Key takeaways:
- Premier, the environment minister, wants to know how data became public.
- Nova Scotia is working to decide how it will price carbon starting in 2023.
Nova Scotia’s environment minister and department officials have been tight-lipped regarding what new regional carbon pricing could mean in 2023 and beyond. Still, internal government records show significant changes could be arriving.
Documents received by CBC News reveal that if Nova Scotia opts for a federal carbon tariff, it could add 40 cents to the cost of a liter of gasoline by 2030 and raise the price of electricity by a compound average of 17.5 percent from 2023 to 2030.
Premier Tim Houston and Environment Minister Tim Halman told journalists Thursday they were not satisfied the records were made public and ordered staff to investigate how it happened.
“I’m perturbed about that,” Houston stated following a cabinet meeting in Halifax.
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“First off, it’s old. Second off, it has very, very sensitive details — details that can have an impact on the market.”
CBC News got the documents, which are almost a year old, on Wednesday. The region’s Environment Department contracted Navius Research to explore three opportunities for future carbon pricing.
Since 2019, the area has priced carbon using a cap and trade program, making for industrial polluters. That program bypassed the sticker surprise other provinces experienced with their carbon price programs because of the government’s work to expand renewable energy through the years.
Nova Scotia’s program, for instance, added a little more than one cent to the cost of a liter of gasoline. By comparison, the federal program, or backstop, added nearly nine cents to the price at the pumps for other areas.
Source – cbc.ca
