collapse, etc. cessfully raising fears of an economic so much. Climate change politicians With the insiders gambling that it Armageddon if the world were to do strain credulity in claiming that a gov- will erupt on the next guys’ watch… the sensible capitalist thing — that is, ernment’s promise to give up carbon A keen advocate of the “if-it-ain’t- to put a price on carbon. addiction is the same as doing it. They gonna-bite-us-do-nothing” thesis in Many conservatives around the slide further in public credibility when Prime Minister ’s office, world have developed an absurdly they mask the failure of the Kyoto, with all the cheek and self-assurance of absolutist posture on climate change: Copenhagen and Durban conferences a successful young political staffer, “It isn’t happening, and the numbers to achieve real reductions in green- offered the following defence. A sum- have been torqued… And anyway, if it house gas (GHG) emissions with new mary of his argument when he was is happening there is nothing we can deadlines, new deliverables and diplo- challenged about the then new gov- do about it. Besides, the climate has matic double-talk. ernment’s apostasy and determined heated and cooled many times over Canadian Conservatives fall into inaction on the issue of climate the millennia and we have survived.” the same trap in failing to acknowl- change was this: In fact, serious fluctuations of the type edge that emissions have exploded by Look, to us it’s really quite sim- now being reported have not been more than one-third on their watch, ple. You can’t see it, you can’t seen since the last Ice Age, a period instead blaming Liberal sins now a taste it and you can’t smell it. when human civilization was only on decade past. Journalist , an You don’t know whether it is the horizon. accomplished communicator and happening or not, whether it’s Again, in this mirror world of broadcaster, would have sneered on air going to hit us here or only competing Manichean visions, the at his stumbling attempts as a minister somewhere else…Nothing will zealous certitude of some environ- to play such silly political prestidigita- be visible for years, whether you mentalists is a given. They do their tion games. agree with us or not. If it’s credibility little good in claiming to be A sign of Kent’s discomposure invisible, it’s meaningless politi- able to predict the future on the basis was his sarcastic attack on Commons cally. We’re going to focus on of early and sometimes ambiguous critics for not being with him in clean air, water and food safety data, just as conservative deniers do Durban — when his department had that people can see. themselves the same damage in claim- expressly forbidden them from join- ing that all the scientific climate data ing the delegation. Again, as a jour- ive years later, from the vantage collected over two decades on five nalist, he would have been bemused F point of Canada enduring only continents is a con. by the sight of Canadian taxpayers

