I’d like to bring a couple of things together.

Forest fires came early this year, forcing us to think about climate change. They didn’t affect the County as much as Toronto, so perhaps it’s understandable that most of the attention fire season has gotten so far has been pictures of blood-red sunsets on the Adolphus Reach, and the day at PECI when children with asthma had to be kept indoors.

But, in the big picture, this was an alarmingly early and blisteringly serious onset of fire season. The army was called in, thousands of residents evacuated. And we haven’t even made it to the summer solstice.

Whether or not we have been directly affected, every citizen — not just of the County, or of Canada, but of the world — needs to recognize that their various habits and necessities are producing greenhouse gas emissions. Each of us needs to do something about it individually, but we must also act collectively. And our greatest collective force is our governments.

Environmental responsibility and democracy are connected.

A few weeks ago Don Wilford wrote a guest editorial for us about the imperative to future-proof new housing builds by designing them to use energy sources other than fossil fuels.

At the same time, the Ontario government was rushing Bill 5, the “Protect Ontario by Unleashing our Economy Act,” into law. As Mr. Wilford noted in a follow-up letter to the editor last week, this bill, in combination with the recently passed Bill 17, and 2022’s Bill 23, reduces environmental regulation and prevents local authorities from setting green building standards.

Now passed into law, Bill 5, which ostensibly addresses mining, uses very general terms, not restricting any of its language to mining. In essence, it legalizes the establishment of deregulated autocratic zones at the discretion of a very few people in power.

The threat to democracy is most clearly and directly pronounced in the language of Schedule 9, the Special Economic Zones Act, which places unchecked power into very few hands. A Special Economic Zone (SEZ) can be created wherever the Lieutenant Governor in Council chooses. It is worth noting that there is no reference to mining here. The law does not restrict itself. Within an SEZ, established rules and regulations need not apply: trusted “proponents and projects”— note that it does not specify the kind of projects — can be exempted from any and all existing regulations. And how is a “trusted proponent” assessed? There is no information about this. It would seem to be at the Minister’s discretion.

The SEZ Act goes out of its way twice to specify that the rules it can override include “by-laws of a municipality or local board.”

That’s us.

But that isn’t all we have to worry about. Big Beautiful Omnibus Bills in the name of “economics” are the flavour of the month.

Welcome to the federal government’s Bill C-5, the “Building Canada Act,” currently being fast-tracked through parliament. In order to unite the country and create stability independent of the United States, this bill will create a special office to identify projects of “national interest.” It is clear that major energy projects like pipelines are what this Act is thinking about.

This is not just a sop to separatist Alberta, it caters to the monied interests of Big Oil.

Projects of major interest will be exempt from the regulations of 13 different acts, including the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, the Impact Assessment Act and the Indian Act. Local and Indigenous rights of consultation are not guaranteed.

Even if we might trust the current government to use these powers responsibly, we should note that projects of major interest can hold their exemptions for five years.

And should we trust the current government? Under Liberal leadership over the past decade, Canada has been the only member of the G7 to increase its oil production and emissions while the others aggressively pursue clean energy economies.

Canada has many energy options whose economic benefits to the nation are equal to or greater than those of oil.

A pipeline built today will have climate impacts for generations in the future. The forest fires we are experiencing today are a direct result of not just our own, but our parents’ and grandparents’ emissions.

Let’s bring this thought home to the County.

Last week Enbridge Gas announced that it is now installing its long-planned and much-debated Cherry Valley extension, intended to service some 200 homes along County Road 10. The project was originally welcomed by Council in 2021, but then, as recently as 2024, it was rejected when the Ontario Energy Board condemned new gas lines as stranded assets — something billed to homeowners through rate increases and that would become obsolete within a few years, as greenhouse gas reductions were enforced.

The Gazette naively said in an editorial last February, “that pipeline will likely never be built.” The logic was clear: you don’t build a pipeline unless you’re going to be using it for its full 60-year lifespan.

At the very same time, not only was the OEB ruling being undone, but the route of the pipeline extension was being adjusted to include Base31, the location of what is projected to be thousands of homes.

Base31’s plan for its first new build — an apartment building — addresses emissions. It will employ heat pumps for both heating and water, with gas as “auxiliary backup” for interior heating and for “second-stage” water heating.

One hopes that future developments will follow such a policy.

The fact that we must hope rather than know with certainty, that we need to depend upon developers’ voluntary good citizenship rather than legal regulation, should worry us. The fact that the legislation being passed at both provincial and federal levels makes deregulation the new policy should worry us.

Enbridge has told the Gazette, “the pipeline has been designed to accommodate future growth in the area. Potential service to the [Base31] site may be considered as part of the broader regional planning efforts, should demand and feasibility align.” They’re clearly happy to supply the smaller amounts of natural gas needed for backup at Base31, in part because they must be anticipating increased demand.

Now we have to apply the same logic that we thought would cancel the extension: you don’t build a pipeline unless you’re going to be using it for 60 years.

The Cherry Valley extension will be paid for through rate increases over forty years, that is, until 2065. The line itself should be functional through 2085.

Ontario has pledged to cut emissions by 30 per cent over 2005 levels by 2030.

I don’t see how this adds up.

Environmental responsibility and democracy are connected. Our legislators know this. And they seem to be protecting themselves against both.