A crucial lesson of history is that ideas have consequences. And another related one, surprisingly often resisted with harmful results, is that people believe their beliefs. And so it is that Canada’s government, entirely committed to the notion that humans are setting the sky on fire and they must rush about by jet airplane denouncing carbon and shut down the energy industry on which Canadians rely, just took a dramatic step to… shut down the energy industry. Not content with a carbon tax that, they insist, is brilliantly solving the problem and making nearly everyone richer into the bargain, and trying to force us all into EVs we don’t want, they’re imposing an emissions cap on the oil and gas sector, 27% below imagined 2026 levels and 35% below actual 2019 levels by “the first compliance period, 2030-2032”, whatever that means, that cannot possibly be met except by drastically reducing output and thus use and also, what are those things again, oh yeah, the taxes government relies on to fund its lifestyle and subsidize ours.

It’s not as if they don’t know about it. Or at least that they have not been warned. Canada’s federal Natural Resources Minister, climate zealot Jonathan Wilkinson claimed “there will be thousands and thousands of jobs created” by a harsh crackdown on productive activity, which makes one wonder what exactly are his qualifications for his current post. But according to Blacklock’s Reporter, a “Cost-Benefit Analysis Summary” from the Department of the Environment stated the obvious opposite:

“Reductions in projected production would be expected to affect income from the reduced demand for labour or any resulting lowering of wages or both. The modeling done for this analysis indicates the proposed regulations are expected to result in a decrease in the oil and gas sector of about 1.6 percent.”

Again it would be shallow to think that Wilkinson is lying. On the contrary, he’s a true believer in that whole shimmering-green-future-only-government-can-see thing:

“The oil and gas emissions cap is part of a broad approach to addressing the climate issue in a manner that actually will create jobs and economic opportunity.”

Or not. The Summary said:

“Over the time frame of this analysis, 2025 to 2032, the proposed regulations are expected to result in cumulative incremental greenhouse gas emission reductions of 3.4 million tonnes. The value of these reductions is estimated to be $4 billion in avoided climate change induced global damage.”

Which works out to $1,176 per tonne of emission reductions. Canada’s GHG emissions in 2022 were supposedly 708 megatonnes, which means Canada caused $833 billion in climate damages in a year when our economy generated about $2.3 trillion in income, so, taking the government at face value about a third of our productive activity was wiped out by “climate change induced global damage”.

And if our government is also right that in 2021 global emissions were 48,210 megatonnes then the total damage worldwide from the extra bad weather caused by naughty human carbon and equivalents should exceed $50 trillion. Which is almost half of world GDP. Pfui.

These people’s economic models are as bad as their climate models, or worse. With severe real world consequences.

Not that they care. Asked to release the legal text of the proposed regulations, which must include a “Regulatory Impact Analysis Statement” presenting direct costs, instead of just a cheery summary, environment Minister Steven Guilbeault brushed it aside with “We will be ready in 2025 to present the final regulations.”

But not to worry, we rush in where others fear to tread. Blacklock’s, in this separate story, quotes Guilbeault thusly:

“Look around the world. No other major oil and gas producer is doing what we’re doing. The United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, the Gulf States – we are the only large oil and gas producer in the world to do this.”

No kidding. We wonder why. But he doesn’t:

“This means no matter what happens to production, the pollution level will go down. Let me be clear, this was carefully designed.”

You just can’t see the details, thanks to the Canadian Jedi mind trick. But they know all and see all so why would you need to? Testifying on the subject before the House of Commons natural resources committee, Finance Minister/Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland burbled:

“The strength of the Canadian economy today and in the past is very much built on our oil and gas sector. I absolutely recognize the value that it brings in terms of jobs, in terms of revenue, in terms of our trade balance.”

So down it goes and up we go. Pressed for an estimate of job losses by a Conservative MP she sneered. And when he then asked “Can you confirm you have done an impact assessment on what this oil and gas cap will do to your deficit?” she shot back “It is absolutely appropriate for me to make clear the falsehoods embedded in your question.” So we batter the economy and tax revenue pours out.

No, really. The Bloc Quebecois, dedicated to the destruction of Canada so Quebecers can live in a social-democratic paradise without any of that nasty energy knocking about, met the announcement of the cap with a huffy too little, too late:

“Bien que favorable à une politique de plafonnement des émissions du secteur pétrolier et gazier, le Bloc juge cette annonce largement insuffisante, arrivant trop tard et offrant de nombreux échappatoires et passe-droits à l’industrie pétrolière.”

Meanwhile the NDP, who want to impose that same vision on all Canadians regardless of race, creed, colour or language predominantly spoken at home, snarled “NDP says Liberals have left their watered-down emissions cap to the 11th hour, all to cave to rich CEOs” and trotted out the usual paranoia, allegedly from their “Environment and Climate Change critic”:

“Canadians are living with the consequences of the climate crisis. They want to see the government taking real action. But for close to a decade, the Liberals have caved to rich oil and gas CEOs on climate measures, and this emissions cap is no different. The Liberals have delayed this cap until the 11th hour and are giving Canada’s biggest polluters room to keep polluting with no limits. The timing and the math don’t make sense.”

Nor does it make sense that the NDP, as non-Canadians may not know and might struggle to believe if told, routinely excoriates the Liberals as tools of the plutocrats plundering the proles while propping them up in a minority parliament since 2019. Or that the math doesn’t make sense but in the exact opposite way to the NDP’s beliefs. But it’s how the political class thinks here.

Even “Clean Prosperity”, one of many muddled groups out there urging Canadians to rally round the white flag on climate, objected that a regulatory cap was the wrong approach at the wrong time:

“Layering on a new cap-and-trade system for oil and gas producers adds uncertainty and regulatory complexity that risks undermining investment in emissions reductions just as we’re getting close to landing significant new decarbonization projects here in Alberta. As Clean Prosperity has argued for the past two years, a much better approach to driving emissions reductions would be to optimize Canada’s existing industrial carbon pricing systems, reinforced by carbon contracts. Improving industrial carbon pricing is a more durable approach that would help leverage current and planned emissions reductions projects.”

Or not, since the notion of producing carbon-based fuels without carbon is inherently impossible, no matter which policy you use, which is precisely why the carbon tax has been all pain for no gain.

Just because it’s economic folly doesn’t mean it’s insincere. But just because it’s sincere doesn’t mean it’s not economic folly. Or that smart people can’t believe it. Attempting to go sane, former Bank of Canada governor David Dodge told the Senate energy committee that when it comes to climate policy “We are all going to pay for it one way or another.” But then he babbled:

“How do we come collectively in business, government and households to the understanding that we have to undergo a little bit of short term pain?”

And the problem here isn’t just that collectivities don’t understand things, individuals do. It’s that the issue isn’t “a little bit of short term pain” it’s long term wreckage to no purpose. Anyone in the energy industry who assumed it was all just talk, or that cooler heads would prevail, has yet again been given a rude awakening. When they say they want to kill your industry, here’s an insider tip: They want to kill your industry.