POLICY OPTIONS 35 FEBRUARY 2012 Robin V. Sears

paying the many thousands of dollars bon such as some American and and their oil patch friends or to edu- it cost to send a minder from the European conservative governments cate Canadians about the damage our PMO to oversee the delegation, even have implemented would not be petroleum addiction does to the as their elected representatives were appealing to not only politically savvy planet. forbidden to attend. environmentalists but also to the Similarly, if one beards a Fraser One MP, Elizabeth May, the Canadian Conservative government, Institute young fogey with the query Green Party leader, did manage to as an alternative to being continually “Do you really think that our get there — as a result of a courtesy savaged by opponents for inaction. have ethical qualities that oil pumped by her friends in Papua New Guinea, The next momentous political from the Sahara or the deserts of the as a member of their delegation. It battle in energy and environment pol- Arabian Peninsula lack?” you get the same response: “That’s not The guilt-driven message of traditional green orthodoxy — the point...” eat less, fly less and wear a sweater — is not only dead on The zealots on each arrival politically, it is wrong environmentally. A green side know that oil sands petroleum will be produced economy and secure green jobs as part of the response to and shipped to Asia and carbon emissions will require economic development, not America, either by pipe, simply taxes and exhortation. rail, truck or all three. They also know that oil is oil, was, according to several Canadians icy, however, is not going to be fought and that pretending that you can at Durban in other roles, a humilia- on the reduced energy consumption choose to fill your gas tank with “good tion for Canada to be seen to have and emission front; it is on the produc- oil” is a fairy tale. We will discover this treated its own Green Party leader so tion side. year, as we appropriately tighten sanc- churlishly. tions on Iran, their “unethical oil,” In Break Through (2007), an ver the next two years, currently destined for Japan, will sim- impressive but little-noticed book ana- O Canadians will hear less about ply be diverted to Vietnam or else- lyzing the political stalemate on envi- their leaky doorframes and their car’s where, nations that will pay Iran a ronmental policy, two American deadly emissions and a great deal higher price for it as confrontation communication and environmental more about the Canadian humilia- raises world oil prices. activists, Ted Nordhaus and Michael tion of “dirty tar sands oil” and the Who owns an oil well or profits Shellenberger, analyzed the political dangerous pipelines and tankers used from its production is ethically mean- stalemate on environmental policy to transport it. ingless in a global oil market. Less and made the foolishness of this block- The production and export of Saudi oil shipped to Nova Scotia simply age painfully clear. these heavy oils is shaping up to be means the same tanker lands in New Overcoming the climate change this decade’s equivalent of the seal England, with some of the product stalemate, they argue, “demands hunt battles of the 1970s or the battles later trucked north again as gasoline. unleashing human power, creating a over logging in the 1980s, with just So, stripped of the comfort of new economy and remaking nature the same mix of hysterical rhetoric, slippery slogans as policy, where ...[T]he right models come not from nonsensical statistical games and huge should we find the right balance of sewage, acid rain, or the ozone hole fundraising potential for propagan- environmental protection, economic but from the very thing environmen- dists of all stripes. benefit and export priorities where talists have long imagined [as the If one braces a hard-line environ- our enormous petroleum assets are problem]…economic development.” mentalist, standing on his toe in a concerned? A good place to start is to In other words, the guilt-driven corner and staring him in the eye, examine the experience of the message of traditional green ortho- and asks, “Do you really think you forestry sector 20 years ago. There doxy — eat less, fly less and wear a are going to be able to prohibit oil are surprising parallels in the players, sweater — is not only dead on arrival sands production or the pipelines politics and propaganda between the politically, it is wrong environmen- required to ship it to market?” the two industries. tally. A green economy and secure response is inevitably a sneer, fol- “Murderous multinational log- green jobs as part of the response to lowed by, “Of course not, but that’s ging companies are raping virgin carbon emissions will require eco- not the point.” Depending on Canadian forests daily, destroying our nomic development, not simply whether the activist is a partisan ecosystem, polluting our lands and taxes and exhortation. Liberal or New Democrat or simply a rivers, killing fish and wildlife habi- It is hard to understand why a professional environmentalist, the tat, all with the connivance of their market-based approach to pricing car- point is either to hammer the Tories political allies in BC and ” was

36 OPTIONS POLITIQUES FÉVRIER 2012 Beyond Kyoto and Keystone

CP Photo Actress Daryl Hannah, centre, and others, take part in a demonstration in front of the White House in Washington, on August 30, 2011, to protest the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

one narrative back then. Saigon had to an earlier generation of been bombed six times in less than a “Irresponsible eco-terrorists are spik- activists. The battle advanced to hun- year —one cannot be as sanguine ing trees and placing lethal triplines dreds of arrests, significant economic about an escalation of the battle threatening the lives of Canadian log- and political damage to Canadian for- over the oil sands. The difference gers, slandering Canada’s reputation est companies and Canada’s global between a spiked Douglas fir or a around the world, killing jobs and a reputation, and mercifully few injuries wrecked logging truck and an way of life” was the other. or deaths. exploding oil sands plant is monu- Clayquot Sound and Meares Given how easy it is to disrupt a mental. The importance of scaling Island became rallying cries with as pipeline — Egypt’s heavily guarded down the incendiary rhetoric of much emotional power as Selma and gas pipeline through the Sinai has both sides is clear.

