 Good afternoon, everyone. On behalf of Professor Barry Raib, the Ford School of Public Policy, and in particular the International Policy Center, it's my pleasure to welcome you to our third webinar event for the North American Colloquium on Climate Policy. The North American Colloquium is an ongoing collaboration between the Ford School, the University of Toronto's Monk School, and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México's Center for North American Research. I would also like to acknowledge the generous support of the Meany Family Foundation for making this fierce programming possible. Today's event focuses on Mexican and Canadian perspectives on North American climate policy. We'll begin with an update from Andrés Avila Ackerberg, Executive Director of Polea, a leading environmental organization in Mexico. Dr. Avila Ackerberg will discuss the current state of play in Mexico with regard to climate policy. We will then move to a conversation between Professors Deborah Van Nynanton and Marcella Lopez Vallejo, leading academic voices from Canada and Mexico, respectively. The discussion will be moderated by Allison Beatty, a recent Ford School PhD graduate. This will then be followed by a question from Professor Barry Raib, and then an open Q&A discussion. As audience members, you can submit a question at any time using the Q&A feature on the bottom of your Zoom control panel. Apologies in advance, we will not be able to get to every question, but I did want to note that we have decided to extend the event until 5.15 local time to accommodate as many questions as possible, with the understanding of course that some of you may need to leave us sooner. And it's now my pleasure to introduce Andrés Avila Ackerberg. Dr. Avila Ackerberg is the Executive Director of Polea and has over 20 years of experience developing and implementing policies and legislation through his work in government, civil society, and academia. He was previously the Director of the Globe Mexico Forest Initiative, where he worked on comprehensive legislation to support sustainable forest management. Recently, he successfully coordinated 17 climate related projects to support Mexico's implementation of its general law on climate change and the United Nations framework for climate changes nationally determined contributions. Dr. Avila Ackerberg holds a PhD in political science from UNAM and a master's in international relations from Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Ackerberg. Thank you very much, Josh, and I will be sharing my screen, so please let me know if you can see it, just to be sure. Yes, you can see it. Yes, we can. Great, great. Okay, so let's start because we have just a few minutes. I was asked to give you a briefing on Mexico's climate policies, which is, you know, very broad, but I will try to do some sort of summary. And then I will concentrate on the subnational legislation, which is what we are doing and which we believe it's a very important tool right now for moving forward in terms of climate action. So maybe you know this just go very fast. There is an emissions gap that we have a challenge worldwide. Current NDCs are not enough to achieve the goal of the Paris Agreement of not going beyond the two degrees. This increase we are going to be more than that. In this sense, Mexico is an important actor is the third thing placed in the world in terms of emissions, and that accounts for approximately 1.3% of the total. Mexico presented its NDC on time before the entry to force of Paris Agreement. It was established on 22% the goal to 2030 below its baseline under the base business as usual scenario not just like a developing country that we are. We could grow up to 36% if we have international support and difficult to decide right now if this is going to be accomplished because it's early, but some calculations have let us know that we, we need to be a bit more ambitious of going is, you know, a crucial contribution to the price agreement target we are in this trend towards three degrees increase. So this is Mexico's inventory. I'm not going to stop use if you want to learn about it. You can just consult it. This is in the sixth national communication to the UNF triple C just to highlight two sectors transport and energy are responsible for half of Mexico's emissions, and you see all the variants. This is the last, the latest inventory 2015 2015. So, what, what are our political tools to fight climate change. It is basically, let me say so before Mexico has been a very active participant worldwide historically in terms of the UNF triple C. So we are where we are and on the next one country in that sense we signed and ratified your protocol of course because we didn't have any commitments as a developed country just to present national communications we have presented six national communication which is, I think one of the countries which has presented the most. We presented our NBC as mentioned and we sign and ratify Paris agreement so we have been very active. Our challenge of course has been implementation, but in terms of national action. Our basis for climate policy is our law, our general long climate change, which was enacted in 2012. We were the first developing country in the world to have a climate legislation the second. It was after the UK, and it has been having reforms the latest and very important was in 2018. So basically the political instruments we have, and we can present on each of them for for many minutes but I will just mention them. It's the strategy which sets you know the, the, the, the, the horizon for the future work in terms of climate change in years, the program the special program which every government in turn has to set one and put the targets in a six year period, the military that I just showed the register and the climate change fund, you know a financial instrument to support implementation of these actions. And as mentioned this latest reform we had for the law included our NBC, which is very, very interesting because our Mexico, our law climate change law already puts the international commitment into a national commitment. Of course, it is you know mandatory it is also subject to some conditionalities but is this very, I think very important to to mention. This is our NBC. Again, I won't stay too long just to have a look that you can consult it at the INEC, that's the Institute on National Ecology and Climate Change, this was the previous one, and it's just to, to see how are the different issues and from the eight sectors considering the inventory. Basically, it's the 22% target for 2030. And if there is some support, it will go up to 36%. No, and you can see here, just that to give you an idea of it. And just recently, as many countries presented our most updated our newest NBC, which you remember last year was supposed to be the year of ambition. And it was had to be the cup in the UK which didn't happen because of international situation, but in the case of Mexico, our NBC that just started just to look at it because of this event. It didn't go more than we already have offered in terms of ambition in terms of numbers. The 22% remains the same in terms of mitigation, but it does say that, for example, energy efficiency wasn't into our actions. And now it is a very important tool to achieving this, this target. It didn't have before, you know, the agenda 2030 SDGs. Now it has reference to many of them. And of course, adaptation. That's I think the most important thing to highlight on this new NBC because adaptation is a much more explained and specified in terms of the different