The World Bank announced July 15 that nearly twenty Canadian companies had signed on to join the Carbon Pricing Leadership Coalition (CPLC), which brings together governments, businesses and civil society groups to identify and address the challenges of using carbon pricing as a way to combat climate change.
Canada’s Minister of Environment Catherine McKenna personally worked with the companies to draw their attention to the costs, and potential opportunities, of putting a price on carbon pollution.
The move, which marks the largest number of companies joining the CPLC at one time, was welcomed by Feike Sijbesma, CEO of Royal DSM, and co-chair of the CPLC.
“Canada has been a true leader in our coalition,” he said. The country has done a remarkable job at the levels of the Federal Government, the provinces, and individual companies to focus on carbon pricing. It helps sets a standard for others to emulate and expand on.”
Several provinces already have full-fledged cap-and-trade or tax schemes, while others are only now getting started. At the same time, a host of companies are looking at different ways to introduce internal carbon pricing. The federal government and the provinces are working out potential courses of action to meet ambitious commitments in their INDC, the national plan prepared for the Paris climate change agreement.
British Columbia, which established its own carbon tax in 2008, levies a charge of $21 per ton of CO2e emissions. The province is now home to a growing clean technology sector, with more than 200 companies generating an estimated $1.7 billion in revenues annually. Ontario, with temperatures at the southern end of the province projected to increase by 4⁰C, and the northern half by about 8⁰C over the next 30 years, is now gearing up its carbon pricing efforts.