An audit by Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development Jerry V. DeMarco has revealed significant gaps in the federal government’s strategy to safeguard over $100 billion worth of critical infrastructure from the adverse effects of climate change. The audit highlighted that three key departments are lagging behind in their efforts to protect federal assets.
As Canada experiences warming at twice the global average rate, DeMarco emphasized the urgency of ramping up initiatives to shield federal assets and services. For instance, the audit pointed out that small craft harbors, which directly support over 45,000 jobs, are at risk due to climate change impacts and require immediate repairs and reinforcement.
The report indicated that the federal government possesses 1,623 vital assets like bridges, buildings, vehicles, and harbors, with 275 of them identified as being significantly vulnerable to climate change. However, only three percent of these at-risk assets have climate resilience plans in place, according to DeMarco’s audit.
The Greening Government Strategy, launched in 2017, aims to achieve net-zero government emissions by 2050 and enhance climate resilience by 2035. Enhancing climate resilience involves evaluating department-controlled assets for vulnerability to climate change and implementing strategies to fortify them against the effects of a warming climate, extreme weather events, wildfires, and natural disasters.
The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat oversees the implementation of the Greening Government Strategy by government departments. Nevertheless, the audit highlighted substantial gaps in oversight, particularly in ensuring the execution of climate resilience strategies by these departments.
The audit scrutinized the performance of three pivotal government departments: National Defence, Public Services and Procurement Canada, and Fisheries and Oceans Canada, which collectively own 67 percent of all federal assets. While these departments conducted risk assessments on their vulnerable assets, no concrete actions were taken to enhance their resilience.
Moreover, the audit revealed that since the strategy’s inception in 2017, the Treasury Board did not allocate any funding to departments and agencies for climate resilience activities. This lack of dedicated funding posed obstacles to implementing actions to improve climate resilience, such as infrastructure upgrades requiring substantial investments.
Furthermore, the lack of interim targets, inadequate progress monitoring mechanisms, and outdated guidance tools were highlighted as deficiencies by the audit. Not having clear guidelines led departments to pursue disparate approaches independently, hindering a cohesive strategy towards climate resilience objectives.
The audit stressed the importance of making progress on climate resilience, as the annual cost of climate change-related damage to government infrastructure could escalate significantly in the coming years. Failure to take proactive measures could result in rising costs to Canadian society due to climate-related events.