actions. So at the first glance, it doesn't seem to be an increasing ambition, but then again, it is early to measure effectiveness. We will see that in a few years, hopefully. So this is also something that I always like to highlight in terms of cost benefit. No, this is also information that I was able to be involved some years ago, the cost of action versus the cost of inaction in Mexico. For 2030, if we do know if we don't do anything, it will cost us $143 billion. No, you know, the consequences of climate change implementing our NBC cost us $126 billion. So just if you are not, if you are a non-believer in climate change, if you see these numbers, that makes sense. No, because it is less what you have to spend that what you will have to pay if you don't do nothing. Of course, the ones who have to incur in the in the expenditures are the ones who are already in government, the ones who be receiving the benefits, not necessarily are those who are will be doing the expenditure. That's the political complication in terms of timing. So, just to finalize what I was saying, this is a situation in Mexico that the current priorities are not very much in line with, you know, from to promote, for example, renewable energy. There's a shift more towards fossil fuels, promoting more, you know, this idea of energy security and energy sovereignty. Just these days, some days ago, there's been a proposal to reform a law, which has been very controversial because it ends up it ends, you know, free, free competence in terms of the energy, you know. So there's a lot of discussion right now in Mexico. That's why, while this takes place, we are currently trying to support that actions don't stop. And maybe just try to use the willingness of some actors at the subnational level to keep doing some stuff and basically through legislation. So, we already, we are an NGO called Polea Political Regilación Ambiental, which is policy and legislation, environmental policy and legislation, trying to support this international process through updating legislation. Maybe 80% of Mexico states have already climate legislation, some still don't, but those who have it, it's a bit old. They already have five, eight years, and it needs some sort of update. Basically, in terms of, you know, the recent international processes, scientific improvements and so on. We did already this with Mexico City, a very important actor in Mexico, in terms of climate change, the law still in the legislative process, it needs to be voted. We are working right now in Oaxaca, a very different reality, you know, Oaxaca with lots of indigenous peoples and adaptation is a very vulnerable state, so priorities are different. And we will be working this year 2021 with support from the UK PAC program on Quintana Roo, Yucatán, the states you can see there, you know, these are six states. Mexico City, if successful, we are doing one step forward. I mean, if approved the update of the legislation, our next challenge will be to harmonize other legislation with climate legislation, which for example, transport legislation, waste legislation to make some challenge of communication with climate, because sometimes you would legislate differently and separately and there is no communication between laws. Very interesting exercise that we will try to do. So this is not only, you know, the technical work that we are doing, we are not just drafting the laws. We are also dealing with decision makers, which is always a challenge and very complicated, but we have done, I think, good things and we have experienced it and of course trying to have an inclusive process and stakeholders to give us their opinions so we can have a relevant thing to present. So just finalizing, you know, these are tough times, tough circumstances, governments under different parts of the world sometimes are very keen on climate change, sometimes they are not, but I think we need to do something. No, not only complaining and that's precisely what we tried to do with these types of actions. In this situation, as I just mentioned, I think climate change actions, either mitigation adaptation are very important for a green recovery that the world needs and more specifically our countries. I think that current country of Mexico is very congruent with the developing country position, you know, but with this principle of common body differentiated responsibilities, we are behaving like a developing country, we are waiting for those to take action, and we are trying to concentrate on our priorities, which is poverty, education and other social priorities. That's what I see in this current government. And I just to highlight and what I assume you will be talking just in a minute. We do need your experiences from the US and Canada in terms of subnational action, because I know you have done this before and of course just to finalize and leave you there. The changes in the US government are very, very at the perfect timing and I hope this triggers lots of action in the region. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Andres. That was very, very informative and we really appreciate you sharing your unique perspective as the director of an NGO in Mexico. At this time, it is my pleasure to introduce professors Van Nininten and Lopez Bayejo, and our discussion moderator, Dr. Allison Beatty. Dr. Van Nininten is Professor of Political Science and North American Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada, where she is also on the faculty of the Bosley School of International Affairs and a research fellow at the Laurier Center for the Study of Canada. Her five books and more than 50 articles and book chapters have largely focused on the topic of Transboundary Environmental Governance in North America at the US, Canada, US, Mexico and continental scales. Dr. Lopez Bayejo is Professor in the Center of North American Studies at the University of Guadalajara in Mexico. In addition to her academic career, she has worked in multiple Mexican government ministries. She has held a number of prestigious academic fellowships throughout the globe, and her numerous publications focus on North American regionalism, transnational governance, climate and energy policy, and the role of sub-state actors in carbon markets. Finally, Dr. Allison Beatty recently earned her PhD here at the University of Michigan, a dual PhD in public policy and political science. Her dissertation focused on cross-national policy diffusion at the sub-national level, which fostered her ongoing interest in climate change and renewable energy policy at the sub-national level in all three countries. So Allison, why don't you take it away and we're looking forward to this conversation. Thank you so much, Josh. It is an honor to moderate today. Thank you everyone across not only the country but the whole continent for joining us today. That's wonderful. And special thanks to Marcella and Deborah. It is an honor and a pleasure to have you here. So briefly, let me start by asking how would you characterize the Canada, US and also the Mexico, US climate policy relationship to this point first under President Obama, then under President Trump. Who did you want to start there, Allison? Do you want me to start? Please, thank you. Okay, well, I would say that if we look across the expanse of time, say from the 1990s further, I would say that the environmental policy relationship has been relatively low key, very focused on pragmatic avenues of cooperation, and a real focus on regulatory harmonization. And I think a good example here is the case of vehicle emission standards, some