People walk toward Rod Robbie Bridge near Front Street and John Street in downtown Toronto on March 6.Laura Proctor/The Globe and Mail
Carbon dioxide and methane are not visible to the human eye. The greenhouse gases garner attention in the mind’s eye – and some sources attract more interest than others.
Emissions in the oil sands were 87 megatonnes in 2022, according to the latest official figures, reported last month. Emissions in passenger transportation, from cars and trucks to planes and trains, were 90 Mt.
Each account for about an eighth of Canada’s total emissions. The oil sands of course attract a lot of attention – and money. Ottawa is set to provide more than $10-billion of subsidies for carbon capture, available to all industries but with the oil sands at the front of the line – even as the technology is untested at such a scale. Transportation also gets significant attention and funding, as government subsidies help drivers shift to electric vehicles.
Now consider buildings. Their emissions were 89 Mt in 2022, roughly split between residential and commercial. It’s as if the oil sands were scattered across the country in small dollops and few people took notice – yet the impact on climate is equal. A molecule of carbon dioxide or methane has the same climate-heating effect no matter its source.
In the work to deliver on Canada’s promise to cut total emissions by 40 per cent by 2030, buildings receive a fraction of the spotlight cast on the oil sands or transport. But that’s beginning to change. Some jurisdictions, such as California, are starting to modernize rules around how residential and commercial buildings are fuelled. Natural gas – which is mostly comprised of methane, an especially potent greenhouse gas – is burned in furnaces and boilers, to provide heat and to heat water. This is how buildings produce such large volumes of greenhouse gases.
The Canadian Climate Institute, a policy think tank, published a report last week about the urgency and challenges to reduce emissions from buildings. What it requires is an across-the-board look at how governments oversee the country’s energy systems, from elected officials and independent regulators to private companies. The institute warned that, for now, “inertia is prevailing” – and if it continues, the cost will be tallied in higher bills for consumers and businesses and missed climate reduction targets for Canada.
The report showed that methane heats about half the residential buildings in the country, led by Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and British Columbia. Among commercial buildings, it’s more than 80 per cent.
The solution is clear, as it is in transportation: electrification. But to make it happen is more difficult, including generating greater levels of electricity and changing long-standing ways of doing things – such as always hooking up more buildings to new methane pipelines. A lack of co-ordination is a primary problem. The institute said no province has a clear plan about the future of gas for heating.
New builds should be easiest. Slow and stop the expansion of natural gas pipelines to heat buildings. Late last year, the Ontario Energy Board ruled on this, after a detailed review, and said new gas connections should be paid upfront, rather than amortized over decades. It was a smart decision, aiming to avoid an “overbuilt, underutilized gas system.” But the Progressive Conservative Doug Ford government immediately fought back – claiming the issue was about housing costs – and effectively overruled the decision this spring. It passed legislation, Bill 165, to limit regulatory oversight and make it easier for Enbridge, the gas supplier, to expand.
That was a mistake. Enbridge benefits as its pipeline network grows and the price is borne by all customers. They subsidize the Enbridge expansion, rather than the company paying the cost itself. And it locks in more fossil fuel infrastructure, worsening the risk of stranded assets in the future, as the Ontario Energy Board warned.
Ontario’s moving in the wrong direction. “Provincial governments need to start directing a shift from gas to electric heating infrastructure,” the Climate Institute argued. It called on governments to help bodies such as regulators and electricity system operators make decisions that abide by net zero goals and, especially, stop expanding fossil fuel systems.
The wrong decisions today will reverberate for decades. It’s easy to point at the oil sands or cars and trucks but the challenge of emissions exists across the economy and buildings merit more attention. Big changes are necessary – and moving in the wrong direction puts Canada further behind.