WPAC Report Canada’s damning reputation Inaction on climate change will impact pellet industry By Gordon Murray G lobal wood pellet consumption will be about 24 million tonnes in 2014. More than 80 per cent will be consumed in the European Union (EU) for heat and power generation. Europe-ans like wood pellets for home heating because they are cheaper than the alter-natives – gas, oil, or electricity. And they use wood pellets to replace coal in power generation because pellets are cleaner and can greatly reduce GHG emissions. It is the EU power sector that has largely enabled the rapid growth of Cana-da’s wood pellet exports. Since 2009, that growth has been supported by The Renew-able Energy Directive . This is the EU law that mandates the increased use of energy from renewable sources, together with energy savings and increased energy ef-ficiency, and the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to comply with the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Frame-work Convention on Climate Change. Of course the great irony of this is that Canada – a country with no demonstrated commitment to combating climate change – is benefitting greatly from an EU law mandating reduction of GHG emissions. We Canadians have to ask ourselves, will Europeans eventually tire of this hy-pocrisy? Why should the EU continue to improve its GHG emissions performance while Canada continues to emit at a record pace without regard to the negative effects on climate change? Why should EU utili-ties continue to buy Canadian wood pel-lets when they can see that Canadian coal power generation (with the notable excep-tion of Ontario) continues unabated? Consider the differences between Cana-dian and EU approaches to climate change: EUROPEAN UNION its 20 per cent reduction target, eight years ahead of 2020. The EU is also on target to meet it goals of 20 per cent re-newable energy and 20 per cent increase in energy efficiency. On October 14, 2014, the European Council confirmed even more aggressive legally binding targets for 2030. These include: at least 40 per cent less green-house gas emissions by 2030, compared to 1990; at least 27 per cent renewable energy; and an energy efficiency increase of at least 27 per cent. CANADA Preventing climate change is a strategic priority for the EU. Under the Kyoto Protocol, EU member states committed to reduce their total GHG emissions to 8 per cent below 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012 and were successful in meet-ing this target. In 2009, the EU adopted the Renewable Energy Directive , a law requiring a 20 per cent reduction of the EU’s GHG emissions compared to 1990; a 20 per cent share of renewable energy in the EU’s gross final energy consumption; and a 20 per cent in-crease of the EU’s energy efficiency. As of 2012, the EU had reduced its GHG emissions by 18 per cent compared to 1990 levels and was close to reaching The Canadian situation couldn’t be more different than the EU. Like Europe, Can-ada ratified the Kyoto Protocol in 2002, promising to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to an average of 6 per cent below the 1990 level over the period from 2008 to 2012. However, instead of achieving reductions, Canadian GHG emissions continued to rise to record lev-els and by 2011 Canada withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol. Peter Kent, Canada’s environment min-ister, commented, “Canada produces less than two per cent of global carbon emis-sions, Kyoto doesn’t require major emit-8 Canadian BIOMASS NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2014
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