• About
    • Which Energy Mix is this?
  • Climate News Network Archive
  • Contact
The climate news that makes a difference.
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
SUBSCRIBE
DONATE
No Result
View All Result
The Energy Mix
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities
  FEATURED
Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA June 4, 2023
Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest June 4, 2023
Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing June 4, 2023
2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season June 4, 2023
Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion? June 1, 2023
Next
Prev

Canada’s Forests Emit More Carbon Than They Absorb, But Ottawa Spins a Different Story

February 25, 2019
Reading time: 3 minutes

peupleloup/Wikimedia Commons

peupleloup/Wikimedia Commons

16
SHARES
 

A mid-February analysis on CBC gets at one of the most persistent myths in Canadian carbon accounting—that the country’s forests absorb more carbon than they emit, or in some erroneous versions of the story, soak up so much carbon dioxide that there’s no need to worry about the rest of the country’s emissions.

The report comes at a time when the federal government is pushing for a new accounting approach that would allow it to take even more credit for forests as a carbon sink.

  • The climate news you need. Subscribe now to our engaging new weekly digest.
  • You’ll receive exclusive, never-before-seen-content, distilled and delivered to your inbox every weekend.
  • The Weekender: Succinct, solutions-focused, and designed with the discerning reader in mind.
Subscribe

“Trees don’t just absorb carbon when they grow, they emit it when they die and decompose, or burn,” CBC explains. “When you add up both the absorption and emission, Canada’s forests haven’t been a net carbon sink since 2001. Due largely to forest fires and insect infestations, the trees have actually added to our country’s greenhouse gas emissions for each of the past 15 years on record.”

Last month, Sierra Club B.C. calculated British Columbia’s uncounted forestry emissions at more than 400 megatonnes over two years, largely due to two seasons of raging wildfires. Environment and Climate Change Canada places the country’s net forest emissions at about 78 Mt for 2016, the last year for which official statistics are available.

So it’s no surprise that Canada “has historically excluded its forests when accounting for its total greenhouse emissions to the rest of the world,” CBC writes. “We had that option, under international agreements, and it was in our interest to leave the trees out of the total tabulation, since they would have boosted our overall emissions.” Canada’s greenhouse gas accounting methods also leave out emissions and absorptions from wetlands and farmland, “and with good reason, if the goal is to reduce emissions on paper”.

But now, the federal government is trying something new. Canada is “making the case to the United Nations that things like forest fires and pine beetle infestations shouldn’t count against us, and that only human-related changes to our forests should be included when doing the calculations that matter to our emission reduction targets.” That would mean leaving out impacts like the wildfire emissions documented by Sierra Club.

The shift in accounting methods would position the forest as a carbon sink, rather than a source. It wouldn’t be nearly a big enough sink to account for the country’s 700 megatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per year. But CBC points out that the shift in process would “improve” Canada’s climate performance on paper, without anything actually changing on the ground.

“Canada should do as much as we can to sequester carbon naturally,” said Canadians for Clean Prosperity Executive Director Mark Cameron, a former policy advisor to then-prime minister Stephen Harper. And “we should take advantage of our forests, our wetlands.” But “it doesn’t mean that, because we have a lot of forest, we don’t have to worry about carbon emissions, which is often the line that people use.”

In a post last year for Policy Options, he added that “by switching to one of the alternative accounting methodologies for emissions from land use, forestry, and forest products allowed under the framework, Canada could narrow the gap—perhaps by as much as 63 or 126 megatonnes—even if our actual emissions don’t change.”



in Canada, Carbon Levels & Measurement, COP Conferences, Drought & Wildfires, Forests & Deforestation

The latest climate news and analysis, direct to your inbox

Subscribe

Related Posts

Pixabay
Solar

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
119
Oregon Department of Transportation/flickr
Cities & Communities

Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing

June 4, 2023
75
Natural Resources Canada
Drought & Wildfires

2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season

June 4, 2023
149

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

I agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Trending Stories

/MaxPixels

‘Substantial Damage’, No Injuries as Freight Train Hits Wind Turbine Blade

May 25, 2022
14.6k
Natural Resources Canada

2.7M Hectares Lost, Nova Scotia at Ground Zero in ‘Unprecedented’ Early Wildfire Season

June 4, 2023
149
sunrise windmill

Renewables ‘Set to Soar’ with 440 GW of New Installations in 2023: IEA

June 4, 2023
132
Pixabay

Greek Industrial Giant Announces 1.4-GW Alberta Solar Farm, Canada’s Biggest

June 4, 2023
119
debannja/Pixabay

Austin, Texas Council Committee Backs Fossil Non-Proliferation Treaty

June 4, 2023
83
Clairewych/Pixabay

Demand Surges for Giant Heat Pumps as Europe Turns to District Heating

June 4, 2023
82

Recent Posts

Oregon Department of Transportation/flickr

Shift to Remote Work Cuts Commutes, Frees Downtown Space for Affordable Housing

June 4, 2023
75
nicolasdebraypointcom/pixabay

Factor Gender into Transportation Planning, IISD Analyst Urges Policy-Makers

June 4, 2023
35
moerschy / Pixabay

Federal Climate Plans Must Embrace Community-Driven Resilience

June 4, 2023
50
Equinor

Is Equinor’s Bay du Nord ‘Delay’ a Cancellation in Slow Motion?

June 1, 2023
867
Ottawa Renewable Energy Co-op/Facebook

‘Hinge Moment’ for Humanity Demands ‘YIMBY’ Mentality: McKibben

June 1, 2023
76
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Notley

Notley Would Have Backed Carbon Capture Subsidies, Smith Less Certain: Ex-Pipeline Exec

June 1, 2023
100
Next Post
Centpacrr/Wikimedia Commons

Alberta Oil-By-Rail Plan Could Block Grain Shipments, Farmers Warn

The Energy Mix - The climate news you need

Copyright 2023 © Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy Policy and Copyright
  • Cookie Policy

Proudly partnering with…

scf_withtagline
No Result
View All Result
  • Canada
  • UK & Europe
  • Fossil Fuels
  • Ending Emissions
  • Community Climate Finance
  • Clean Electricity Grid
  • Cities & Communities

Copyright 2022 © Smarter Shift Inc. and Energy Mix Productions Inc. All rights reserved.

Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behaviour or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}