The New Democrats say they will back the Conservatives on a motion to pull the carbon price off all home heating until after the next election.
The New Democrats say they will back the Conservatives on a motion to pull the carbon price off all home heating until after the next election.
While not representing a majority of Canadians, there are people living in regions that get regularly cold enough for heat pumps to be inadequate. Which means running a standard electric furnace (expensive and inefficient) during the coldest months of the year. Which… is not ideal, especially for lower-income rural persons. (IE, most people living in these regions of Canada.)
The rebate is great, but there are persons for whom it is insufficient.
Do I think that’s a good reason to remove the carbon tax from heating fuels? No, not really. (Assuming I understand how the tax works, it really isn’t the burden people expect it to be. (You can debate about inefficiencies, but as far as manipulating economics to incentivize transfer away from fossil fuels without harming the general public, it’s reasonably sound.)) But people do have legitimate concerns that shouldn’t be trivially dismissed.
Heat pumps are more popular in colder climates than they are in warmer -> Scandinavia vs Continental Europe
That is a true statistic, yes. Without a ton of relevance to the discussion at hand unfortunately. Most of Scandinavia is coastal, and while cold compared to the rest of Europe, has quite mild winters compared to the northern Canadian interior. Additionally, popular in this context is about a 50% adoption rate by household, without much information (that I can find, at least) on distrobution; I suspect most of those are in southern and costal areas, and the (less populated) northern interior primarily relies on other heating methods.
You’ll find most of Canada isn’t in the interior Northern regions. Considering heat pumps still have furnaces attached, I think it’s fine to force everyone to have them
The whole principle of the rebate is that the average person within a province breaks even. So people in Saskatchewan are only competing with other Saskatchewaneans, not with Vancouverites.
And if you’re polluting far more than the average person in your province, such that the rebate is grossly insufficient, even after figuring in the rural boost to the rebate?
Good.
Do better.
Maybe I’m misunderstanding, but I think perhaps you misread what I said (or I communicated poorly). I’m speaking about the funding incentive to purchase a heat pump. The carbon tax rebates, as you say, are designed to break even by or better for the majority of the population; I’ve got no issues with that. I was responding to the implication that a transition to electricity was trivial because households could purchase a heat pump for little to no cost. There are households for which the energy costs of resistive heating+heat pump are likely higher than their current heating costs, making this not the case. (Unless there are further rebates I don’t know about for people who have a heat pump, beyond covering initial costs?)
Rural and remote residents already get a slightly larger rebate, and as a city dweller, I think their share should be higher for exactly the reason you state. Also, keep in mind that at night time, which will typically be the only time people end up using resistive heat while on a heat pump, electricity is cheaper. Ontario’s ultra-low off-peak option is even more extreme. It’s probably cheaper to run resistive heat at night, than running the heat pump during peak times.
Saskatchewan does not have “off-peak” electricity pricing because Saskatchewan runs our power grid on old Coal plants. So not only does it get cold enough for heat pumps to not be sufficient here (even during the day sometimes), our electricity is not a green option either. Natural gas heating makes more sense here in Saskatchewan and it pains me to say that. Until such time as we get a green grid (get rid of the coal), natural gas heating is the best option for us.
Edit to add: I will gladly continue to pay the carbon tax because of 2 things: 1. I get more back on the rebate than I spend (my provincial premier is full of it) and 2. If some of that money from the tax goes to green initiatives, then I gladly support that.
Comparing the federal energy mix for Saskatchewan in 2019, to SaskPower’s claims for 2023, we’re going in the right direction with respect to coal. I don’t expect Moe’s SaskParty to do much better than that, unfortunately. Hopefully nuclear and wind take off more, or we’re more willing to import hydro from Manitoba, even at a higher cost.
Though reading that closer, SaskPower’s claims for hydro include imports (it’s unspecified from where, but the only place that makes sense is Manitoba), while the federal paper is only generating capacity, no imports. I wonder what the mix including imports was in 2019.
A majority of heating oil users are in the Atlantic provinces. Heat pumps are fine for their needs.
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