really long running joint technology projects, carbon capture and storage is one of them, but really a lot of focus on issues relating to shared environmental resources. And I would say that the relationship has really been based in what we would call trans governmental relationships. So really close working ties between offices and companion departments across the two countries that work, you know, through issues outside of the political limelight. And I think really this has contributed to the resilience of the bilateral environmental relationship, even during periods of time when I would say our leaders have perhaps not been so enamored of one another and I might use the examples there of Prime Minister Harper and President Obama, and then President Trump and Prime Minister Trudeau. And I would also note that the relationship is very multi level, and Andres talked a little bit about that we cannot just look at what is happening between the two governments at the national level because there are lots of environmental policy interactions between states and provinces but also what I call diagonally between Canada and the individual US states. Now, in terms of the climate policy relationship, I would say that it has not been particularly ambitious in terms of climate initiatives and, you know, I would say that's probably by design. There has not been until recently a full consensus in either country that climate change should be the priority in terms of domestic policy and in the bilateral relationship. You know, I think we did get a taste of more ambition with the meeting of the minds between President Obama and the then newly elected Prime Minister Trudeau but all of these initiatives, I think without fail were sidelined under the Trump administration and just disappeared. But I would say at the present moment, overall you've got two countries that are used to working together they've got lots of really good mechanisms for getting stuff done together. And now they have a shared purpose which, you know, I think is is actually breathtaking in its scope and single minded single mindedness I'm not sure I've ever seen this and certainly not in the environmental relationship so I think it's really an exciting time to be watching the climate policy relationship. And I want to thank, thank you so much for inviting me at this time to take part in the discussions because I think there's a lot of scope to think about new initiatives going forward. Hi, everyone. Good afternoon. Thank you for the invitation, Professor Barry Rave, Professor Joshua Bachette, and Allison Bidi, thank you for for this moderation, Andrés, nice to see you. And I couldn't agree more with Andrés about how has the relationship been throughout the North American region regarding climate change. Especially it has been, you know, turned like upside down, because we had Obama with Calderón and Enrique Peña Nieto, having this as quoting Deborah enamored about climate change, maybe, maybe just in paper, because there were several federally led instruments, like diplomatic instruments, memorandum of understandings, frameworks, task forces, etc. Which, which led to the same goals, maybe you know, the very slowly, in terms of implementation. However, the goals were, were aligned, especially with our national law in 2012. And our energy reform in 2013, which, which included the law for energy transition, right, and several instruments. So, I guess with the Obama, Calderón and Peña Nieto relationship, things were going straightforward in terms of even harmonizing some standards for, well, attempts to harmonize in terms of methane emissions, or be or vehicles standards. And it was, for me, it was very, very surprising to see that 2016 leaders, North American leaders summit, you know, where the three the three executives, Peña Nieto, Amantru, put all all efforts into having a North American greenhouse gas emissions reduction goal to 50% to 2025. It was impressive. Of course, it was not achievable. It was just ambition, but it was, it was a good message. However, all this, all these good efforts led, were led by the Subnational, the Subnational efforts to, they were accompanied by those and even sometimes they were pushed forward by the local efforts, especially having, you know, this cross border relationships between the North, the US, Southern states with the Northern Mexican states. Just an example, the electricity integration between California and Baja California is so tight that Baja California, the Northern state in Mexico is not even connected to the Mexican grid. It's connected to the California grid. And it's regulated by the Western, the WECC, right, the Western Council of Electricity. So, and, and the, the interaction between cross border transmissions line cross border exports imports in terms of renewables is very, very important. And another example would be how the California Quebec carbon market is, is going into a very important phase by, by including other, other Subnational governments, and even signing a memorandum of understanding with that new Mexican carbon market, the Mexico CO2, in terms of having a cooperation between a Subnational, a Subnational initiative, trans-regional initiative, with a, with a federal government in Mexico. You know, maybe collaboration was, was, was going forward in those administrations. And it was expected that in Mexico, as Andres mentioned, we were taking the road to towards developing renewable energy with the energy reform and with all instruments to implement the climate change law of 2012. And, however, well, maybe we can talk about in the other segment about what happened, what, what changed in North America, especially in the, in the Mexico-U.S. relationship between, especially between with a change of both executives, and with the also an change of both new executives calling, calling it Trump and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, and aligning another, once again their interests, but in the other, in the other sense. Make an excellent point that when you characterize the U.S. Canada or U.S. Mexico relationship, there's so many levels, it's not just a federal, there's transnational, there's Subnational, there's nonprofits, all of these different groups together creating the relationship. So along those lines, what would you say right now are the most salient political, economic and policy dynamics in Canada and Mexico right now relating to climate change, and maybe we can go in reverse order this time. Thank you Allison. Well, you know, I don't want to take more, a lot of time in scrutinizing the Mexican, the Mexican climate and energy policy because Andres has already talked about it, but I would like to, to raise a point on this multi-level approach that Allison and Andres also brought to the discussion, which is, of course, we have the federal government, the national, the subnational governments, but also the role of business in this, in this pushing forward certain agendas for climate change and or for renewable energy. You know, in Mexico with the energy reform, we had a lot of investments from renewable business from Canada and Mexico and from other parts of the world, that we're going, that we're starting to, to provide renewable energy, call it solar, call it wind in the, in recent years. That's one part, but the other part which is rarely touched or talked about is that consumers here in Mexico, because of NAFTA, of course, and, and now USMCA, we have a lot of Canadian and US business here in Mexico, which are making the transition into renewables, into consuming renewables. Let's say General Motors