The Trudeau Liberals are over-promising with their prediction that a future without fossil fuels will happen. Their only plan is to impose a carbon tax on all Canadians. Canadians in provinces where the carbon tax was imposed by Ottawa will get 90 per cent of their dollars back and the federal government’s 10 per cent cut will grow their coffers by billions.
Green energy via windmills is one of government’s answers; but can you build windmills without fossil fuels? Around one MW of wind capacity requires 20 tonnes of cast iron, 6.8 tonnes of fiberglass, 103 tonnes of stainless steel, three tonnes copper and 402 tonnes of concrete. The blades are fiberglass; the tower is steel and the base concrete.
Can steel be produced without fossil fuels? Can concrete be produced without the production of carbon dioxide? Can fiberglass be made without the extraction of oil and natural gas? No!
Steel is made from iron ore. Mining using high energy powerful steel equipment requires fuel. Transportation to steel mills requires trucks, trains and bulk carrier ships, all dependant on fossil fuels. Steel production requires blast furnaces which use large amounts of coal or natural gas. Iron ore is purified by removing the oxygen. Production of carbon dioxide is not just a result of energy requirements of steel production but the chemical requirements of smelting. Each step of production is dependent on fossil fuels.
Cement is made in a kiln using fuels like coal, natural gas and tires, all sources of greenhouse gases. Fifty per cent of greenhouse emissions producing cement is not from energy used but from chemical reactions in production. The conversion of limestone into lime leads to the emission of carbon dioxide.
Globally cement production equals five per cent of carbon dioxide emissions and steel production seven per cent. No fossil fuels means no wind turbines.
How are Canadians going to build any large infrastructure without concrete, steel or fossil fuels? Enough of Trudeau’s rhetoric-instead of taxing us give Canadians a concrete plan.
Gary A. .O MacKay,
Birch Hill
