OPINION: On EV policy, Trudeau’s government has a pitch for Biden – by Adam Radwanski (Globe and Mail – September 17, 2020)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

After Joe Biden takes office next month, one of the earliest cross-border priorities for Justin Trudeau’s Liberals will be gauging the next U.S. president’s interest in setting continental quotas for electric-vehicle sales.

For months, there has been speculation about Mr. Trudeau’s government imposing a zero-emissions vehicle mandate, addressing auto manufacturers’ perceived failure to meet demand for EVs.

Its new plan for meeting the country’s climate-change targets, released last Friday, didn’t go that far. But it laid the groundwork, pledging to work on “supply-side policy options” that include “regulations and investments to accelerate and expand” the availability of ZEVs.

In an interview that day, Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson indicated what Ottawa is waiting for. “With the election of Joe Biden, it provides an opportunity to engage that conversation on a North America-wide basis,” he said.

“This is something that we are going to be engaging very early on with president-elect Biden, and [Mr. Biden’s climate envoy] John Kerry and others, to ensure that we sort out whether this can be done together in a manner consistent with the integrated nature of the auto market.”

For the rest of this column: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/commentary/article-on-ev-policy-trudeaus-government-has-a-pitch-for-biden/