TYLER IRVING: A new Environment Canada report questions the effectiveness of Canada’s carbon reduction strategy. The report states that carbon reductions due to government actions will amount to a mere 5 Mt in 2010. Not only is this amount less than 1% of total emissions, it’s also 10 times smaller than last year’s estimate of 54 Mt.

The report is required under a Liberal private member’s bill that was passed in 2007, and was posted quietly on the agency’s website last week. It cites such government programs as the Public Transit Tax Credit, which is estimated to reduce emissions by only 3000 t, equivalent to taking roughly 500 cars off the road. There is also an admission that there is no system in place for keeping track of how the money from larger programs, such as the $1.5 billion Clean Air and Climate Change Trust, is spent by the provinces.

In a media release, Sierra Club Canada Executive Director John Bennet said that “Slipping the report under the teacher’s door doesn’t change the fact that the government gets an F.” [ index ]

SHAK HAQ: Ontario Power Generation and the Moose Cree First Nation have joined to construct Northern Ontario’s biggest hydro project in 40 years. The $2.6 billion project will take five years to complete and is estimated to create approximately 800 jobs, for which local residents will receive preference. Located on the southern part of the Mattagami River, the plant is expected to double the output of the four existing stations. The new plant will add 438 megawatts, which is enough to power 400,000 homes. Combined with the existing stations the total output will reach 924 megawatts. The plans for the current project will not flood any new territories through dam creation and any generating stations that need rebuilding will be built on the same footprint as existing dams or stations. The project supplements the existing wind and solar power available to the region and will boost the amount of clean energy available during peak demand periods. After almost 20 years of negotiations between the Moose Cree Nation and the OPG, the final contract between the two groups declares the Cree Nation receives 25 percent plant ownership and 25 percent of revenue generated by the plant. [ index ]

TYLER IRVING: A plan to generate electricity from disused railway ties may find a new home in Prince George after being rejected in Kamloops.

The Aboriginal Cogeneration Corporation (ACC) is a company that builds plants to convert woody waste products into a synthetic gas similar to natural gas and propane. The process, called “gasification,” can accept such waste products as disused railway ties, which are soaked in creosote to prevent rot. The company has a contract with CP rail to dispose of 250,000 ties per year.

Earlier this year, a plan was in the works to build such a plant in Kamloops. Although the ACC had obtained permits from both the Interior Health Authority and the Ministry of Environment, the project was scrapped after massive public pressure from Kamloops residents concerned about the plant’s emissions.

Following the plant’s rejection, a group of business and community leaders from Prince George contacted ACC’s president Kim Sigurdson. They say their community has the required industrial land and wants the 25 jobs the plant is expected to generate. So far, Mr. Sigurdson has said only that he continues to search for a suitable location. [ index ]

SHAK HAQ: Three years ago Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced that $500 million from the federal budget would fund the construction of commercial ethanol plants that would use agricultural or forestry waste to make transportation fuel. Iogen Corp, a biotechnology firm in Ottawa, and its partner and part-owner, Royal Dutch Shell PLC were designated as the leaders of this initiative. Today, there is no plant at the proposed site in Prince Albert Saskatoon and no specifics on a future plant. Iogen cites government delays in climate-change policies as the main problem. The ethanol-from-waste technology, also known as cellulosic ethanol, could be commercially viable with more assertive government backing such as a higher price on carbon dioxide emissions and making fossil fuels more expensive. Cellulosic ethanol uses enzymes to break down agricultural and forestry waste into a product that can be turned into fuel. This process produces fewer greenhouse-gas emissions than producing ethanol from corn or wheat. However, biofuel critics feel cellulosic ethanol producers still face tremendous hurdles as the enzymes currently being used do not break down the cellulose into ethanol efficiently enough. Critics feel cellulosic ethanol producers would need to be generously subsidized to compete with current fuel markets. [ index ]

TYLER IRVING: Charlottetown Harbour’s shellfishery is in the midst of a shutdown that will last at least seven days. That’s because heavy rains last weekend overloaded the city’s wastewater treatment system, dumping raw sewage directly into the harbour.

Like many cities, Charlottetown’s sewer system was originally designed to handle both stormwater and sewage in the same pipes. Although the two have been separated in newer parts of the system, there are some older parts where the sewers remain combined. Heavy rains can easily overwhelm the city’s capacity to treat the water before it is released into the harbour.

Officials from the provincial Department of the Environment will be taking water samples, while the Canada Food Inspection Agency will be testing shellfish from the affected area. The closure will affect hundreds of oyster fishers in P.E.I. [ index ]

BRYANT BOUILANNE: British Columbia’s glass sponge reefs are one step towards having protected status, following a move by the federal government. While reefs around the world are formed by coral which produce carbon shells, B.C.’s glass reefs are unique in that they were formed by sponges which produce silicon shells. Glass reefs, common millions of years ago, were thought to be extinct until they were discovered off the coast of B.C. in 1987. This makes them the only known living glass reefs in the world, in essence, living fossils. Their unique ecological importance has led to an announcement Tuesday by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans that the reefs, located in the Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound, are officially an area of interest, the first step in conferring protected status. Designation as a Marine Protected Area would ensure that the reefs are protected from damage by fishing trawlers, undersea cables, or other development. [ index ]

BRYANT BOUILANNE: Earlier this week, British Petroleum managed to place a cap on its leaking oil well. The cap is now siphoning oil through a pipe up to the surface to be stored by a tanker. BP estimates that it is siphoning 15,000 barrels per day, and is hoping to increase this number to 20,000 barrels by next week. The US government estimates that up to 25,000 barrels or more are being released from the well, however, meaning that large quantities of oil are still being released into the ocean.

Meanwhile, researchers from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have confirmed the existence of undersea oil plumes. These plumes of suspended oil droplets extend in the water column between 50 and 1,300 metres below the surface, and have been found up to 78km from the well. It is believed these plumes formed in part due to chemical dispersants that BP has been injecting into the leaking oil to prevent it from pooling on the sea surface. While the oil plumes pose no threat to beaches and wetlands, there are worries they could pose threats to underwater ecosystems. [ index ]

BRYANT BOUILANNE: An Indian Court has found the Indian division of Union Carbide guilty of negligence over the Bhopal Disaster. Seven former employees of Union Carbide, all Indian, have been sentenced to 2 years in prison and given $2,200 fines. The former Indian division of Union Carbide has been fined $11,000. The decision was rendered as thousands of angry protesters gathered outside the courthouse demanding severe punishment for those responsible. Activists responded negatively to the decision, calling it a light punishment for such a deadly crime.

The Bhopal Disaster occurred in 1984 when a Union Carbide chemical plant released 40 tonnes of toxic gas into the air. An estimated 3,500 people were killed immediately. Activists claim up to 25,000 people died of chronic illness in the following years, and a further 100,000 were inflicted with lifelong illness and birth defects.

The ruling applies only to local officials, and cases against the American company are still pending. Those convicted still have the option of appealing the decision, a process which could take years. [ index ]

BRYANT BOUILANNE: A new report by the International Energy Agency, a Paris-based NGO, calls for governments to cut subsidies for fossil fuels in order to promote energy efficiency. The report calculated that governments paid $557 billion in fossil fuel subsidies in 2008, up from $342 billion in 2007. The largest provider of oil subsidies, according to the report, was Iran, which issued $101 billion in subsidies, almost a third of its national budget. The report argues that fossil fuel subsidies remove economic incentives for improving energy efficiency and for developing alternative energy. The key findings of the report were released this week, and the full report will be published in November as part of the IEA’s World Energy Outlook report. [ index ]