THUNDER BAY -- The local chamber of commerce has joined a chorus of 20 of its counterparts across Ontario in calling for the provincial government to defer its plans to impose a cap and trade system on Jan. 1, 2017.
According to calculations the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce released Tuesday, local residents and businesses will be paying an additional $10 million in natural gas alone in 2017 over 2016 rates,
The chamber also pointed to electricity prices, which have risen from 4.7 cents per kilowatt hour in 2004 to 18 cents per kilowatt hour at peak times in 2016, an increase of 383 per cent. It's not yet clear how much diesel or gas will increase business costs city-wide but the cost of fuel for municipally-owned vehicles is expected to drive up costs $350,000.
It's a combination chamber president Charla Robinson said the province isn't considering when it comes to the rising cost of doing business.
"We're talking about all the trucks that deliver the food to your grocery store. Their costs are going to go up, which means their fees are going to go up, which means those fees will be passed on to the grocers, which means those fees will be passed on in higher food costs," Robinson said.
"It's really going to impact everybody, not just your home or business gas bills. Everything is going to be hit with extra costs."
Robinson also urged the province to consider the program within a broader geopolitical context. She pointed out the Canadian government has announced its intention to impose its own carbon pricing system for provinces who don't establish their own by 2018.
South of the border, the outgoing Barack Obama administration that was actively moving the U.S. away from coal and toward green energy technology will be replaced in January with an administration to be led by President-elect Donald Trump, who has given indications his administration will move in the opposite direction.
Those factors, Robinson argued, could disadvantage Ontario among its trading partners.
"Ontario is already a real leader. Our energy grid is one of the cleanest. We've gotten off coal," she said.
"We're very much focused on renewable fuels and non-carbon energy and yet we're still trying to do more when those around us that we trade with aren't. It's great to be a leader but we have to look at a balance."
The chamber is not calling on Ontario to cancel the plan, however. It's looking for a delay in cap and trade's implementation while sector-by-sector economic analysis is conducted to show the effect it could have on the commercial and industrial sectors.
"It's sometimes easier to put the brakes on something and consider it a little further from a political perspective, it's easier to say we've heard you and we're going to look a little more closely at that' rather than saying 'it's a yes or no answer,'" Robinson said.
"We really want them to put the brakes on, defer this for another year. Let's see how some of these other factors play out and potentially at that time, reconsider whether this is really the right way for Ontario to go.
"Evaluate what the impacts have already been of our high electricity costs and look at those trading partners and what they are doing and is this going to impact that? Then move forward based on all that information. '
