Carney, premiers must see through climate change-denial smoke
Opinion
More than 350 years after the discovery of gravity, nearly 150 years since Thomas Edison fired up a light bulb and close to a century after a Scottish bacteriologist's accidental observation of penicillin's superpower, scientists are being forced to come to the defence of science itself.
This past weekend, representatives of the leading science academies from G7 nations released something called the 'Ottawa Declaration of the Science Academies of the G7,' a one-page document that serves as a prelude to a summit meeting to be held later this month in Alberta. This gathering is being hosted by the Royal Society of Canada, a non-partisan, non-governmental organization that advises the federal government on policies impacting science, academics and the arts.
'Especially in times of uncertainty, it is essential that our Academies commit to strengthening our efforts in defence of the integrity of science and the science advice systems that are critical elements of free and democratic societies,' Royal Society president Dr. Alain-G. Gagnon said in a news release accompanying the declaration.
Why would these non-partisan scientific organizations feel the need to defend science? In large part because the government of the United States, the nation that invests the most money in scientific research and development, has launched an all-out war on science and scientists.
With little more than the stroke of a pen, U.S. President Donald Trump has cancelled research projects, eliminated funding for research and for the institutions of higher learning that conduct the scientific exploration.
Meanwhile, Trump has put the Department of Health and Human Services into the hands of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a self-described skeptic of long-established, evidence-based medicine who has not met an unfounded health conspiracy theory that he could not embrace. Recently, Kennedy announced intentions to stop federally funded scientists from publishing in peer-review journals.
At the same time, the Trump administration has waged an equally furious war against climate science, eliminating programs to promote clean-energy generation, rolling back subsidies to help the automotive industry transition into EVs and cutting funding for climate research.
Given the important role that the U.S. plays in global science, Trump's decisions have triggered shock waves that are undermining science all over the world.
What is most frustrating is the fact that the war on science is so counter-intuitive.
Right now, there are millions of people questioning the efficacy of vaccines, even though they have been protected from fatal diseases for most of their adult lives. Fights continue to erupt over whether to wear masks in public to slow the spread of airborne viruses, even though most of us would never allow a surgeon to operate on us without a mask. We question whether carbon is ruining our climate even as we head into what experts believe will be the warmest year on record.
The war on science is a pandemic of irrationality, fuelled by ignorance and sustained by misinformation. It's also highly contagious.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith leads the war on science — particularly climate science — in this country. Smith has never explicitly denied that climate change is real, but her actions demonstrate her contempt for the idea that burning fossil fuel is ruining the planet.
When asked last summer about the devastating wildfires that ravaged the tourist mecca of Jasper, Smith blamed 'arsonists' and not the drought and extreme heat brought on by climate change. Meanwhile, she has pursued a range of policy demands that clearly show she does not believe climate change is an existential threat.
She wants guaranteed access to the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic coasts for her province's oil and gas, elimination of carbon emission caps and the abandonment of net-zero requirements for new power generation.
Like most oil and gas advocates, Smith canters ahead with policies to sell and burn more fossil fuels without any consideration of the net cost.
There is no doubt that Alberta's government would become much wealthier if it were easier to get the province's oil and gas to more markets. It's also equally true that, at the same time, Alberta would incur considerably more costs to deal with the carnage of floods and fires that are directly caused by climate change.
More worrisome is the fact that Prime Minister Mark Carney's government may be willing to give in to some of Smith's demands in a futile effort to cultivate more political support in Alberta.
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Monday's first ministers meeting in Saskatoon included discussions on fast-tracking infrastructure projects of national significance. The list of projects has not been publicly released, but there is little doubt that new pipelines are the main priorities for provinces such as Alberta and Saskatchewan.
Carney is faced with a choice: accept the science and growing anecdotal evidence of the impact of climate change; or join Smith in kicking the climate-change can down the road until we can no longer see it through the smoke.
When it comes to energy infrastructure, there is no sane argument for investing now in anything that is not zero-emission, or that helps connect the electricity grid in Canada so provinces can help each other meet their power needs.
As the authors of the Ottawa declaration in the defence of science have made abundantly clear, to do anything else would be indefensible.
dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca
Dan LettColumnist
Dan Lett is a columnist for the Free Press, providing opinion and commentary on politics in Winnipeg and beyond. Born and raised in Toronto, Dan joined the Free Press in 1986. Read more about Dan.
Dan's columns are built on facts and reactions, but offer his personal views through arguments and analysis. The Free Press' editing team reviews Dan's columns before they are posted online or published in print — part of the our tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
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