POLICY OPTIONS 37 FEBRUARY 2012 Robin V. Sears

In the case of the BC logging bat- the early oil sands production meth- peers to step up to tougher standards tle, the cooler heads of a very small ods might want to visit Cape Breton, of production, emission control and group of industry executives — led, where tar ponds from primitive min- clean-up. If some don’t want to make ironically, by Tom Stephens, a quin- ing practices are on their way to those commitments, fine. The market tessentially Southern gentleman becoming a country park on the will reward the pioneers, and govern- imported to Canada by McMillan boundaries of Sydney. Or they might ment will back pioneering industry Bloedel to run one of the forestry visit the bucolic parklands around agreements with new rules for the giants in the midst of this epic strug- Sudbury, which a generation ago recalcitrant soon after. gle — found a path to peace. Inviting could have been used to train astro- Every Canadian’s home and car is green activists, First Nations leaders nauts preparing for a moonwalk, so fed by petroleum products delivered and trade unionists in ones and twos complete was the devastation left by at some stage of production by for private conversation, he built a early mining there. (In fact, Apollo pipelines. My gas furnace and your dialogue of trust in a series of lunch- astronauts did visit Sudbury before commuter train are the taps at the es and dinners, often at his their flights, not because of the grim end of a massive network of 700,000 Vancouver home. “I cooked a lot of after-effects of mining, but because kilometres of pipelines that snake barbecue that year!” he laughed in the geology of the area was shaped across every corner of North America. recalling his campaign. by a massive impact crater of the sort They could be replaced by thousands Slowly the invited players were the astronauts were planning to of new oil-tanker trucks and trains, at able to outline an agenda, define their explore on the moon.) considerable cost to every consumer, own red lines and begin to develop Along with the rest of the devel- greater risk of oil spills and accidents, relationships based on candid private oped world, we do have a long history and higher emission levels in moving debate. Out of that process the oil from the production grew a new commitment from Who owns an oil well or profits from site to the end user. industry to stronger environ- its production is ethically Obviously, that’s a foolish mental practice, economic trade-off on every level, so development agreements with meaningless in a global oil market. the issue is not whether to First Nations on whose land Less Saudi oil shipped to Nova build and maintain our grow- most of the forests stood, and Scotia simply means the same ing pipeline network. It is finally a set of legislative and tanker lands in New England, with how to ensure that its con- regulatory changes providing a struction does minimal envi- much tougher and more trans- some of the product later trucked ronmental damage and that it parent framework for an indus- north again as gasoline. can operate to the highest try often known for its standards of safety. These are buccaneering history. of exploiting profit from the land policy or engineering issues that we crudely and wastefully. We also have a have faced for generations. t is tempting to look at today’s more recent history of restoring the Canadians know how to build com- I multi-stakeholder shared forestry damage done and forcing more plex engineering projects in the councils and their joint statements, respectful processes on the resource harshest terrains in the world. and the calm that surrounds sector as a whole. Richard Gwyn’s magnificent sec- forestry policy today, and dismiss it The business of rock and log ond volume of his biography of Sir as inevitable. That would be insult- production is a tough, dirty, and John A. Macdonald paints a com- ing to those who risked reputations until recently an environmentally pelling portrait of our ancestors’ ambi- and careers in the long complex damaging business — and it gener- tion and project skill. In the 1880s, we months of debate that led to today’s ates about one-third of every set a world’s record for railway con- harmony. Canadian’s wealth. It has made struction across some of the most diffi- This is not a new debate. Canada Canada a rich country since beaver cult terrain on the planet. has drawn resources from the ground hats faded as an export product. So with sometimes devastating environ- let’s drop some of the hypocrisy and et us hope that on a ranch some- mental legacies for nearly two cen- hysterical rhetoric and begin to find L where between Calgary and the turies. We have also learned how to paths to peaceful and environmen- Rockies a quiet visionary oilman is run resource industries more responsi- tally respectful production similar to preparing to “cook a lot of barbe- bly and how to clean up those messes. those achieved by the forestry sector cue,” inviting some of the more Those tempted to claim our only a few years ago. courageous leaders of the green com- habitat has been forever sullied by The more visionary leaders in the munity and First Nations and labour the vast filthy tailings ponds from oil patch are quietly pressing their to talk seriously. It’s about time that

