On the cost of addressing climate change, you are letting others shape the narrative

For those of you who follow my column, Substack and social media you will know I have been beating on this drum for several years. Government needs to be honest about the cost and implications of commitments to address climate change. Some don’t want to talk at all. Some halfheartedly say it will be ‘cost neutral’ to residents (e.g. carbon tax) and others have even said it will bring down costs (e.g. the former NS premier saying that massive new wind projects would ensure Nova Scotians have cheap power in the future).

My concern was that if you aren’t prepared to shape the narrative others will step into the void.

As I waited for my luggage to come out at the Halifax Airport yesterday (a 45 minute affair even though we were the only flight at 1:30 AM), there were several large video screens cycling messages like this:

And this:

OK.

So because you didn’t want to have a serious conversation someone else has come in and is saying Nova Scotians are going to see their power bills quadruple and create a system that will generate blackouts at -30.

I can tell you the 200+ people waiting for the luggage at 2 am were not in any mood for that kind of message.

I think we are close to seeing politicians in this region promise to significantly roll back climate change commitments (provincial and federal) because we are not having an honest conversation with people.

The Conservative leader in England - just rolled back a bunch of commitments such as timing of the EV rollout because they saw the political writing on the wall.

We need to have a broad-based conversation now - that reaches everyone - young, old, rich and poor - business owner and retiree. What does this transition really look like? Who is going to pay (ratepayer, taxpayer, businesses, federal government)? What are the timelines and are they serious or just vague targets (clean electricity grid by xx, no ICE vehicles sold by xx, oil heated homes converted by xx)?

And on the costs I would be brutally honest. Right now our best estimate is that it will cost $xx billion to upgrade the electricity grid in Nova Scotia and xx billion to swap out the electricity generation infrastructure. It will likely cost xx to the average household but we intend to yy and zz to help mitigate the cost for lower income households.

The carbon tax that is starting to annoy you now? Get ready. Within a decade if you are still driving a gas powered car you will be paying $250 to fill it up. Now the feds are planning to rebate some of that cost but……

I don’t know what the alternative is. Right now I see us steamrolling towards electing politicians that dump most or all climate change commitments and are politically rewarded for it.

BTW. Look closely at the pictures above. Look at who is paying to convince Nova Scotians to turn away from carbon reduction commitments. That is the other big piece of this complex picture - if the feds and the provinces can’t agree on a shared path forward……