Isramart : District anticipates purchase of carbon credits

Isramart news:
When planning for the Eldorado Hydroelectric Generating Station began, District staff and council immediately recognized its revenue generating potential. Now that it is complete and the money being brought in by it is being used to pay the loans that were taken out to create it, council must decide how the District will spend the money when those debts are gone.

A Climate Action Reserve Fund is being created specifically for that purpose. Last week council gave third reading to a bylaw that will create the fund.

The bylaw stipulates that the money is to be spent in a manner that will help to reduce the District’s carbon footprint on a corporate and community basis.

“This fund and tracking corporate carbon emissions is important because it’s part of meeting our Climate Action Charter target,” said Kate Berniaz, Project Manager/Policy Analyst for the District of Lake Country.

The Climate Action Charter was signed by the District of Lake Country—along with nearly 200 other local governments across BC—as a pledge that the signatories would work to become carbon neutral in their emissions by the year 2012. For signing the charter, the District now receives a grant each year for the full amount that it spends on carbon tax.

As the push to reduce carbon emissions goes on, Stephen Banmen, Director of Finance says there is even talk of emissions reductions being legislated provincially in the near future.

Such reductions could necessitate the purchase of carbon credits according to Banmen. He says that the intent of the Climate Action Fund will to reduce the District’s carbon footprint. When reduction legislation is introduced the District will then be in a position to argue to the provincial government that the District is already funding its own carbon offsets.

If successful, the money that would be spent on carbon credits would be kept in the community rather than being sent out of town.

“We’re not alone in planning like this. It’s a strategy that other communities in BC are trying as well,” said Banmen.

In addition to the revenue generated from the hydroelectric station, the District will also, on an annual basis, put an amount equal to what it would have to pay for carbon offsets to achieve carbon neutrality.