Canada has long been the environmental gold standard of Western developed nations, with several of its cities featured among the cleanest on the globe. However, some recent criticism has questioned this long-standing belief, criticizing some of Canada’s industrial practices and ranking them significantly below other Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) nations.
Despite the negative press, many maintain that Canada is still an environmental leader, even when compared to other wealthy democracies.
As critics have been quick to point out, several of the studies disparaging Canada’s environmental quality failed to take specific integral factors into account. For instance, Canada possesses some of the largest and most abundant oil fields, bitumen sands, and shale reserves throughout the world. Though much of the country is uninhabitable during the harshest months, Canada remains an incredibly resource-rich nation. Some studies misconstrue this fact as being immediately damning for Canada’s record.
For instance, when looking at total emissions within a country and calculating for overall air quality, many studies don’t account for population density. While certain industrial refinement zones within Canada feature some of the worst pollution possible, these areas act as outliers, pushing the data to evoke images of a smog-choked nation.
While other countries undoubtedly suffer from the same problem, the fact that most heavily populated areas are located nowhere near the worst pollution makes Canada itself a unique outlier. In China, for instance, the smog coming from the coastal factories covers Beijing, one of the county’s largest population centres. The same is true for Los Angeles, London, and other industrialized nations. For Canada, a significantly larger distance exists between its largest population centres and its most polluted areas.
Of course, this does not speak to the macro “environmental footprint” Canada is making. As far as waste generation, Canada ranks highly among its cohorts. However, we must look at how they handle that same waste — a follow-up many studies fail to complete.
Canada is extremely cognizant of the waste it produces and is one of the most advanced countries when it comes to proper waste disposal. Logically, the steps and processes a nation uses to dispose of its waste should count as highly — if not more so — as the raw amount of waste produced in the first place. After all, nations are widely beholden to the natural resources available to them: Any country with large reserves of oil will drill and export it. What those same countries do for cleanup helps define their environmental track record.
In a recent comprehensive study, researchers adjusted many of the factors normally measured to be more country-specific. For instance, Canada’s per capita carbon dioxide emissions — which normally place it high on the list of OECD nations — can be adjusted according to the geographical location and relative size of Canada.
After all, a country that is larger and features a more thinly spread population will logically necessitate people travel longer distances when commuting or transporting goods for work, causing more emissions. Also, a sparser population density means more individuals will own homes and fewer will use shared heating and cooling services available in apartments.
Canada is also one of the northernmost countries within the OECD, and accordingly requires some of the most heating during the winters. Furnaces and boilers are some of the leading contributors to domestic greenhouse gases, but are also entirely necessary for surviving a Canadian winter. By adjusting both factors — size and distance of commute, and essential heating during the winter — which do not reflect active choices by the Canadian government, Canada leapfrogs to the top of the list.
Of course, researchers cannot adjust some of these measures. How can one adjust for the relative temperature difference between Italy and Canada? Given the geographical anomaly of Canada, the only data available is from regions of Russia — a non-OECD nation — or from Canada itself, which defeats the purpose of a comparative study. Given this, some factors will still naturally push Canada in a negative direction, and are impossible to adjust fairly.
With Earth Day 2018 freshly in the rearview mirror, it seems timely that this new research would come out so recently. However you look at it, even in comparison to other OECD nations, Canada finds itself among the highest performers. For those measures that are unadjustable or in which Canada is lagging, the country still performs well in comparison with much of the rest of the world. All OECD nations find themselves ranked relatively highly when compared to most other nations, and Canada is no exception. Despite its detractors, Canada remains a model for environmentally-minded growth.
This guest post is written by Kate Harveston, a writer and political activist from Pennsylvania. She blogs about culture and politics, and the various ways that those elements act upon each other. For more of her work, you can follow her on Twitter or subscribe to her blog, Only Slightly Biased.
