Is Canada (or the province Alberta) staying on a right track for tackling climate change?

11/24/2015

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The Weather Network
http://www.theweathernetwork.com/news/articles/report-canada-warming-at-twice-the-global-rate/60197/

CBC News
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/first-ministers-climate-change-scientist-1.3331884

Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
Original source: http://www.kit.edu/kit/english/18857.php

ScienceDaily
English version

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25 Comments

Louise

11/25/2015 09:27:42 am

Actually since our winter has been delayed, we should know there must be something wrong with how we are treating our nature.
I could still remember what my last year science teacher was saying that we have showed no effort in cutting down greenhouse gases at all but rather making more emissions. The numbers listed on most research studies are kind of blindfolding us from whatever threats behind climate change. And he also told us that some environmental or energy policies just shift the problems to other that even makes things getting worse.
But the number of 2 degree rise of our average temperatures is very shocking.

Alfred

11/26/2015 06:58:52 am

In my opinion what we are experiencing right now and turning into a diminishing point that resources and labor just can't bring in higher productivity and economic gain, but we must stick to it so much. If we look at our living more closely by the same token our goal of being environmental friendly is set to the same scenario. How much more we could afford to cut down more emissions and resources at the same time that won't hurt our economy, that's the question we got to know.

Greg

11/27/2015 12:04:42 pm

The 3rd article is pretty hard to understand. If the idea of 'methane cracking' really works, that would help a lot. But if we think about what we are getting, cell phone, game consoles, and all those accessories, people will get bored of having the same models of electronics and will definitely replace them by other ones in less than a year. For this reason how could we cut down the greenhouse gases once people always want new things and keep consuming?

Ella

11/29/2015 10:47:46 pm

I am not sure they are heading for a right direction in terms of cutting more emissions. It's too early to say. It sounds to me that Alberta might start it at the wrong time. We are still not sure if oil demand will be bouncing right back.

Calvin

11/30/2015 02:44:41 pm

Let's look at the reality, that really shows how Canada couldn't successfully cut down the amount of greenhouse gases and emissions after having signed the Kyoto Protocol back to 1997 but withdrawn in 2012. It is much like other same economic systems - consumerism., most of those countries haven't really done much on complying with the committed targets under the protocol.
Alberta, a province that has heavily relied so much on energy industry, simply it's about oil & gas. Once again it hasn't been successful for the province either to lower or even to keep the amount of emissions since the era of oil boom. If we look at the results of the Scandinavian countries, that have made some effort though. China, the manufacturing powerhouse of our world, not surprisingly hasn't really committed. The air and water quality is extremely horrific to the people. What I'm trying to say is every country has its little math to do, not everybody's willing to give up what's having now.

Fred

11/30/2015 08:57:52 pm

I am a bit doubting whether separating between hydrogen and carbon is really practical while combustion is taken place. There might be other byproducts.
If you pay a little attention to what's going on the news, all the headlines are about climate change. Many scientists have warned us since a long time ago but who would listen though? I guess people now realize the rise of the global temperature that's getting more serious. So most countries have to show up and talk about that.

Jessie

12/1/2015 07:21:31 am

The problem we are having is no matter where you could go, the environmental crisis is just global, can't really avoid it. I am thinking they possibly know how serious the consequence is now, so many countries are finally getting together to talk about climate change again since many years as far as I know. Look around the weather in AB back to 3 years ago, we were having 10-30cm of snowfall already by November. But actually it has been getting warmer.
I kind of agree some of you were saying what matter is how we keep buying new things, new models of phones or electronics coming out almost every half a year. However the economy has been slowing down, the upside is we get a break for the mother nature.

Brian

12/2/2015 01:54:47 pm

I absolutely agree with Calvin.
This should have been done way earlier, at least by the time our global economy was still in a good shape. But right now our governments want to do a bit more, planning to add more environment tax on either or both businesses and citizens. There's going to be a rebound. I am not sure how they could convince the oil corporates to take a lead.

Matthew

12/4/2015 05:45:17 pm

Just heard of the news saying that the amounts of spending and carbon dioxide that those countries' representatives have made since the beginning of the conference of climate change are egregiously surprising. It's contradictory and like some kind of anti-climax. To what I feel so far this UN's conference or showtime- supposedly true in a way will be another copy of Kyoto Protocol, nothing really new will come up.

Anthony

12/4/2015 10:01:10 pm

I wonder how most countries are caring so much about the climate change right now but not global economy, for this reason I am pretty sure there's good ground of statistics showing how bad our Earth is turning to be.
For example the living things in oceans have been greatly affected by warm water temperature. There's a great deal of sea animals either gradually disappearing or reducing in shocking numbers. It certainly jeopardizes our food chain.
If the governments ask the corporations to help now, it's not very likely once the economy is in downturn. If they want to tax normal people, that would eventually hurt the local economy.

Willy

12/5/2015 06:14:20 am

What they are trying to do is to separate those byproducts while having a combustion, if it could be adopted in the energy industry, the amount of carbon dioxide might be possibly reduced. However the cost of the method is very crucial. Even the cost of C02 emission control is reluctantly done by a few car makers.

