The good news story we rarely talk about is the remarkable progress British Columbians have made on reducing GHG emissions per unit of GDP (also known as “GHG GDP intensity”) — despite making little headway on reducing absolute emissions.

Access to, and use of, “dense” energy is central to economic and human development. We depend on readily available energy to enable day-to-day needs like staying warm in winter and cool in summer. We also depend on energy for mobility including supply chains, taking the kids to school, getting groceries to feed our families, and recreation. Put simply, reliable, affordable energy enables our standard of living.

To make sense of how well we are using energy in our every day lives, we need to dive into two important concepts: energy density and GHG intensity.

Energy Density

Energy density is the ability of that source to deliver “power” (i.e., energy flow per unit of time) relative to its weight and physical dimensions[1]. It is the most important attribute of an energy source, and it is fixed by fuel type.

GHG Intensity

GHG intensity partly reflects energy density, and the mix of fuels used in the economy. It also reflects how they are used in our economy, which depends on the technologies, machines and processes of our integrated energy system and economy.

There are two ways to measure GHG intensity: GHG emissions per capita; and GHG emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP).

GHGs per capita

GHG per capita is a common reference measure, but it has notable limitations when it comes to being a useful measure since it ignores geospatial, social, economic, and population factors. These indicators matter when making comparisons.[2]

Population growth plays a big role in the quantum of energy used and in determining GHG per capita. Between 2018 and 2023, B.C.’s population grew by 10%. Every new British Columbian arrives with a need for goods, services, and housing, all of which have implications for energy use and eventually the per capita GHG emissions will move towards the average.

These geospatial, social, economic, and population factors undermine the usefulness of domestic per capita GHG emissions comparisons with other jurisdictions. Canada or British Columbia is not the European Union (E.U.) nor is it the United States. A simplistic per capita measure fails to account for the substantial differences in geography, distance between population centres, and economic structure. For example, the E.U. is only 40% as large in land area than Canada with a population density of ~122/km2 compared to our ~4/km2. And while the United States is similar in land area (in fact, it is slightly smaller), it has almost 10 times more people, an economy 13 times bigger than Canada and 100 times larger than British Columbia. These intrinsic differences matter and cannot be captured in a simple measure of per capita GHG intensity.

But even if we do look at per capita GHG emissions, Figure 1 shows a decrease. As shown in Table 1, since 1997 B.C. improved per capita energy use by almost 25%. It is now rising again, albeit slowly. The main reasons include economic recovery from the pandemic (which briefly reduced GHG emissions) and an astounding increase in the population of B.C., particularly in the past two years where the total increase of new residents was 335,000.

Figure 1

Source: B.C. GHG Inventory, Canada GHG Inventory, BC Stats Population Data.

Table 1

GHG per unit of GDP

Given the limitations of measuring GHG per capita, a more useful measure can be used, which looks at GHG intensity of the economy: GHG GDP intensity.

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) measures the value-added of all the goods and services produced within a country's borders in a specific period, typically one year. Measuring GHGs per unit of GDP shows the relationship between how much energy the economy uses relative to overall output or GDP. A smaller ratio and decreasing intensity per unit is a positive outcome, which means we are producing higher output with less energy (i.e., becoming more efficient). This is exactly what the data shows in Figure 2. Table 2 translates this trendline into change over time.

Since 1997, B.C. has improved its efficiency by almost half. In other words, we are using about half as much energy to do more work using technology and systems to find, extract, convert, and use energy more efficiently. As a province, we have made impressive progress in using less energy in our day to day lives, businesses, and the entire economy — something that should be celebrated.

Figure 2

Table 2

Conclusion

There are many confounding questions about whether B.C. can meet its absolute GHG emissions reductions targets. It is also unclear whether the plethora of GHG emissions management policies and programs now in play in British Columbia (and Canada) will have on the intended effect of reducing GHG GDP intensity. However and regardless of what lies ahead, we should be acknowledging good progress on becoming more efficient users of the energy. We should celebrate and embrace these improvements, particularly while thee trendline suggests the province remains on a positive path for managing its GHG emissions.

[1] https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262529730/power-density/

[2] https://www.bcbc.com/insight/2017/11/07/the-relativism-of-environmental-indicators?rq=relativism

B.C. GHG Emissions Intensity