A Brief History of the Canadian Carbon Tax

Carbon taxes have more sources than our current politics would have you believe

BY ALBERTA OIL STAFF

Canada, under successive federal and provincial governments, has become a continental leader in carbon pricing. Some see it as a green gateway to getting a new pipeline built, while others see it as the industry’s death by a thousand cuts or, at very least, a giant tax grab.

Canada’s carbon-tax history began in March 2007, when Alberta became North America’s first jurisdiction to legislate greenhouse gas reductions from large industrial emitters via a carbon levy. The following month, B.C. joined forces with five U.S. states in the Western Climate Initiative—a market-based group aiming to tackle climate change. Ontario and Quebec have since signed on too. In May 2008, Conservative federal environment minister John Baird called carbon trading a “key part” of the government’s emissions plan targeting oil and gas producers and coal-fired power plants. In July of that year, B.C. became the first province to implement a carbon tax—with proceeds going back to taxpayers.

In the 2008 federal election, Conservative and Liberal leaders both included carbon pricing in their platforms. The Conservative government of Stephen Harper won a minority mandate with a campaign that pledged to “develop and implement a North America-wide cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases and air pollution, with implementation to occur between 2012 and 2015.” Following the election, Conservative environment minister Jim Prentice began to explore a national carbon market, “something that has never been done before in this country,” he said. That plan was dropped when the Conservatives won a majority government in 2011.

Fast-forward to 2016 and by the time Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced plans for a national carbon pricing plan, several provinces—excluding, most notably, Saskatchewan—already had one in the works.

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