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Carney is well versed in the subject: In December 2019, United Nations Secretary General António Guterres to be his Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance. Before that he served as the governor of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England. But I sense that Carney is coming up against the realities of politics and all those wise words may soon be forgotten.

He has already jettisoned the carbon tax even though in his book he states that “the best approach is a revenue-neutral progressive carbon tax� where the proceeds can be redistributed as rebates to less well-off households. He then goes on to say that the “Canadian federal carbon pricing framework is a model for others.� So much for that in the face of Pierre Poilievre’s sloganeering.

He also suggests that we must shift from oil, natural gas, and coal to renewables: “Achieving net-zero (he’ a big fan of net-zero) will require moving away from fossil fuels to renewables, decarbonizing transport and reducing emissions for industrial processes.�

I think most Canadians are in favour of renewables since our vast hydroelectric resources power so much of the country. But try and explain that to Alberta Premier Danielle Smith who has put a crimp on solar and wind power in her province in favour of natural gas. And she wants to double the production of oil from about four million barrels a day.

Smith is also asking for a whole lot more, like pipelines, abandoning climate change regulations, and lifting the tanker ban on B.C’s coast. This certainly doesn’t fit in with Carney’s view, according to his book. So far, he’s (maybe) promising her an oil pipeline and the huge Carbon Capture Use and Storage facility being proposed by the oil sand operators “although they have a ways to go to become economic,� he writes.

Carney is also enthusiastic about EVs. “For example, in electric vehicles governments could help to build the charging infrastructure necessary and introduce policies to incentivize purchases,� he writes. Do you think that is going to happen as U.S. President Donald Trump wages his tariff war and makes every car more expensive?

One more thing. Carney is also a fan of Greta Thunberg. He was in the auditorium when she delivered her scorching takedown of U.N members. And he tells a story about when she visited him at The Bank of England and he took her down to the vaults to see the gold. “That gilded hoard, nominally of great value, lying inert in a basement mocked our earlier conversation about the resources needed to fight climate change,� he writes.

Carney was writing his book during COVID. Who could have foreseen that Trump would get elected and cause so much malignant destruction. His threats against Canada have to be taken seriously and have sucked up most of Carney’s time and energy. In his meetings with the premiers hardly a word is spoken about the need to address climate change as he considers the big nation building projects such as ports, pipelines, and railroads.

Seems like Carney has almost abandoned his longing to confront climate change as a matter of values which will lead us into a brave new world. Hopefully, I am wrong. But the need to deal with the immediate crises has once again pushed climate change to the back burner.