But possibly not for the reasons you might think. A tax on the environment commodifies that environment, and the environment is a public resource that shouldn’t be for sale. Fine the heavy polluters.

Taxing everyone who uses fossil fuels is ridiculous. There are no realistic alternatives to fossil fuels, certainly none that are cheap and ubiquitous. Punishing people for using the only energy source they can afford is a copout, and providing an after-tax rebate for the poor is counterproductive (that money could be going to green programmes, and giving people free money certainly won’t encourage them to curb usage).

In my opinion (full disclosure: I’m no economist), I think a better solution would be to eliminate all subsidies, tax breaks, and other financial incentives to all fossil fuel businesses. Transfer those incentives to greener programmes, like encouraging more electrical vehicles and charging stations, making biodiesel more available, making transit free of charge and more reliable, switching to mass renewable energy, and so on. This will make so-called dirty energy solutions more expensive and clean energy solutions cheaper. People will switch on their own.

Without a tax.

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.

Climate change is something that affects everyone, but as with many things in this world, it actually doesn’t affect everyone equally. New evidence has suggested that the changing climate can have unique adverse effects on women specifically.

Through a gendered lens

The Paris Climate Agreement, which all but one or two countries have signed now, is working to address climate change in countries around the globe, but it is primarily a male-dominated field. Most of the policies are made in committees that are predominantly male, which can make it difficult to get women-specific issues addressed.

Catherine McKenna is the minster of environment and climate change for Canada and has spoken up repeatedly about the seemingly disproportionate impact that climate change has on women — maybe not in first world countries, but in the developing world. She has stated that there should be more women included in the policy cabinets so that these issues can be viewed “through a gendered lens.”

Impacts in the developing world

We might not see the impact of climate change firsthand in countries like the U.S. and Canada, but in the developing world, the direct impact of these changes becomes much more apparent, especially for women.

In many developing countries, women are responsible for the majority of the farming and food production. Higher temperatures and drought conditions make it harder to grow crops, reducing overall crop yields and making food shortages a bigger problem than they already are.

Speaking of drought conditions, women and young girls are also more likely to be seeking water supplies if there are none available in their immediate area. To gather water, these women will have to travel further and further each day, taking up time that could be spent on other activities both in and out of the home.

These climate changes are also causing stronger and more frequent natural disasters — you just have to look back at the past few months to see some of those impacts. We’ve seen the catastrophic impact of fires in California, and Hurricanes Irma, Harvey and Maria in the Gulf of Mexico and Puerto Rico just in the past few months — and these are in areas that actually have access to more of the means and the resources to recover from a natural disaster.

Hurricane Maria landed in Puerto Rico as a Category 5 storm and decimated the island. Now, more than 2 months later (at the time of this writing), large swaths of the island are still without power, and it may be months or even longer before utilities are fully restored. And Puerto Rico is considered part of the developed world.

In areas where there is a cultural difference between men and women — where women aren’t allowed to learn to do certain things, for example — a natural disaster can lead to a higher chance of death for women. Flood waters aren’t great for swimming in but you do have a distinct advantage if you at least know how to swim — which some women aren’t allowed to learn.

Changes for the better

Some countries are already starting to make changes to make it easier for women to weather the effects of climate change — no pun intended.

In rural India in 1995, the Self Employed Woman’s Association made strides in water collection, improving irrigation and water systems so that women had to spend less time gathering water each day. They even challenged societal norms at the time by having female technicians build and maintain the water systems. Similar initiatives are springing up in the developed world too, as more people become aware of the unique issues that citizens in developing countries face.

In Bolivia, much of the farming is done at high altitudes which add a new level of difficulty to what can already be a difficult task. To help farmers adapt to this, the country started a program that encourages traditional farmers to train other farmers how to use local flora and fauna to predict weather patterns for the coming year. They also rely on women, who traditionally carry the knowledge about storing and planting seeds, to share that information to improve overall crop yield.

We’re not there yet — women still don’t have much of a say in a field where they are so heavily impacted, but we are making strides to improve this. Climate change has the potential to affect everyone, whether you’re rich or poor, male or female. We need all of our great minds, regardless of gender, working on this problem.

Afterwards, refreshments were available in the gym. While they were pretty tasty, it did produce a lot of waste. All the dishes were polystyrene foam, and the styrofoam cups contained only water.

It got me thinking. I was contemplating several of the church activities I attended in the last few months and realized it was the same at all of them: polystyrene foam dishes.

So I have been wondering what sort of options are available to try making church activities more environmentally sustainable.

1. Use dishes from the kitchen

Pros: No non-food waste
Cons: Requires more cleanup. Uses more water and natural gas (hot water) than disposable dishes

2. Use paper dishes

Pros: Less cleanup. Decomposes faster than polystyrene.
Cons: Still contributes to landfill use.

3. User paper napkins for dessert-only refreshments

Pros: Less cleanup. Decomposes faster than polystyrene and paper dishes. Less distribution and storage costs.
Cons: Still contributes to landfill use.

Any other thoughts?

Now, the Globe and Mail reports something many probably never expected the consumerist behemoth to do. It’s single-handedly changing the ecological footprints of dozens of companies by the green policies it is starting to implement.

Consider this:

When Wal-Mart announced recently it would carry only two-times-concentrated (or higher) liquid laundry detergent by May, 2008, it set off a reaction that amounts to one giant leap for the environment among manufacturers, packagers and shippers, experts say.

. . .

Wal-Mart’s directive influences not only what suppliers make for its shelves but what they market to the world. By April, 2008, Procter and Gamble will have dropped non-concentrated liquid detergents from all Canadian stores, says Lee Bansil, director of external relations for consumer products giant Procter and Gamble Canada.

In fact, the article claims Wal-Mart is accomplishing something no other company or non-profit has been able to do to date.

Is it too early to stop referring to Wal-Mart as evil? Can a change in environmental policy make up for labour practices or its economic effects in small towns?

How did you do?