The Cost of Net Zero to Quebec

Contributed by Robert Lyman © 2026. Robert Lyman’s bio can be read here.

The image is licensed from Adobe Stock

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Few Quebecers are aware of the costs of the climate policy measures now being implemented by the federal and Quebec governments. Surprisingly, there is no authoritative and reliable inventory of climate measures now in place; of past, present and planned expenditures; or of the results achieved.

In Budget 2022, the federal government stated that over the period 2015 to 2022, it had spent over $120 billion on climate measures; however, it did not identify the expenditures. In Budget 2023, the federal government announced its intention to spend an additional $121 billion over the period of the fiscal plan (i.e. to fiscal year 2027-2028). It provided no breakdown of these expenditures either by year or by measure. The Canadian Climate Institute contracted with Navius Research to develop what it refers to as the Climate Policy Tracker, a list of current and projected climate measures and related expenditures. According to it, there are 112 federal government climate policy measures and 364 provincial and territorial climate policy measures where funding has been approved or planned.

The total federal and provincial expenditures on climate measures  over the period 2020 to 2030 as listed by the Carbon Policy Tracker are $476 billion (i.e. $11,900 per resident of Canada or roughly $28,000 per household). That is just what has been announced to the end of 2025.

Most of Quebec’s climate spending up to now has been financed by the revenues that were raised though the province’s joint cap-and-trade carbon market with California. All proceeds from the sales are paid to the Electrification and Climate Change Fund (ECCF). The revenues are raised through the payments by Quebec firms that are subject to the emissions caps. As of June, 2026, the cap-and-trade system had resulted in payments of $11.5 billion to the Quebec government.

In 2025, Quebec published a 2030 Plan for a Green Economy. Separately, the Quebec government has announced that it will spend $10.1 billion over the five years of the plan. Almost $4 billion will be spent on emissions reduction from the transport sector, $1.7 billion on Industry, $1.45 billion on buildings, $37 billion on agriculture, $48 billion on forests, and $340 million other measures.

The expenditures on climate measures to date and those planned to 2030 constitute only a small share of the costs that will have to be borne by Quebecers and other Canadians in pursuit of the goal of complete decarbonization of the economy. In its March 2023 Budget, the federal government projected that the cost of net zero would be between $125 billion and $140 billion per year from 2023 to 2050, or somewhere between $3.4 trillion and $3.6 trillion.

Quebec’s population of just over nine million is about 22 % of the Canadian total. A cost of $3.6 trillion equates to $792 billion for Quebec or about $400,000 for every Quebecer over the next 24 years. The $3.6 trillion figure is probably an under-estimate.

This story needs to be told.

Please read the full report in PDF format.