Alberta Premier Danielle Smith criticized Canada’s Climate Change Minister for displaying “appalling” double standards by pointing out his contrasting treatment of China compared to his own country.
Smith made her comments on CFRA 580.
“The Minister of Environment doesn’t know a single thing about our power grid,” she said.
“I find it appalling as do most Albertans that he is co-chairing a committee with China that has a 2060 target.”
The Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault traveled to China on Monday to collaborate with top communist politicians, where he serves as the vice chair on the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED). The Chinese Communist Party has indicated it plans to reach net-zero emissions by 2060.
On the other hand, the Trudeau Liberal government aims for carbon neutrality in the electricity sector by 2035. This means provinces would need to eliminate power generation carbon emissions by then. Premier Smith opposes this, fearing it could harm Alberta’s energy industry.
Smith continued, “So he is working with China on a less aggressive target that he is trying to impose on Alberta. And that is unacceptable.”
This all comes after the former CN Tower Scaler Guilbeault lectured Canada’s Premiers on coal to the point of threatening them with criminal sanctions should they violate his timeline, despite the fact that Canada produces less than 2% of the CO2 emissions that China emits annually.
The Trudeau Liberals are also considering restricting billions of dollars in tax credits and grants for electricity projects to provinces that agree to Ottawa’s 2035 clean power target — something Smith says is unreasonable for Albertans, given Alberta’s energy industry heavily relies on fossil fuels.
Premier Smith has also emphasized the importance of provincial autonomy in Alberta’s energy policy.
On Saturday, Guilbeault said “There is no solution to tackle climate change without involving all the large emitters around the world, and that certainly includes China.”
He further called Conservative politicians who criticized him hypocritical, given that former Conservative environment minister Peter Kent previously served on the same communist council.
