Money alone not enough to address climate change, says conservationist Louise Comeau

On one of the hottest days of the year, the Higgs government belatedly reannounced provincial funding for a range of environmental projects — funding that one recipient says isn't enough to address climate change.

Environment and Local Government Minister Jeff Carr held a one-hour event to tout the $2.5 million from the Environmental Trust Fund for more than 60 projects.

Ironically, the announcement was planned for the spring but was postponed because of the St. John River flood, the kind of extreme weather event scientists predict will be more frequent because of climate change.

"Better late than never," Carr said at the event at the University of New Brunswick, acknowledging to the crowd that the list of projects had been on a government website since April or May. 

He told reporters later that it wouldn't have been "appropriate" to be making the environmental fund announcement during the flooding, "when I could be out helping my own constituents." 

Active and committed

The Progressive Conservative minister said he believes the new government's environmental measures need more attention.

Environmentalists have criticized the PC fight against the federal carbon tax on consumers and its proposal to weaken emissions standards on industry. 

But Carr portrayed the government as active and committed, highlighting its embrace of a 2016 all-party report on climate change. 

"We don't promote that enough as a government," he said. "We realize there is an urgency. It may not look like we're doing much … but there's a lot of work going on."

Wednesday's event featured representatives from several organizations that have received funding from the Environmental Trust Fund, or ETF, a grant program paid for by bottle deposits. 

Carr had warm words in his speech for University of New Brunswick climate researcher Louise Comeau, a recipient of some of the funding for three projects, and other groups getting money.

Comeau returned the favour, saying she was "very grateful" to Carr and his predecessors for keeping the Environmental Trust Fund in place when they could have shifted the budget elsewhere.

"If it was not for the Environmental Trust Fund, a huge amount of intellectual and community-based work that gets done in the province would not happen," she said at the podium.

Policy disagreements

But Comeau told reporters afterward that the mutual congratulations shouldn't distract from serious policy disagreements on how to tackle climate change.

Projects approved this year include a study of how lakes and rivers are affected by warmer temperatures, a study of coastal erosion and the development of adaptation plans for communities.

Comeau said while the ETF projects, including her own research, are valuable and have an impact, they don't go as far as provincial policy can.

"The projects that the groups are doing are very, very important but they are a contribution," she said. "They are not at the scale of what a government can do, whether it's at the level of investing in infrastructure, whether it's setting targets and policies, legislation and regulation."

As an example, she called for an overhaul to provincial legislation and the Energy and Utilities Board to accelerate the provincial climate plan's target of getting 20,000 electric vehicles on provincial roads. 

And the Higgs government's proposal to regulate industrial greenhouse gas emissions is very weak, Comeau said.

"We are not making the changes that need to be made to position this province to succeed."

Stringent rules unnecessary

In June the Higgs government submitted a carbon price plan for large industry to Ottawa. The provincial levy would replace the federal backstop now in place in New Brunswick and would apply the price to a much tinier fraction of industrial emissions.

Carr says more stringent rules aren't necessary because provincial emissions have already come down to close to the 30 per cent reduction called for in the Paris climate agreement.

The minister said he hasn't heard whether the federal government will rule on the provincial plan before the fall federal election campaign. 

Carr said the Environmental Trust Fund indirectly created pressure for bans on plastic bags because it began with high school students pushing municipalities to act.

NB Liquor is eliminating the bags and the Sobeys grocery store chain announced Wednesday it will do the same. 

ETF projects in schools encourage students to pressure "the rest of us that are a little slower at adapting," he said. "Is enough ever enough? I don't think so. I think we could always do more but we'll have to continue to improve on that."

Comeau said the province could be "an even stronger partner" by bringing in its own, more robust climate change curriculum in provincial schools rather than leaving it to outside groups.

Curriculum change

One of the major ETF projects is a $100,000 grant to the Gaia Project, a charity that helps teachers and schools in the province incorporate climate change into their curriculum. 

A recent academic study found that New Brunswick's climate curriculum is one of the oldest in the country, lagging behind the scientific consensus on human causes and on solutions.

Carr pointed out that Education Minister Dominic Cardy is convening a major forum on education this fall. "I'm pretty sure that will be part of the discussion," he said.