OTTAWA – The
Mining Association of Canada (MAC) and its members have issued principles addressing climate change issues, including carbon pricing.
MAC’s Principles for Climate Change Policy Design document recommends the following:
- Establish a broad-based carbon price that is applicable to all sectors of the Canadian economy.
- Be revenue neutral by investing revenues generated through carbon pricing into the development of lower emission technologies and to ensure a level playing field for trade-exposed industries that are emission intensive.
- Address competitiveness and carbon leakage concerns across all sectors to prevent declines in investment, employment, tax revenues and trade.
- Be predictable, flexible and sensitive to changing economic conditions and geographic circumstances, to enable consumers and industry to adapt and to treat regions fairly.
- Be simple, complementary and effective to ensure that a national climate change regime works in tandem with existing provincial schemes, avoids duplication, and is simple to understand and administer.
- Support investments in the development and implementation of technologies that lower emissions through capital investments, which could include public-private partnerships.
- Recognize early action, acknowledging that some companies have been proactive in reducing their climate footprints and that several provinces have already established climate change mitigation regimes.
“Today, one of Canada’s largest industries is coming out in support of a carbon price, identifying it as the most effective and efficient means of driving emissions reductions and making real progress in the global fight against climate change,” stated Pierre Gratton, MAC president and CEO. “MAC’s support of a carbon price is guided by our principles for climate change policy design, and is based on 16 years of our members’ continuous efforts to reduce emissions through technology and innovation and become more energy efficient.”
Learn more about MAC and the Canadian mining companies that support it at
www.Mining.ca.
3 Comments
Mike samuels
I personally believe that any implementation of a carbon tax (which is inherently a form of a consumption tax) should be associated with a concurrent equivalent reduction in personal income tax. Only then is it truly “revenue neutral”.
Prakash Mullick
Very pleased to learn that MAC has taken this decision to support carbon pricing to address climate change issues. As a consumer I have no problem paying my share to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Krusty
The hugest issue confronting this whitewash policy is in recommendation #2.
This new government is an expansionist government, their hierarchy has been retained from past administrations. Any new revenues collected won’t be re-invested into any technology, they’ll be rifled into the expansion of their bureaucracies and into their international bureaucratic commitments.
As for the MAC, it is evident that their own bureaucracy is being dragged along with it. It looks as though the MAC members’ own political hierarchy has gagged their own technical operations. I know many in the industry who are already on the fine line and can’t believe the thought process undertaken invoking that a mere 100 ppm increase in CO2 over 100 years will affect anything. In addition to the already crushing economic conditions facing Canadian mining, a carbon tax will end a significant component of Canadian operations.