or even Walmart here in Mexico. Now, there's, there's this push forward for the renewable sector in Mexico and for getting to, to, to comply with that with certain goals in climate change, that they're not, they're not only pushed forward by certain types of NGOs or by certain governments or groups in society, but also by business. It is now esteemed that it is the, it costs the same to rebuild coal factory than to establish a wind park. So the choice is political, right. It's not, maybe 10 years ago it was cost benefit, but now it is political. So we, and who is pushing forward this type of, of, of agenda to align with global, with global leaders in the market, while their business is totally a business and sorry, that's my dog. And whether that was at one point that I wanted to raise and the other one is that deep integration in terms of energy that we have in, in between Mexico and the United States, in terms of natural gas, and in terms of electricity exchanges in the border. So we cannot talk about climate goals or climate cooperation, at least in Mexico US and I'm sure in the Canada US case also, without going into acknowledging how, how climate goals and climate policies are supported by energy policies. Excellent point. Um, you know, it's funny when I was thinking about this question, which originally, when we talked about using this question on this will be easy to answer, right, what's really going on in Canada right now and, you know, in terms of thinking about if I were a policymaker, what am I worried about right. But it was harder than I thought. So let me sketch out a few things, a few sort of observations on on what I think is interesting about the Canadian context right now. So of course Canada faces many of the same challenges that the US does with the covert induced economic decline and the same with Mexico. I would say that we have used slightly different tools to address it than the US has and the political debate has taken on a different complexion. The economic economic situation in Canada is what you would expect right given the rolling restrictions and lockdowns. I'll highlight just a few things, high levels of unemployment. A little comparison here in 2019. The unemployment rate was 5.67% in 2020. The national average was 9.25%. And of course, it fluctuated through the year and and across regions and some regions were very hard hit, especially in the west. So big focus right now, everything that a politician talks about always lands on the word jobs. That's kind of the number one imperative. The impact on business and industrial activity has been immense. Obviously, a big impact on small and medium enterprises which for Canada actually make up 98% of employer businesses, which is quite staggering. You know, a lot of them lost revenue in the order of 40 to 50%. Many of them unable to take on more debt bankruptcies. And then of course you've got the big players like the fossil fuel industry which which is so critical to the economy of western provinces and in the Atlantic provinces as well, very hard hit as demand tanked and this is number two on my on my hit list right this is one of the top burning questions surely on the cabinet agenda I'm sure what do we do about the fossil fuel industry and the provinces who are likely never going to recover from this and are sliding down a knife edge of structural transformation and the way that the global economy powers itself so a really big issue here. We responded really right from the beginning with a large suite of both individual social and income supports, but also sectoral support funds given out to different industries, and and to social and community groups, lots of programs to hiring subsidies to encourage employers not to lay off their workers, additional support programs for caregivers sick leave mortgage referrals loans for a whole variety of different kinds of businesses and then layered on top of that were provincial support programs. Now I would say that these support programs for the most part were supported by the Canadian public and by the, you know, political class, there wasn't a huge debate about whether government should be stepping in in a serious way. And I would think, though, that this may really become the subject of debate over the coming year. Okay, so if you if you think about taking the pulse of the Canadian public I would say that covered really highlighted the important role that the government has to play in steering society in the economy, particularly through really tough times. Now, there is a deeper reserve of support in Canada for active government intervention, I would say, but I think this crisis really showed that the Canadian public, what government can do in a really short amount of time. I would also say at the same time that I think there's a good reserve of support in Canada for action on the climate crisis. But here's the rub. What we want to know is whether there's, you know, stable support for buying the Trudeau government's argument that the way out of the economic crisis that that everybody. has experienced and government support was supported, etc, etc. You know, does that transfer to government large scale support for a green transition which is being proposed now. And I would say that an increasingly restful population, restless population is going to want to see some action pretty fast. Again, there's a reserve of support for government actions on climate, but it won't last if, if the public can't see really tangible impacts. And then of course in Canada, we're having a very big debate about equity and diversity across all policy areas. And it is expected that the Canadian government's approach in terms of the green transition will, you know, really have that lens applied of equity and diversity. So there's going to be that there's obviously some really huge files on the Canadian government's agenda. And I think the trick's going to be to really kind of bring them together in a way that creates those tangible benefits really quickly. Can you elaborate on that a little bit, especially with respect to how the agenda, like what are the most promising avenues for climate policy cooperation with the United States with the incoming Biden administration with the Mexican government. Did you want me to go or. Yes, please. Sorry. So I'm just going to share my screen here. This was also really interesting to think about because I have been focused on the Canada US environmental relationship now for, you know, two and a half decades. And it has been very interesting, because the approach that I took to thinking about what are the most promising avenues right now is that I've been looking for alignment between I would say four factors right I want to see if there's four factors in different arenas that that I think would undergird really good cooperation. Those four factors are political commitment at the highest level established working relations in the area, a supportive regulatory framework would be nice or plans to put one in place pretty quickly, and relatively low or no technical barriers and I kind of see those four factors as as a litmus test for cooperation. And then that my my second kind of aspect of my approach is to look at clusters of action because we know that in terms of climate policy there are so many linkages across policy areas, and so many interactions between programming, and we have to really pay attention to those interactions because you know they they have effects and sometimes unintended consequences. So I kind of approach this in terms of thinking about green bilateralism cooperative clusters. Alright, so