Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault yesterday dismissed Budget Office arithmetic showing climate change regulations will cost Canadians thousands a year. Guilbeault said the numbers were wrong but provided none of his own.

“Their analysis takes the same unbalanced modeling approach as they did with the analysis on the price on pollution,” Guilbeault told reporters. “The Budget Office is consistently failing to take into account the steep and rising costs of climate change.”

Budget Officer Yves Giroux in a report said new regulations to take effect July 1, the Clean Fuel Standard, will cost Canadians nationwide. “Our analysis focuses on the cost to households in 2030, the year in which the ultimate reductions in carbon intensity are achieved,” said the report A Distributional Analysis Of The Clean Fuel Regulations.