What are some government strategies we could immediately adopt?

Reposted from Carbon Neutrality Canada.

What are the strategies, policy instruments and incentives that could be used by the federal and provincial levels of government to accelerate more ambitious targets and adoption of climate innovations by local governments? What would a federal/provincial climate agenda look like to engender the capacity of cities to adopt more aggressive and bold targets and transform their energy systems and the take-up of climate innovations at the local level?

1. Strike a high-level Task Force of city mayors from across the country led by the federal Treasury Board, reporting to the Council of Premiers, to transform the current tax system that incentivizes municipalities to ‘develop’ at all costs as their only way of generating revenue severely limiting their policy options for optimal intensification.

2. Both levels of government to identify and harmonize incentives to reduce carbon lock-in and accelerate the take-up of climate innovation.

3. The Council of Premiers lead a national round table on exploring institutional lock-in and decision-making between levels of government.

4. The Federal Government to implement the Municipal Energy and Emissions Database (MEED) given how effective benchmarking comparisons are between practitioners.

5. A provincial/federal working table to determine how to aggressively incentivize new low carbon technologies.

6. Eliminate all oil and gas subsidies and redirect savings to incentives.

7. Transformative energy change will require addressing differential provincial access to more sustainable energy inputs, through equalization payments.

8. Implement a guaranteed annual income to address differential starting points and no one province left behind.

9. Mandate the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM)  to lead a formal network of senior city planners to facilitate knowledge transfer and leading-edge climate practices, promote the urgency and necessity for transformative change and to address asymmetries of scale between small and medium-sized cities, critically examining infrastructure provision, public engagement, industry participation, regulating gasoline prices, tax incentives, provide subsidies for behavioural change, and implement climate mitigation strategies in cities.

^{Photo by Maarten van den Heuvel on Unsplash}