Dan

12/6/2015 07:09:31 am

I want to say that of course the climate change is due to the fact of human activities. It just recalls when I was in grade 6, I have known the ozone layer is reducing by 4-5percent each year because of the depletion. That might be forgotten by most people. Co2 emission on overall hasn't really been significantly reduced, if we look at the cars people have, like SUVs/ 4x4 trucks and the things they bought and dump in a short period time. I doubt the UN's conference would get us and our environment to anywhere. I think we could try to educate how people consume, for example taxing those less-environmental friendly vehicles/ products.

Mag

12/7/2015 06:34:55 pm

If you look around, there's no snowfall in Alberta right now!!! We are having positive number in temperature on most days. There may be other green Christmas in this province. Setting up a goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 Celsius? The reality isn't always coming out upon your wish. Albertans are now being finger-pointed as the bad guy of the whole emission reduction campaign.

Justinn

12/7/2015 10:18:54 pm

It isn't a new topic for having hazardous substances from emission output when burning fossil fuels. In fact we have never been successful in cutting down the emissions even having banned the use of CFC/ HCFCs. Our nature hasn't been really gone well.

Henry

12/8/2015 05:03:47 pm

The thing we should worry the most is Canada's water sources. We have one of the highest proportions of clean drinking water sources. If the climate change is getting worse, some other countries might target at the water sources. So our drinking water has become a more strategic asset than...let's say oil patches. But some in Alberta never think that's true.

Eddie

12/9/2015 07:58:11 am

Global warming has already showed up and has made some impacts on our ecosystem. Almost everyday there are some sea animals either going to be endangered or extinct without notice.
As some of you having said that climate change definitely puts our food web and ecological pyramid into risk. Now wouldn't it be too late to patch the problems? To me it's may be so or better than not doing anything though.

Margge

12/10/2015 07:58:26 pm

Basically the people need to know what's going on and what's it all about the conference before trying to win support from most people. Up to this point I bet most Canadians don't even know why they need to set the goal of CO2 emission cut-off. The message hasn't been clearly declared to the Canadians. The NDP government and Albertans are now stuck in a crossroad - being environmental-friendly vs. sustainable economic growth. I don't see a win-win solution proposed by neither the NDP nor the energy corporations. I feel what the Albertans are doing now is to wait for some kind of miracle.

Chantal

12/11/2015 05:19:52 am

We're making a trade off between keeping our economy of consumerism and nature. Not to mention that if the average global temperature is raising by 2-3 degrees C the regional environment would change dramatically. Some viruses and diseases might either re-emerge or outbreak in certain regions. It would just bring another great challenge to local public health system. For example I am not sure how many of you realize that the peak time of influenza has lasted longer.

Neil

12/11/2015 04:31:24 pm

First of all are people only doing the cut back altogether or case-by-case by themselves? It's the question we got to know on the first hand before should go after whatever goal they have set. I doubt most Canadians know what have been going on at the UN conference. Before signing up & committing anything we must find out how Canada could do that. It isn't about singing up a hobby club.

Eddie

12/13/2015 11:12:17 pm

I have a funny feeling of this Paris pact is just another copy of Kyoto Protocol. Apparently the reason is all those member countries are having a wide range of discrepancies, simply saying they wouldn't comply with whatever restrictions set in the pact. The real purpose of the conference is to make most countries know what's been going on in our nature.

Collin

12/15/2015 07:39:55 am

Taking action is always the best response to social issues like this one. On the other hand having ambitious goals is like stabbing in the back of environmental groups, corporations, and even common people like us. We aren't sure how the governments are planning to cope with the agreement. Right now our economy is pretty bad, who knows when it would better anytime soon. Another question for us is how + how much should we commit that would make sense to the people?

Johnson

12/15/2015 05:35:25 pm

The only thing we should worry about is will the energy companies transfer the cost to us. Let's say a rise in CO2 tax, or will it be an excuse of raising tax on energy necessities. I hope not.

Dave

12/16/2015 02:46:15 pm

If the global temperature is raising faster than any periods in human's history, that isn't funny at all, the geographical landscapes are definitely threatened by that. Imagine that low sea-level cities will be the first to take the hit. Another problem is that we are having the scarcity of fresh water source, a lot of sources of groundwater have been contaminated.

Sherena

12/17/2015 06:13:14 am

Kind of responding to some goals of reducing in emissions, I personally wouldn't think they can be easily reached. The developed countries want the developing countries to do more on their part, but that's where the dilemma actually started. Both developed and developing countries for sure want their economic growth, but at the same time the developed ones assume others could do the cutback on CO2/ greenhouse gases emissions. Does it imply that most factories/ manufacturing plants should either slow themselves or shut down completely in those developing countries? So we got to bring the manufacturing processes back to our countries, wouldn't we want/ be able to spend double on the same product that originally made in the developing countries? This is the big question for us and the governments of developed countries to answer.

Adrianna

12/17/2015 10:53:21 pm

They had finally done with the meeting in Paris. Our economy is weakening, production has been apparently slowing down. So the demand of fossil fuels is dropping, contradictorily, we may reach the target later on. I don't agree with putting carbon tax on corporations and even consumers like us for now, that's absolutely due to the gloomy economy. If that has to be done, it will do more harm than good.

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