Canadian Carbon tax exemption on home heating oil sets climate policies back, advocates say

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Continuing to punish individuals for basic living needs isn't going to do anything more than continue to make life more unaffordable
In an ideal world, yes, we'd keep the carbon tax cranked. But fuck that. People with oil heaters would get off them if they could. If they're still on oil, there's probably a reason.
The current subsidies of heat pumps look like they're structured as loans. And they're complicated. Don't do that. Just install the damn heat pump for free, and call it a day.
- yeah i think it's like around -42 C that most of them you can't run anymore? so you need another heat source during times when you get that low, which up north is obviously more common
  
  From the article, much of the heating oil use is in NB, PEI, and Nova Scotia. The Atlantic climate is well within the limits of heat pump use.
  With toaster elements, heat pumps are effective for southern Ontario as well.
  Northern communities, not so much.
I think they should get an exemption as it is literally keeping them alive.
I think a better solution would be to heavily subsidize heat pumps, resistance furnaces, and electric space heaters and make them more cost effective to use. People will switch to save money. Of course the cost of electricity has to be significantly cheaper than the oil.
- Electric furnaces are very common in Canada, though I don't think quite as common as oil/LNG.

7 comments