Dear John,

Everybody wants to do what we can to protect the environment and combat climate change. But we need to understand what consequences such actions will have.

That is what today's new analysis from the Fraser Institute does.

Canada's ambitious targets are based on the assertion in the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2018 Special Report on 1.5°C Warming, which showed such measures would yield net benefits to society.

One problem: the report itself expressly stated that it did not complete a cost-benefit analysis of limiting warming!

What's more, the studies that the IPCC cited to support a 1.5°C target were based on a selective survey of the research and have been criticized by economists as flawed.

In fact, some leading economists – including Nobel Prize winner William Nordhaus – have gone so far as to say that it would be better if governments did nothing at all about climate change than to try to achieve the 1.5 °C target because the costs so outweigh the estimated benefits.

Check out the full analysis here, and be sure to share this one on social media.

Stay safe,

Niels Veldhuis
President