the first cluster is really I think straightforward and I think we would get that pretty quickly. I call it the electric trifecta right electric cars electric batteries electric infrastructure and that's something that clearly very highest levels, both the Biden and Trudeau administrations committed to all three of those. There are very strong established working relations in vehicles more generally on vehicle admissions standards setting, of course on North American automobile manufacturing. You know, keeping in mind NAFTA's new domestic content requirements right all of these things I think fit into or really undergird nicely, a ramp up of Canada US cooperation on the electric trifecta right because there's even a supportive regulatory framework in place. In Canada it's in place in in the US. It took a little hit under the Trump administration but I think that can be ramped up pretty quickly and you know the technical stuffs. You know we're still working on some of this, including some really good battery technology but you know we've got the fundamentals in place so I think this is one thing that we can ramp up really quick. The other thing I think that I would say is is a really quick startup is working on what I call the wicked three pollutants right and and that's methane, black carbon and hydrofluorocarbons and all three governments admit have made commitments. They actually started working on these. Before the Trump administration came in and that was the three countries we're going to talk about methane and black carbon. Canada has a methane regulatory framework that has been in place but its implementation has been delayed largely because the Trump administration kind of sidelined that. So again I think that's something where there's political commitment established working relations programming that was in place that got sidelined and a supportive framework in place. Again some of the technical stuff replacements for HFC that's that's harder, but you know we can work on that boosting of green tech that's another thing you know sort of a cluster of activities that we can talk about. You know we have, as I said before, a really good basis on cap carbon capture and storage. You know the US Department of Energy was working with Canada on a long term demonstration project, but both administrations want to really ramp that up and make it more easily applicable and low cost right. That's it that's a no brainer I think. And I think that what would be interesting here. One of the biggest problems that both countries have identified as a barrier to green tech is is is guaranteeing markets right uptake. I think there might be something that the Canadians and Americans can do together, and Mexicans as well to say, you know, hit some large industry partners, and get them to make some commitments to use these technologies, so that you can guarantee markets right a place for the supportive technology that you've been working on. I think we also need to talk about green procurement. And one of the interesting things there is this is going to be a sensitive issue right with by American orientations. And I'm sure Canada is ringing its hands about, you know, some of those discussions, but maybe a good way to address that actually is to talk about a good news story on green procurement. Right. So, you know, I'm sort of thinking about that. Another, another cluster of activities that I'm still trying to work my brain around is in low carbon agriculture. And that is is really an interesting group of possible projects like, you know, carbon sinks sequestrations in the farming community, even doing some carbon trading, you know, there's some discussions about that. There's some cross border possibilities there. Biofuels, right, both countries have been working on biofuels and trying to address this issue of, you know, how do we create biofuels especially for the aviation industry, so that you've got big uptake and some clean tech for the agricultural sector. And then finally I would say another cluster is in regional climate resilience. And that's where we can talk about cooperating in the Arctic on what I call the CES nexus so climate economy and security. And there's there's a whole bunch of commitments that both governments have very recently made and I think a real meeting of the minds there, shared infrastructure on the border on the coasts there's a lot I think we could do there. And, you know, I was, I was kind of thinking that the commitment of both countries to adjust transition kind of fits in with this longer term climate resilience how do we support those fossil fuel communities that are really feeling the hit from, you know, large structural adjustment in the energy sector. So, you know, some, some clusters there, and then a few just thoughts on, you know, Canada in the US do a lot of work in international forums in terms of aligning their asks and in negotiating forums and you know we can do more of that especially now when the two governments seem to agree on how to move forward. And finally, I would say, I think it's important that Canada in the US identify some strategic partners in the green tech race because make no mistake we're in a race. Right. And Germany, I would put at the top of that list for both countries, indeed for all three countries. I'm not a China expert, but I think Canada is going to have to re engage with China in some way, and maybe green tech is the way to do it. And then Mexico I'm going to, I'm going to sort of throw this a little bit over to Marcella because I've been shaking my head watching some of the decisions of the federal administration and thinking it's exactly the opposite of what the other two administrations have been focusing on. And I'm, and I'm trying to think about how we can engage because we have to engage. And one of my thoughts there was maybe even legislative engagement. You know, that is, is, you know, focused on sort of building networks for programming. I love that I definitely agree we would like to hear your thoughts and I'm wondering also if Marcella you can also wrap up for us by talking about possible avenues for Canada and Mexico cooperation as well. Yes, thank you. Well, I would like to write to raise three points. First, and with the administration of Trump and, and, and there's Manuel Lopez or our, our president in Mexico. There were, I guess, and then this mentioned is quite quite well that there was this premise of a going for energy sovereignty and not energy security. Right. And that is a problem when Biden comes to power, right, for Mexico with this with this administration in Mexico, because I don't know if you remember the one of the debates between Trump and Biden. And Trump pushed Biden to, to, to, to respond to a question on who will you be able or will you be willing to confront the oil companies in Texas, right, or the oil or the coal manufacturers, etc. And the answer at the end of the day of Biden was yes. So it was, I guess, politically, it was very tough to say it. And I guess that that will bring some implementation problems in the US with all these executive orders and because well, let's, let's be clear that we the energy relation with Mexico or the climate relation between Mexico and the US is not a priority. Now in the in the US in the US Mexico agenda, we have migration security and other and other issues going on. However, I guess in the in passing one year two years of Biden, we will be, we will be seeing some very tough and tough guidelines for Mexico to align back to pushing forward renewables and to to raise ambition. Especially because