Pirate Party of Canada

This is what we received from Ric Lim, candidate for the Pirate Party of Canada  https://www.pirateparty.ca/

1.    Do you believe that peak oil is here or near?

I don't think we can definitely say we have reached the peak. We need more data to be able to make a more definitive conclusion. To accomplish that, we would need more data and transparency from the oil sectors. But whether peak oil is here, coming soon or way off into the future, push for cleaner energy is a win win proposition. I would like to see more innovations toward cleaner energy and make sure these new innovations become accessible and affordable to average Canadians.

2.    Do you believe that climate change is happening?

Majority of scientist are saying climate change is happening. Skeptics (some of them scientist) are saying it is not. I recognize that there are some cases where scientist can be wrong and groupthink happens from time to time. Not being a scientist or expert in that field, I cannot give my personal expert opinion. But I would give the majority of the scientist the benefit of the doubt. But it is important that they improve their communication and avoid practices that would be deemed as non-transparent and secretive (as some e-mails have shown). We should pursue clean energy and not get bogged down on whether climate change is happening or not. The argument of some people seems to be that if it is not really happening then we should go on burning fossil fuels. I disagree with that argument. Burning fossil fuels not only contribute to health problems and pollution (e.g. smog) but also economic problems due to reliance on oil from world's trouble spot and their non-transparent cartel practices. Cartel practices, price fixing and creating artificial scarcity by stocking / limiting supplies are illegal in some parts of the world for a good reason. Realistically, we will not be totally abandoning oil anytime soon. But we should keep moving forward and looks into alternatives for our reliance on carbon based non-renewable sources of energy.

3.    Do you believe that peak phosphate is here or near?

Just like peak oil, it is hard to point to exactly when the peak would be reached. But the increased demand from countries like China makes people wonder whether we are reaching the peak soon. Whether the peak is here or not, we should be taking advantage of phosphate in sewage, animal and human manure for our farming. By tapping into waste at the local municipal area as source for fertilizing our farms, we could cut down on demands for mining rock phosphates.

4.    Do you believe it is appropriate to produce bio-fuels with food to supply our energy needs?

Some would argue that there is no shortage of foods or agriculture lands so there should be room for using some agriculture lands exclusively for biofuels. That approach should be treated with caution. If farmers think they can make more money from producing crops for biofuels, they might switch to that instead, and away from crops for food. So we will be creating a competition for the use of agriculture lands. Reliance on biofuels as replacement for fossil fuels is not sustainable. We should instead support our farmers through a fiscally efficient co-operative to help them market any surplus produce elsewhere.