38 OPTIONS POLITIQUES FÉVRIER 2012 Beyond Kyoto and Keystone the oil patch and its antagonists changing policy and behaviour stopping climate change was impos- looked to the pioneers in the might want to drop the claim that sible. It also endorsed different forestry sector and began their own with enough noise they will bring the strokes for different high-emitting peace process. oil and gas sector to its knees. folks. Universal solutions would not At the political level, it is proba- Courageous leaders in that move- be enforceable; market and culturally bly too much to hope that the ment could acknowledge that there is sensitive ones chosen at the local antagonists will give up the blood no prospect of Alberta or Canada giv- level would inevitably fare better. sport of demonizing each other over ing up the wealth and energy inde- he Harper govern- Brian Mulroney, David Cameron, Arnold Schwarzenegger and T ment’s determination to avoid the trap of a Sweden’s Carl Bildt are among conservatives who have National Energy Policy, or benefited internationally from being seen as both market and for that matter a national planet defenders. emissions strategy, reflects its unusual respect for a environmental policy. After all, it pendence guaranteed by 150 billion less coercive federalism. Offering generates headlines and fills party barrels of oil. Instead, they might market and tax expenditure incen- coffers on all sides. Perhaps the prod focus on demanding the types of tives to cities and provinces — there- to developing a Canadian environ- environmental protections, inspec- by helping to reduce emissions — mental peace plan, one covering car- tions and clean-up and liability guar- using whatever policy instruments bon pricing and with a national antees that the nuclear industry was they chose would hardly offend such energy and emissions strategy at its built on. And yes, a price and a tax on a philosophy. core, will have to come from carbon and emissions. Partisans on each side will refuse thoughtful outsiders. If each side were to suspend the to disarm unilaterally, to abandon It doesn’t seem to matter to the demonization games, the large swathe their rhetorical heavy artillery, with- Harper government that it is seen to of common ground would become out any sign that their antagonists have not a green gene in its political obvious. As Pat Daniel, the sagacious would respond peacefully. Given two DNA. But it does seem that an obviously Enbridge CEO observes with mild irri- generations of scaremongering and potential political asset is being unneces- tation in speeches, we travel by transit, confrontation, it may be harder for sarily wasted because the Harperites are air and car using fuel his pipelines environmentalists to take the first not making a greater effort. Brian deliver. We heat and operate our hous- step, fearful of attack from their own Mulroney, David Cameron, Arnold es, schools and factories on their gas or activists. Schwarzenegger and Sweden’s Carl Bildt the electricity it generates. Nor was it a For conservatives, however, the are among conservatives who have ben- coincidence that Daniel was named arguments in favour of a more efited internationally from being seen as Canada’s CEO of the Year in 2011, proactive green agenda are surely both market and planet defenders. As after the way he stepped up to take both politically and philosophically many external critics have observed, responsibility for the 2010 pipeline compelling. It is ironic that clarion there is an obvious connection between spill in Kalamazoo in the middle of calls such as “[Environmental] fru- conservation and conservatism that is Michigan cottage country. He immedi- gality is founded on the principle both philosophic and etymologic. ately flew into the state and that all riches have limits,” and that As Roger Scruton, the British con- announced that it was “our mess” and society “is a partnership not only servative and environmental writer, he wasn’t leaving until it was cleaned between those who are living, but argues in his recent book, Green up. He remained on the scene more between those who are to be born” Philosophy, an environmentally con- than a month. sound as if they had come from a scious conservatism is possible, and The Hartwell Group, named after press release. They are any genuine environmentalism needs a UK castle where a group of academ- actually the wisdom of one of the to be conservative if it is to be coher- ics met to ponder ways of breaking English-speaking world’s greatest ent and effective. He makes a com- the climate change impasse, offered conservative thinkers, Edmund pelling case for each thesis, describing potentially useful counsel to govern- Burke. a variety of approaches that might ments of all stripes in a 2010 paper. actually move people of all stripes to It dismissed demands that govern- Contributing Writer Robin V. Sears is a accept tougher policies that protect ments should be required to “solve principal of Ensight Canada. He is a for- the environment. climate change,” saying that, as with mer national director of the national By the same token, environmen- the war on drugs, citizens were smart . talists who are interested in really enough to understand that victory in [email protected]

POLICY OPTIONS 39 FEBRUARY 2012