Hon. Mary Coyle: Senator Gold, on November 8, I attended a COP 27 panel at the Canada Pavilion on the importance of deep blue carbon. We know that the ocean is the most significant global storage depot of carbon on earth. It holds 50 times more carbon than the atmosphere, soaking up more emissions than all the world’s rainforests combined and that the North Atlantic is the most intense carbon sink on the planet. Of carbon, 90% is deep blue carbon, and the panel identified this as the “deep blue hole” in the Paris Agreement — a problematic gap.

Senator Gold, Canada’s Ocean Frontier Institute, led by Dr. Anya Waite, is spearheading an international initiative to observe, understand and predict the ocean carbon system in order to make more fully informed climate decisions. Other nations are aligning with this vision, and international conversations at COP 27 supported the creation of a North Atlantic carbon observatory.

Senator Gold, as Mark Carney and others have said, we cannot mitigate what we cannot measure. Will Canada take a leadership role in supporting this critically important climate initiative?

Senator Coyle: Senator Gold, this important opportunity for Canada to take a leadership role in establishing the North Atlantic carbon observatory and moving ocean observations into real climate action along with our international counterparts is urgent and will require significant and creative cooperation among government departments, including Environment and Climate Change Canada as well as the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

Senator Gold, could you tell us how the government would go about ensuring interdepartmental cooperation so that we don’t miss out on leading this critical ocean climate observation effort?