From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy

By Joseph Fournier

Canada’s emissions policy rewards biofuels but punishes the people who grow our food

In the global rush to decarbonize, agriculture faces a contradictory narrative: livestock emissions are condemned as climate threats, while the same crops turned into biofuels are praised as green solutions argues senior fellow Dr. Joseph Fournier. This double standard ignores the natural carbon cycle and the fossil-fuel foundations of modern farming, penalizing food producers while rewarding biofuel makers through skewed carbon accounting and misguided policy incentives.

In the rush to decarbonize our world, agriculture finds itself caught in a bizarre contradiction.

Policymakers and environmental advocates decry methane and carbon dioxide emissions from livestock digestion, respiration and manure decay, labelling them urgent climate threats. Yet they celebrate the same corn and canola crops when diverted to ethanol and biodiesel as heroic offsets against fossil fuels.

Biofuels are good, but food is bad.

This double standard isn’t just inconsistent—it backfires. It ignores the full life cycle of the agricultural sector’s methane and carbon dioxide emissions and the historical reality that modern farming’s productivity owes its existence to hydrocarbons. It’s time to confront these hypocrisies head-on, or we risk chasing illusory credits while penalizing the very system that feeds us.

Let’s take Canada as an example.

It’s estimated that our agriculture sector emits 69 megatonnes (Mt) of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) annually, or 10 per cent of national totals. Around 35 Mt comes from livestock digestion and respiration, including methane produced during digestion and carbon dioxide released through breathing. Manure composting adds another 12 Mt through methane and nitrous oxide.

Even crop residue decomposition is counted in emissions estimates.

Animal digestion and respiration, including burping and flatulence, and the composting of their waste are treated as industrial-scale pollutants.

These aren’t fossil emissions—they’re part of the natural carbon cycle, where last year’s stover or straw returns to the atmosphere after feeding soil life. Yet under United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines adopted by Canada, they’re lumped into “agricultural sources,” making farmers look like climate offenders for doing their job.

Ironically, only 21 per cent—about 14 Mt—of the sector’s emissions come from actual fossil fuel use on the farm.

This inconsistency becomes even more apparent in the case of biofuels.

Feed the corn to cows, and its digestive gases count as a planetary liability. Turn it into ethanol, and suddenly it’s an offset.

Canada’s Clean Fuel Regulations (CFR) mandate a 15 per cent CO2e intensity drop by 2030 using biofuels. In this program, biofuel producers earn offset credits per litre, which become a major part of their revenue, alongside fuel sales.

Critics argue the CFR is essentially a second carbon tax, expected to add up to 17 cents per litre at the pump by 2030, with no consumer rebate this time.

But here’s the rub: crop residue emits carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide whether the grain goes to fuel or food.

Diverting crops to biofuels doesn’t erase these emissions: it just shifts the accounting, rewarding biofuel producers with credits while farmers and ranchers take the emissions hit.

These aren’t theoretical concerns: they’re baked into policy.

If ethanol and biodiesel truly offset emissions, why penalize the same crops when used to feed livestock?

And why penalize farmers for crop residue decomposition while ignoring the emissions from rotting leaves, trees and grass in nature?

This contradiction stems from flawed assumptions and bad math.

Fossil fuels are often blamed, while the agricultural sector’s natural carbon loop is treated like a threat. Policy seems more interested in pinning blame than in understanding how food systems actually work.

This disconnect isn’t new—it’s embedded in the history of agriculture.

Since the Industrial Revolution, mechanization and hydrocarbons have driven abundance. The seed drill and reaper slashed labour needs. Tractors replaced horses, boosting output and reducing the workforce.

Yields exploded with synthetic fertilizers produced from methane and other hydrocarbons.

For every farm worker replaced, a barrel of oil stepped in.

A single modern tractor holds the energy equivalent of 50 to 100 barrels of oil, powering ploughing, planting and harvesting that once relied on sweat and oxen.

We’ve traded human labour for hydrocarbons, feeding billions in the process.

Biofuel offsets claim to reduce this dependence. But by subsidizing crop diversion, they deepen it; more corn for ethanol means more diesel for tractors.

It’s a policy trap: vilify farmers to fund green incentives, all while ignoring the fact that oil props up the table we eat from.

Policymakers must scrap the double standards, adopt full-cycle biogenic accounting, and invest in truly regenerative technologies or lift the emissions burden off farmers entirely.

Dr. Joseph Fournier is a senior fellow at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. An accomplished scientist and former energy executive, he holds graduate training in chemical physics and has written more than 100 articles on energy, environment and climate science.