Should Canadians carry a carbon card, loaded with a year's worth of points?

TORONTO -- Imagine if, tucked between your debit and credit cards, your wallet had a another piece of plastic: a points card designed to save the planet as you use it.

Loaded with a year’s worth of points, your carbon card would need to be presented to buy a pound of steak from the butcher, a flight to Mexico, a tank of gas – anything that adds emissions to the atmosphere and contributes to climate change.

Your annual points limit would be determined through a variety of factors, such as access to public transit or geography. A lobster fisherman in Nova Scotia who needs gas to power his boat would have more points than, say, a barista in downtown Toronto with access to public transit.

If you run out of points before the year ends, you could buy more from someone with extra points to spare – a financial reward for going green.

The idea was floated in a recent Globe and Mail opinion piece by Vancouver-based writer Eleanor Boyle. Her argument is that, during the Second World War, food rations helped galvanize citizens who weren’t at the frontlines of battle. Studies show rations were popular, too. 

Tackling climate change can be compared to going to war, but Boyle suggests the fight can be propelled by rationing carbon instead of food.

“I think life is empty without contribution,” Boyle told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview. “We all want to know how to contribute to addressing this problem.”

Boyle didn’t invent the idea. Eleven years ago, a group of British MPs floated the idea of citizens carrying carbon cards loaded with points. At the time, Britain’s environment minister praised the idea as having potential, but said it was “ahead of its time.” It was eventually shelved.

Canadian politicians have never officially considered the idea. But maybe they should, Boyle said.

“If systems are designed that really address the problem and are as fair as possible, people will get on board.”

COULD IT WORK?

Some environmental experts are, at best, skeptical of the idea.

Jessica Green, an associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto who has written extensively on environmental politics, called the idea of a carbon points system “a political loser, over and over again.” Worse, she said, it would unfairly put the onus on everyday citizens to tackle climate change rather than big corporations.

One report suggests that, since 1988, 100 companies are responsible for 70 per cent of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions.

“It forces the individual consumer to consider, ‘Do I want to spend all my carbon credits on this new television,’ as opposed to saying to business and firms that they need to solve this problem -- fossil fuel companies, I might add,” she said.

“If there is any value in such an approach, it would be the government officially recognizing that we’ve come to a crisis point. Which could be useful in trying to galvanize more public support. But I think that’s the extent of it.”

Simply put, Green said: “It’s not going to fix the problem.”

Steve Easterbook, director of the University of Toronto’s School of the Environment, said rationing “in some form or another” is inevitable because today’s solutions – such as the carbon tax and emissions trading schemes — don’t go far enough to adequately curb emissions.

“But given the political battles over the federal carbon tax, it's hard to imagine that voters in Canada would willingly accept rationing until a lot more people experience the impacts of climate change,” he said.

“People need to see that rationing is in support of a massive effort on all fronts. So you can't just introduce rationing and expect people to go along with it. What we really need is a government willing to make the massive investments in clean energy infrastructure that would create jobs and boost the economy in the process. Rationing comes later.”

THE VALUE OF COLLECTIVE ACTION

Boyle responded to the critiques by pointing out that she isn’t married to the idea of a carbon points system, but simply thinks it is a possible solution worth considering. She also agrees that big corporate emitters need to be held accountable.

But there’s something valuable in uniting people behind a single goal with clear instructions, she said.

“Systems like rationing are a form of collective action … As well, they give individuals a way of participating in this grand project that we all have,” she said.

“What I’m saying is let’s put some big ideas on the table. Let’s talk about some really broad and wide-scale actions that we might consider.”