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Canada Falling Dangerously Behind U.S. Efforts on Climate

Canada has come under significant international criticism on climate change. The Canadian government’s primary and most persuasive reply is that the country will “match U.S. efforts.”

Copenhagen, Dec. 14, 2009 - Results of a comparative report by PowerUP Canada show that Canada has fallen well behind the United States in fighting climate change and is not keeping up with current efforts by the U.S. federal government.

The report titled “Falling Behind: Comparing Canadian and U.S. efforts on Clean Energy and Global Warming” was released in Copenhagen by PowerUP Canada’s Executive Director Tzeporah Berman.

“The Canadian government promises to ‘match US efforts’ but we have already fallen dangerously behind and the gap grows by the day,” said Berman. “Every day of delay, the federal government is giving away opportunities and piling costs onto Canadians.”

Report Highlights include:

  • Canada’s global warming emissions are growing significantly while U.S. emissions are declining.
  • The U.S. government is providing unprecedented levels of support to clean energy and efficiency while Canada’s primary programs are expiring.
  • The U.S. is aiming for deeper carbon cuts than its Copenhagen “target” -- deeper than Canada’s “target” by orders of magnitude.
  • Every moment of delay means that Canada is starting from further and further behind although nominally aiming for the same finish line.

“The US needs to do much more but by contrast Canada is not even trying” said Berman. “The U.S. has accelerated to unprecedented levels of action on carbon restrictions, efficiency and clean energy in the past year while Canada is falling dangerously behind.”

NUPGE

The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) is one of Canada's largest labour organizations with over 340,000 members. Our mission is to improve the lives of working families and to build a stronger Canada by ensuring our common wealth is used for the common good. NUPGE

Additional Information:

Report available at www.powerupcanada.ca/~ASSETS/DOCUMENT/fallingbehind_low.pdf