Federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change Catherine McKenna and Minister of Finance Bill Morneau released draft legislative proposals January 15 relating to the proposed federal carbon pricing system for public comment. The system would apply in provinces and territories that request it and in those that don’t have a system in place, which meets the federal standard in 2018.
Minister McKenna also released for comment a regulatory framework describing the proposed federal approach to carbon pricing for large industrial facilities. This component of the federal pricing system would create a price incentive for large industrial facilities to reduce emissions while limiting the potential impacts of carbon pricing on their international competitiveness. The system is designed to reward facilities with efficient operations and support clean innovation.
Presently, carbon pricing is in place in four provinces (Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec), covering more than 80 percent of the population. All provinces have committed to adopt some form of carbon pricing. The government says it will continue to engage provincial and territorial governments, Indigenous Peoples, industry, environmental groups, and other stakeholders on the design of the federal carbon pricing system during the winter and spring of 2018.
The draft legislative proposals and the framework released January 15 build on the pan-Canadian approach to carbon pricing, announced in October 2016. The documents represent the next step in the development of the federal system, and they are a follow-up to a technical paper on federal carbon pricing released in May 2017.
The comment period was open until February 12. Further details are available online at