The Nova Scotia government returned $5 million in federal funding earmarked for land protection because it did not spend it, and it made no measurable progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the last year.
Those are some of the details in the most recent provincial update on progress to achieve goals related to addressing climate change, released last week.
Opposition leaders say what’s in the report is just as concerning as what is not.
The government passed the Environmental Goals and Climate Change Reduction Act in 2021 and with it came an annual requirement for a progress update toward achieving the legislation’s 28 goals.
But tracking that progress is more difficult this year because for the first time, the annual report does not include an update for each specific goal.
In an interview Wednesday, Environment Minister Tim Halman said that the change was simply the result of new formatting for the report. Opposition leaders had a different view.
“I think they have essentially abdicated their responsibility for environmental protection and action and I think that if we were to see the detail in this report, it would demonstrate that,” NDP Leader Claudia Chender said in an interview.
Details that are included in the report serve as proof that the Progressive Conservatives “have done a terrible job” on the environment file, she said.
The report says the province has reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 38 per cent from 2005 levels. That’s the same place it was in last year’s update. The legislation calls for a reduction of 53 per cent by 2030.
This year’s update also includes a final accounting of the Canada-Nova Scotia Nature Agreement, a deal signed in 2023 that saw about $25 million in funding from the federal government to help the province purchase land for the purpose of protection and biodiversity conservation.
According to the document released Friday, the province spent about $20 million and sent the rest back to Ottawa.
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Halman said determining how much of the federal money to use came down to a question of balancing priorities.
“There’s a lot of competing interests now in Nova Scotia — quite frankly, across the country — for land,” he said.
“Housing, clean energy projects, land and water conservation. So we do as much as we can, where we can.”
To date, 14.56 per cent of the province’s land and water mass is protected. The government has a legislated target of reaching 20 per cent by 2030 and it’s committed to hitting 15 per cent by the end of the year.
With that in mind, interim Liberal Leader Iain Rankin said it makes no sense for the government to have left federal money on the table, especially at a time when it’s contending with record-setting deficits and looking for ways to reduce costs.
“The rhetoric is there around ensuring that we protect the environment and grow the economy, but they’re proving that they’re not able to do both at the same time,” he said in an interview.
Halman said he remains committed to achieving the targets laid out in legislation, including for land protection and getting the province off coal for the purpose of electricity generation by 2030.
To date, the government has closed no coal-fired power plants. Halman said the continued buildup of onshore wind should help with that process.
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