the thing about legislating caps is that the industry then works any fines into the cost of business. the only way legislating caps can be effective is if the government is willing to go in there and actually shut the businesses down. this is going to set off expensive & lengthy court battles that will give corporate interests an opportunity to write the case law on the subject from the position of a court that is going to be forced to stand up for their constitutional rights.

nor am i particularly optimistic about trudeau's choice of court justice to replace mclachlin. we may very well be on the cusp of a more right-wing supreme court in canada.

i've been saying for years that the only answer is mass public investment. fuck authoritarian decrees, fuck punitive police states and fuck naive theories about market incentives. you have to just fucking build it, already - that's the only solution. and, i'd be happy to see an election fought partially over the question of whether the trudeau government has lived up to it's commitments on 'green infrastructure'.

don't get me wrong, here: nikki ashton is not an ideal. she's actually younger than i am, and yet seems stuck in the identity politics of the previous generation. she's not a youth candidate; she's in truth deeply out of touch with youth, and rather stuck in an ivory tower bubble. she'll be wise to listen to the advice of a charlie angus, and she's going to need it. but, it's almost like the left has to get out of - perhaps grow out of - this mess together. as impossible as it is going to be for nikki ashton to win an election, she's the better candidate to try and rebuild an actual base.

and, she's more correct on the right approach to emissions reductions.

https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/07/18/ndps-niki-ashton-targets-corporate-greed-in-green-platform.html