Biden has said that they will, he will organize another leader summit of the Americas. In joint collaboration with some climate change decision makers and with the conference of parties, etc. So, and the goal is to raise ambition as a region so Mexico will need to align or to do something to to push forward the the our nationally determined contribution because, as Andres mentioned, we have not increased any ambition we were we stayed the same as in as in Paris in 2015. So, one point is, Mexico needs to think on how to get out to escape this premise of energy sovereignty and to go back to a different concept of energy security including renewables in the energy matrix. Second, second thought is, and I guess with Biden, we are going to see a little bit more more room for for action at the subnational level, because well, no, no, I'm not sure if it's because of the United States but for in the case of Mexico we need that we need some room for action to cooperate with some states in the United States, and some provinces in Canada to to create this bilateral subnational agreements to push forward the agenda of climate change and renewables, just in the case that the federal government cannot move the the the policy that it's that it's performing now. So, you know, one, one very elegant solution for the Mexico federal government would be to, to let the states do their thing right and cooperate with other states provinces or even with both executive governments with both federal governments in Canada and in the United States. And I say this because I say this elegant this thing about the elegant solution because, as you all know, one of the main projects of the Mexican president and this administration is to rebuild and reconstruct the refinery sector in Mexico, the oil refining sector in Mexico, and to strengthen and let's say protect, get some protections to the both companies, state companies of power and oil, Pemex and Sefe. So, if that if those are the projects and that is very, you know, very measurable in terms of the national budget, you know, a lot of the budget where for those projects for Sefe, for for for Pemex for the refinery so, you know, he would need to fulfill the commitments that he made in the campaign and in the first year of government. So, the only solution would be to to leave others do the renewable push to towards the North American alignment. And the third and the third point I want to raise is the USMCA. The USMCA is very important for Mexico, for different reasons and for different approaches. However, it is the protection renewable energy has in Mexico, because as you know last year, the federal government launched and drafted some some laws and against renewal, renewal provision of energy in the hands of private companies. And there were some, well, there were a lot of protests, there were, there was even a letter for from congressmen and from energy companies in the US addressed to the President Trump for him to address the president Sam Loh in Mexico to stop that here in Mexico, right, all the auctions for renewal for and for electricity, which were in general for a renewal projects where are postponed or suspended. I don't like I don't want to say canceled the in my mind I hope they're just postponed. So, there were some attempts to give strength to to both state companies, energy state companies, through this legislation. However, the USMCA has several chapters on a non discriminatory practices on regulation on avoiding protection, protectionism to foreign investment, etc. So, with the USMCA in place, well, it is expected that if Mexico doesn't, doesn't take out or quit those legislations, we will be having panels will be having problems with that. So I guess we have several protections to try to align to Biden's agenda. And the federal government may be able to to pull it up to pull it up because we have some mechanisms so some cross border issues, some already developed frameworks in the relationship, which will give a solution to to to the the Mexican federal priorities. Thank you, both of your answers outlined some significant obstacles but also some significant opportunities for collaboration both with the United States and between Canada and Mexico. Thank you very much for both of you for being here this has been an honor and I'm going to turn it back to Josh. Thank you so much Allison and thank you Deborah and Marcella what a fascinating set of conversations and responses. I'm going to turn it over to Professor Barry Raib who is going to kick off our Q&A session but I before I do so I want to let our audience members know that you can feel free at any time beginning right now. At the bottom of your screen to click on the Q&A tab and to submit a question and writing, and we will do our best to cover those after berries after the responses to berries question. So at this point I'm going to introduce Professor Barry Raib. He's the J Ira and Nikki Harris family professor of public policy and the Arthur Thurnau professor of environmental policy here at the Ford School. Barry will welcome our panelists and kick off our Q&A. Barry. Thank you so much Josh and thanks to you and Allison for your role in leading today's conversations. And a particular shout out and thanks to our Canadian and Mexican colleagues it is just wonderful to have you with us and so thank you for your role and the insights that you're sharing. On behalf of the entire Ford School and University of Michigan, Michigan community. I'd like to order out dinner and filibuster and go along into the night but I'm not going to do that but I am struck by the fact that we've been talking about climate change for some time now. And there's been very little reference to the idea of putting a price on carbon emissions either through a tax or a cap and trade system. Even though this is part of the national and continental and global conversation on climate policy for more than a quarter of a century. When you think of the three nations I'm always curious about sort of how differences do promote possibilities for coordination or possible conflict. And they may even link a bit Marcel to your question about trade issues. We're beginning to see particularly outside the North American area. The United States instead of established large carbon prices beginning to talk about linkages to trade and border adjustment processes particularly the European Union which is really double down on both forms of carbon pricing up on a continental as well as nations scale, moving in just a couple of years to using kind of trade adjustments on imports. So if you look at the three nations very quickly as I understand it, Mexico has a very modest carbon price less than $5 a ton with some exemptions. The US has no price on carbon nationally and may well go through the entire Biden presidency and not add one. And yet, you know when we go across to Canada, we see an extraordinary commitment of now moving to formally $50 a ton through British Polish policy, but one well into triple digits that would put Canada into the role of a global leader in using this very tool, given all the trade that takes place, and all the mechanisms to think about trade adjustments environmental side dimensions of this. How do we begin to reconcile those differences and does the fact that the tri national approach to carbon pricing is so different in these three countries. Does that further divide us and complicate the challenges of coming together, or are there opportunities to begin to stitch this together short of all out trade wars and border adjustment challenges. Just some questions for