Alberta is the pollution province. Despite a population of less than a third of Ontario, it is responsible for 70 percent more greenhouse gas emissions. Furthermore, while Ontario’s emissions are decreasing, Alberta’s are increasing. In fact, the province now accounts for almost 40 percent of Canada’s total emissions with only 12 percent of its population.

The reason is no secret: the tar sands. In 2022, all but two of the 10 biggest greenhouse gas polluters in Canada were oil and gas fields.

Albertans like to advertise that the greenhouse gas problem is being solved by production companies reducing emissions during bitumen production. Indeed, the industry boasts that it will reduce emissions from its operations to net zero by 2050 by capturing the emissions and injecting them into underground storage.

And maybe it will. But the emissions from their operations make up no more than 15-20 percent of the total emissions in a barrel of crude. The other 80 percent are released when the barrel of crude is burned. And where does that take place? Mostly not in Canada. We pass the buck. We export the bulk of it, so our customers get to take the blame for most of that 80 percent.

Such is the case with all countries that export fossil fuels. The landmark agreement reached in Paris in 2015 to fight climate change requires countries to set targets and report on progress reducing their levels of greenhouse gas emissions, but it imposes no such requirements for emissions generated from fossil fuels they ship elsewhere.

That allows even advanced countries from Norway to Australia to the United States to Canada to say they are making progress toward international climate goals while at the same time exporting fossil fuels at record levels.

The top two fossil fuel emissions exporters are Russia and the United States, both of which export oil, gas and coal. Saudi Arabia comes third with its massive oil exports. Australia and Indonesia are fourth and fifth because of their large coal exports. Canada comes in sixth with, like the U.S., exports of all three fossil fuels. (We are the world’s third largest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia and Russia.)

For a number of countries, including Norway, Australia, Saudi Arabia, and yes Canada, their exported emissions are larger than their domestic emissions. Australia, the U.S. and Canada are reducing domestic emissions, but their fossil fuel export emissions are increasing. Per capita, these are the big three polluters of the industrial world.

All this isn’t exactly what we were taught at our mother’s knee, that we should be accountable for our actions, the well-established “polluter pays principle.” To the contrary, pollution exporters are profiting, even while trumpeting domestic successes.

As long as they do, the world will have trouble reaching the phase-out that is necessary to contain global warming. It’s time to hold the emissions exporters accountable.