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B.C. Premier Christy Clark speaks with Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty during a meeting of the Premiers and National Aborginal Leaders in Vancouver, Wednesday, July 20, 2011.Jonathan Hayward/The Canadian Press

" We're at the forefront in North America, we're creating thousands of jobs, we're reducing our contribution to climate change. We're shutting down coal-fired plants," Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, before heading to the premiers' meeting in Vancouver.

Those are fighting words on the West Coast. The B.C. government has aggressively promoted its green credentials ever since former premier Gordon Campbell kicked off his climate action agenda in 2007. The message clearly did not reach Mr. McGuinty.

Or is B.C. really trailing behind?

Mark Jaccard, professor of sustainable energy at Simon Fraser University, says B.C. leads the country. However, prominent environmental groups – the David Suzuki Foundation, Environmental Defence and the Pembina Institute – are not as unequivocal.

Both B.C. and Ontario have introduced significant programs in the past few years to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. But the two provinces adopted different approaches, which allows each to claim to be number one in different areas, the activists say.

A major thrust in Ontario has been to phase out all coal-fired plants by 2014 and to buy power from renewable energy projects – solar, wind, biomass or hydro – at a fixed rate for 20 years. Its push for clean energy is creating a manufacturing sector that could supply solar panels and other items to markets across North America. The province says the clean-energy initiative has created 20,000 jobs so far, and expects to create 50,000 jobs in total by 2015. Its request for renewable energy projects has been over-subscribed.

The Ontario clean-energy program has been widely recognized as groundbreaking. Former U.S. vice-president and environmentalist Al Gore has described the Ontario green-energy program as the single best energy legislation in North America.

B.C., which relies mostly on hydroelectric energy, does not have coal-fired plants to close down. Instead, the province concentrated directly on the nub of the problem – carbon. The government put a price on carbon, imposed a carbon tax and required any new sources of energy as well as all government operations to be carbon neutral.

Prof. Jaccard said Ontario has done a better job in marketing its green policies. Look at the praise for closing coal-fired plants by 2014. Ontario is celebrated as if all the plants have been mothballed, although only a few units have been closed. Ontario should not be given credit until the operations are actually shut down, he said.

Meanwhile, the coal-fired plants will not be totally replaced by renewable energy. The province is still building new natural-gas plants.

The carbon tax, which will change behaviour over time, puts B.C. ahead, Prof. Jaccard said. Meanwhile, Ontario continues to subsidize car manufacturers who build vehicles dependent on fossil fuels.

The environmental groups give Ontario more credit for its achievements. Ian Bruce, a climate-change specialist at the David Suzuki Foundation, said Ontario has shown that the shift to clean energy can lead to jobs and improvements in the environment at the same time.

Tim Weis, director of renewable energy at the Pembina Institute, said fixed pricing for new projects is encouraging changes across the economy. However, he endorsed programs in both provinces. "It's nice to see a race to the top," Mr. Weis said. "Both are doing good things."

As B.C. Premier Christy Clark and Mr. McGuinty sit across the table at the premiers' meeting, the latter can claim leadership in phasing out coal-fired plants and developing a green economy. Ms. Clark can boast about the carbon tax and the province's carbon-neutral approach.

Yet it may be too early to determine who is in the lead. B.C. has not yet indicated whether annual increases in the carbon tax, intended to encourage a shift to renewable energy, will continue. In Ontario, a provincial election this fall may lead to a shift in a different direction.

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