you. Marcella why don't you start. Okay. Thank you very. You know, cover pricing is, it was in the agenda of the North American leader summit in 2016. And I was very glad to hear that. Well, it was just, you know, a good wishes right you know like we will be doing this and this and this and in the list was putting a price in carbon in the in the region. However, I guess, you know, in terms of regional pricing we would need to have the institutions to support it. And we only have, you know, we have a diversity in Canada of different types and of taxes and cover markets. We have the North American, the, well the WCI or the, the Reggie, right in the Northeast to carbon market local carbon markets or transnational carbon markets. And in Mexico we have a national carbon market which is starting right now this, this year after trials and exercises and whatever right. So I guess we would need to to first set the institutional conditions to regulate measure, especially measure with with similar methodologies for example, and how to deal with offsets in the region. And how to deal with with leakage and all those, you know, carbon market problems that if you don't, if you don't address them in the design, the, you know, it, it, it won't work, you know, it would be a useless effort. That's my first point. And the second point is that, I guess that, although, although the USMCA has, you know, certain protections and certain regulatory protections for, for renewable energy and has, you know, the, the chapter of environmental I guess the USMCA also plays against pricing carbon regionally, because of integration of sectors and different tariffs, etc. So I'm not sure if, if a regional goal or a regional price could be set. But how, but, but, you know, you talked about opportunities, I guess the opportunities are to use those institutions that are already working as, you know, as Mexico, as I, as I said before, the Mexican platform for the Mexico CO2 platform that mark the industrial market has learned a lot from the California Quebec market, and we have an agreement with them. So maybe start, you know, with what we have. And in Canada, of course, you know, that would be kind of a problem because not even in the Canadian context you can, you know, agree on a price. That's different mechanisms. So maybe to, to find a flexible institution, a flexible market which you can, you know, be responsible as in a global area, but with very, very differentiated capabilities would be one of one of the, the starters to to set a carbon, a carbon price. Yeah, and I, you know, I would say three things. One is that, you know, Marcel is absolutely right. So provinces across Canada have very different approaches BC has a straightforward carbon tax, Quebec has a cap and trade system. There, there is a focus on the electricity sector in Atlantic provinces. And the western provinces, you know, the national tax applies in those jurisdictions that don't have their own, their own system in place so it really is a patchwork that's supposed to achieve a, you know, a minimum federal kind of price and I think that's debatable. I agree. I think regional subnational cooperation you build on what is there, sectoral cooperation for the electricity sector, where those grids are integrated anyway, and that stuff is working that is an option. But honestly, I think Canada, the US and Mexico should be in multilateral forums talking about how this is going to work, and what the trade thing is and I think that would be a good way to help the region iron out its own differences. Right, it would pose a bunch of questions about integrated trade and where trade's not really integrated, and how we start thinking about, you know, the green surcharge on things. Great. Andres, do you have anything to add to that or should we move ahead to the many other questions we have. Maybe move ahead and I contribute at some point. Great. So, we got a question that actually is strikingly similar to one of the questions that we were going to ask if we had time and that is about prospects for bilateral coordination between Canada and Mexico, leaving out the US. It's kind of serendipitous how this worked out so what are your thoughts on that. I'm going to have a hard time with this because when I so when I look at all of the things that I talked about those clusters of cooperation. Five or six years ago I would have had a whole list of things that I thought that could could be a starting point for trilateral or or Canada US or Canada, Mexico interactions. Let's be frank about this so there there even was a Canada, Mexico environmental cooperation agreement. And at one point I had a Canadian official contacting me saying, we don't know what to do. You know, we don't know what would be good avenues for cooperation. It's hard because their economies are so different. And the geopolitical interests are are not aligned. But the recent decisions as Marcel clearly laid out, make it difficult to address the kinds of things we were talking about with, you know, green energy, clean tech, you know, electrification. You know, those kinds of things may be hard to have those discussions, but maybe not at the subnational level. Right and at one point we had Ontario and Quebec politicians going down to Mexico to talk about renewables right. Maybe that's the answer maybe we we don't try so hard at the national level but we forge a network of connections that is in fact, subnational and sectoral, you know, in orientation. Marcella. Just a quick note. I, I agree with with Deborah. However, the, well I read the and some officials here in some Canadian officials in Mexico also talked about it. There's a funding. There's a fund given by the Canadian federal government to the Mexican federal government to implement the NDC, the Mexican NDC in terms of even from infrastructure to research, right. And a lot of the money has gone to to research, not to infrastructure really to research through universities etc. There's a lot of cooperation with between provinces or the federal government with the university universities in Mexico. So, I guess one of the avenues to cooperate is through universities is more like a transnational approach. And the second thing is through cooperation projects not not from a from from maybe from the federal government, per se, but for what but with this figure that we have in Mexico called inter institutional agreements, inter institutional agreements are agreements that that any any agency of the Mexican government at any level can or any government state or local can sign an agreement an agreement with a foreign partner without the Senate ratification. So through those international agreements, you know, which are enforced like it like by international law. And Mexican agencies can can easily cooperate through these very technical projects of a of climate change or a pushing forward with their renewable agenda. The second thing is that a provincial activity in Mexico were provincial Canadian provinces in Mexico are very active and not all of them, of course, but the case of Quebec is impressive how they are funding and pushing forward their renewables and the economic experiences here in Mexico in the federal government and also in the States, because in Mexico by law as Andre said, the states and the municipalities need to have an acclimat action plan, which was, you know, left behind some years and really work like much. But, you know, the provincial governments are in Canada, especially Quebec, and some and in some way my need to find the hydro electricity sector has been pushing forward the reactivation of these