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I was going to talk to you about the report by the Transportation Safety Board (TSB) on the Lac-Mégantic accident, but I think everything has pretty much been said. Transport Canada, under the Harper Conservatives, left the rail industry to regulate itself, with results we are all familiar with. Should I also mention that Transport Canada applies this same laxity to the pipeline sector?
I invite supporters of TransCanada's proposed Energy East pipeline project to take a few minutes to browse the TSB report and see the risks involved.
Other than the TSB report, the recent meeting between Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne and Quebec premier Philippe Couillard caught my attention in August. After their meeting, the premiers issued a press release entitled "Québec and Ontario Partner to Strengthen Central Canada's Economy."
The press talks a lot about this new alliance between the two provinces on economic issues as a means to counteract, for example, the western provinces.
But the release also includes a section on the fight against climate change, which emphasizes Quebec's cooperation with California as part of the Western Climate Initiative (WCI) for the implementation of a carbon market, and stressed the importance of putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions.
Greater cooperation between the two provinces on environment and energy is highly desirable. In my July 14 column, I mentioned that Equiterre had published a report with Ontario Clean Air Alliance on the economic and environmental benefits of an increase in electricity trade between these provinces.
Under the McGuinty government, Ontario made plans that were eventually abandoned to join the WCI. A shift in the Ontario government under the aegis of Wynne would be great news for greenhouse gas emissions, but also for Quebec businesses, which would no longer be the only ones subjected to this system in Canada.
This article by Steven Guilbeault, senior director of Equiterre, originally appeared in French in the Métro newspaper.
Photo: Patrick Lachance, MCE
