Dear Editor:
RE: Tax ‘hurting people’, April 20.
The carbon tax on propane went from $0.0774/litre last year to $0.1006/litre this year, an increase of $0.0232/litre. The rest of the $0.28/litre increase in the price of propane came from the propane company, not the carbon tax. People like to put all the blame for price increases on the carbon tax when it’s simply not true.
The point of the increasing carbon tax is to encourage people to move away from burning fossil fuels and give them time to do so. That’s why we weren’t charged $170/tonne CO2 from the beginning.
For people heating with propane, it makes sense to switch to an air exchange heat pump powered by electricity. Typically heat pumps give 3.5 units of heat energy output for each unit of energy input. That would drop a monthly heating bill from $500 to about $200/month, taking electricity costs into account. The cost of installing a heat pump can be reduced by applying for a Greener Homes grant or by making use of a zero-interest, 10-year loan from the government. Even without help from the government, the monthly savings will soon pay for the heat pump.
Instead of complaining about the carbon tax, it would be better to save money, pay less carbon tax, retain more of the rebate and help save the planet.
Ron Moore,
Hillsburgh