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Canada Is Primed to Burn. Why Aren’t We Ready? (thewalrus.ca)
submitted 4 months ago by to c/canada@lemmy.ca
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Wildfire seasons, amplified by climate change, are getting hotter, longer, and drier, and Canada’s resources are buckling under the weight of the number and scale. In the last three years, Canada has spent more days at National Preparedness Level (NPL) five—the highest, meaning domestic resources are maxed out—than in the combined years of the decade before.

A decade ago, destructive fire seasons were seen as flukes—until 2023, the worst fire season in Canada’s history. That year was followed by two more extreme fire seasons. All told, 8 percent of Canada’s forests have burned in the last three years, which works out to be about 4 million hectares a year—four times the rate in the 1970s.

This summer, with the combination of a “Super El Niño” and persistent drought on Canada’s West and East Coasts, scientists are predicting high intensity wildfires across the country—and particularly in the west.

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[–] 2 points 3 months ago (1 child)

Carbon taxes do work. When we don't carve out exceptions.

Carbon pricing has successfully reduced GHG emissions internationally:

  • The US has two separate cap-and-trade systems that are reducing emissions.
  • The UK is on track to fully phase out coal; its carbon tax is cited as the primary driver of this phase-out.
  • The European Union’s Emissions Trading System, since its inception, is responsible for between one third and one half of the region’s emissions reductions.
  • Sweden has the world’s highest carbon tax; ten years after bringing it in (2001), emissions were as much as 25% lower than they would otherwise be.
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  • [–] 1 point 3 months ago

    Carbon taxes don't work at all. Well, in fairness I suppose I should have you at that. They don't work to reduce emissions. In BC which was one of the first to adopt it and paid as much attention as possible to the results it was found that it slowed the growth of carbon emissions by about 5%, possibly as much as 10% although five is more likely.

    It didn't reduce anything though. It just meant that gross was a tiny bit slower. Carbon taxes don't work

    Us carpentry is not reducing emissions at all.

    The Uk is phasing out coal because Cole's not actually an efficient way to do things. But they're not switching to a non-carbon model, they're going for things like natural gas. And of course they cite carbon taxes as a big thing because the government wants to continue collecting carbon taxes. I'm sure it's shocking to everyone that our government may want to try and justify why it's taking your money 😂

    I know, Sweden's emissions would have been low either way. The carbon tax did not make that happen

    And you'll have a tough time finding anyone who doesn't have a direct interest in promoting carbon taxes saying otherwise

    This has been explained by a number of economic studies. The biggest problem is that energy expenditure is not elastic. The whole idea behind carbon taxes was that if it cost you more to buy gas you would drive less. Essentially. And it turned out that that wasn't true. People still needed to drive and get to where they were going every bit as much as they used to. What they stopped doing was spending money on more discretionary things like going to the movies and it causes the economy to slow down but it doesn't help emissions other than if you can't afford to go to the movies at least you're not driving there

    So then it was hoped that if it didn't change Behavior at least it might help change people's buying decisions. Perhaps corporations and people would buy more electric vehicles?

    But it turns out that for a variety of reasons about the same number of people by electric vehicles as would have either way. The actual driving force there is in carbon tax but rather subsidies. If you use subsidies to make an electric car cheaper than a gas car then people will buy the electric car and that's pretty obvious. That would happen no matter what.

    As far as carbon taxes on businesses go it doesn't actually cause them to do much different at all. They're always going to go with the most efficient system and pass the costs on to the consumer if necessary. So they don't really buy anything that they wouldn't have already bought even if there wasn't a carbon tax, and if they have to stay with something where there's a carbon tax they pass that on to the consumer and it's the economy that suffers

    Global warming hasn't slowed down one tiny little bit as a result of carbon tax. It's just smoking mirrors for governments to collect money

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