Experts agree that the centrepiece of any national climate change plan should be a policy that "puts a price on emissions" broadly in the economy. The two main policies that can do this are a carbon tax and a cap-and-trade system.
The Government of Canada has committed to announce some form of cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions. This paper aims to identify the key questions that should be asked to evaluate any Canada-wide cap-and-trade proposal.
This paper was published as Chapter 13 in:
Canada: The State of the Federation, 2009
Carbon Pricing and Environmental Federalism
Edited by Thomas J. Courchene and John R. Allan
McGill-Queen's University Press, 2010
