Credit Check
Should Canada get climate credit for its LNG exports?
This brief debunks the popular myth that Canada should get credit toward its nationally determined contribution for its export of clean energy, specifically liquefied natural gas (LNG), under the Paris Agreement's Article 6.2.
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No, Canada can't get climate credit for its LNG exports under the Paris Agreement's Article 6.2. Even if LNG exports did qualify (they wouldn't), our buyers aren't going to give us those credits for free. Time to get real—put this argument to bed.
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So many gas supporters are calling for Canada to export LNG to reduce emissions globally and get Paris Agreement credits for doing so. Wake up call: it probably doesn't reduce global emissions, and we definitely won't get credits for doing so.
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How to avoid making real emissions reductions in the Canadian gas sector? Pretend we can get international credits for exporting "clean" fuel. Don't be fooled. It's never going to happen (and most proponents know that).
A chorus of voices argues that Canada should expand its exports of LNG and get credits under the Paris Agreement's Article 6.2 (internationally transferred mitigation outcomes, ITMOs) for doing so, based on the assumption that those exports lower global greenhouse gas emissions.
Those voices are wrong. They assume that we could prove that foreign coal production dropped because of our LNG exports (we couldn't), and that foreign buyers would simply give away valuable emissions reduction credits (they wouldn't).
Article 6.2 doesn’t work that way. Korea doesn't get credit for Canadian drivers buying its electric vehicles and thereby emitting less, for example.
The typical Article 6.2 deal is actually a development project where a rich country helps a poor country reduce its emissions and then buys the resulting credits. If Canada did that with coal-to-LNG switching, it would wind up being a very costly way to support our domestic gas producers (and would violate our commitments not to subsidize fossil fuels abroad).
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