local climate action plans. There are, you know, different avenues of cooperation. And again, maybe not through the official channels, you know, federal with federal, but with other actors with business, Canadian business in Mexico, we have Bombardier here in in El Etaro, and we have a lot of very important business which are transiting to to to a more to a cleaner energy. So maybe with those other actors, it's easier to cooperate. Great. So the next question is actually a Mexican focused question and I'd like to address it to both Marcella and Andres to get both of your input on it. And that's a question about the role of NGOs in Mexican politics and policymaking at either the national or national level. And these could be domestic or foreign NGOs, but Marcella from your point of view as an academic. How to what extent have they been, you know, major players and Andres as your as a NGO representative. How influential do you feel you are and what are some ways that you might increase your influence. Well, I would, you know, leave the question to Andres I would just say one thing from the, because he's part of it. Yeah, so I would, I would only say that from the academia we are having. We tend to have a very important connection with NGOs all the time. However, from academic studies and colleagues, you know, chats and talks is that here in Mexico NGOs we perceive them as not that strong, or, you know, we have a weak civil society still here in Mexico. And we have one or two or three NGOs that are, that are, you know, like pulling the other ones, you know, to towards pushing forward a climate, a climate agenda. And these, let's say, these three or four NGOs included polar and others are very related to academia, you know, because there's, if we go alone, the academy with the academia and the NGOs, we will not do anything. We tend to, to merge in, in chats in projects in Congresses because we, we have, you know, either the academic weight or the NGO weight here in Mexican politics is not that developed still. So we tend to go together and hopefully we have, we have achieved some things in the past so maybe we can do it in the future. And thank you for the question. Yeah, if compared with the US and Canada, maybe we still need some work to do, but I think we have, as a sector accomplish important things. One was the law, I think that was a result of NGO activism and coordination. That was involved there. And right now is a difficult time for NGOs in Mexico because funding is not, you know, moving around, especially local funding, government funding has been very demanding on us complying with a lot of things. And this is because it has consequence because there was some and not correct use of funding before for NGOs, you know. So in light of this, there has been so much government overview of our, you know, complying with the law and fiscal situation, which is correct, but then that has deterred some of us some NGOs to move forward. But still, I think this is a moment and you know NGOs tend to to be more important, I think personally, when when government is not doing stuff. So in climate change, I think our work is very relevant. You know, there's all sorts of NGOs, international NGOs with representation here in Mexico, like Greenpeace, WWF, EDF, and so on. We have the, you know, very legalist NGOs here in Mexico that are marching to suing government because of non-compliant with the law that has very much in light of, you know, the previous NAFTA, now the, how you call it, the USMCA, Chapter 24, and the citizen, you know, these articles 14 and 15 before in the NAFTA were citizen petitions, I think was the name. But it's difficult, you know, for example, with the Tren Maya, this huge infrastructure project, which is dividing public opinion, some are totally favourable, some totally against, basically those against arguing the environmental impacts, but the head of government is, you know, publicly mentioning which NGOs are not the ones cooperating, which is not, I think that is not healthy, because they are doing their work and they are, you know, put them in situation even with some dangerous things, because then they can be, it's part of the business, you know, but anyway, I think this is a moment where maybe just as an academic endeavor should know much more than I, with this USMCA framework. We didn't have the same discussions that we had with NAFTA, you know, where environment was so much an issue for having or not the trade agreement. But I see some similarities, and it's not that we want you to tell us what to do, but we need your support, either by the university side, you know, the academia or the city society. So because we are a region and what we do or don't affect us all. So I think this type of events, the type of initiatives that you are promoting are very welcome and users keep these things happening. And just in the other question you mentioned on bilateral between Canada and Mexico, we have been able to work with the Canadian Embassy here in Mexico to precisely let more know to the general public about the new trade agreement and the new conditions and the new Chapter 24 and how the CEC will work and who's the CEC is the same or not, you know, the Environmental Commission of North America. So I think there are things moving, but we need just to be more energetic about it. Thank you so much, Andre. So the final question for today is directed towards Deborah and it has to do with the role of the Keystone pipeline and all of the drama there. I knew somebody was going to ask about it. Yeah, and it's actually a nice segue because our next NAC session is on the topic of pipelines, but what are your thoughts about how the US-Canada relationship is being affected by all that? I'm going to be a heretic and say, not much. Okay, so you think it's not as consequential in terms of? No, it's not that it is not consequential. It is absolutely consequential to large regions of this country. There is no question about that. And it is part, for me, it feels like the last blow to an already ailing region, right? At the same time, if again, what I said about the Canada-US relationship holds, right? Low-key, pragmatic, let's get the job done, let's focus on the things that we can do. And honestly, the Buy America provision, I think for Canadian policymakers, that is a sort of a more broad-based long-term kind of, you know, how are we going to deal with that? But, you know, I don't want to minimize Keystone, but I also think that it's just clear it's going nowhere politically in the US. That's done. So, you know, understandably, I think federal politicians and even our ambassador kind of said, okay, well, we got to move on because, you know, nothing we do will change this. But Keystone is the message, you know, we have to address that segment of the populations in the three countries that are transitioning and need serious, serious support. Well, thank you so much. And on that note, what a fascinating conversation this has been. I've learned so much and it's really nice given the US-centric nature of some of our earlier presentations to be able to talk so much about these three countries together. And very much that will be the theme as we continue on with the colloquium. Our next session, which we hope you will join us for, is on February 25th at 4pm. We'll be talking about pipelines. I want to say a special thank you to Professors Van Ninington, Lopez Viejo, and Andres for joining us, as well as my partner in all of this, Professor Barry Rabe and Allison Beatty for moderating. And we'll sign off for now and wish everyone a great evening.