Saskatchewan to stop collecting carbon tax for electric heat in defiance of Trudeau government

Saskatchewan announced on Thursday that it would stop the collection of carbon tax for electric heat in 2024, in defiance of the Trudeau government.

In a video posted to X, Premier Scott Moe stood alongside Saskatchewan Party MLA for Athabasca Jim Lemaigre and announced that the change would go into effect on January 1.

Moe stated in the video that around 85% of Saskatchewan homes are heated by natural gas – with the remaining 15% using electric heat, among other sources.

“We’re going to need to determine who is heating their home with electricity and then estimate the percentage of their power bill that is being used for that heat,” Moe said in the clip.

“But those are details, and we will get that all worked out.”

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On January 1, we’re taking the Trudeau-NDP carbon tax off natural gas for home heating to match the federal exemption for heating oil.

About 30,000 Saskatchewan households, many in northern and First Nations communities, use electricity to heat their homes.

Here’s what we’re… pic.twitter.com/TJ3ylVuzjm

— Scott Moe (@PremierScottMoe) November 30, 2023

Late last month, Moe also announced that SaskEnergy, the provincial natural gas utility, won’t remit the carbon charge on natural gas after Ottawa exempted home heating oil.

The exemption resulted in the temporary pausing of the fuel charge on deliveries of heating oil in all provinces and territories where it currently applies, which is more commonly used in Atlantic Canada.

Saskatchewan later joined a call alongside the premiers of Ontario, Alberta, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick for “a meeting with the Prime Minister on carbon tax fairness for all Canadian families.”

Since 2019, every jurisdiction in Canada has had a price on carbon pollution, with the federal government stating that in provinces where the federal price on carbon pollution is in effect, Climate Action Incentive Payments result in quarterly payments.

‘Through these payments, the majority of Canadian families receive more money back than they pay, with low-income Canadians benefitting the most,” the government added.