The new transfer should be at least $20 billion a year (representing about one percent of Canada’s GDP) and perhaps as high as $40 billion.

It could and should fund much of the climate infrastructure needed in the coming years. But the transfer would speak to a climate confederation conundrum: much of the climate infrastructure needed will logically come under provincial, municipal and Indigenous jurisdiction (energy, transit, housing, etc.), but it is the federal government that has the greatest capacity to pay.

The transfer’s distribution could be based on a formula linked to recent greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in each province (but fixed from that point onward, so that it does not perversely incentivize continued high GHGs).

Doing so would recognize that jurisdictions such as Alberta, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador face a more challenging task and will have to do more of the heavy lifting to transition their local economies.

For example, as Alberta currently produces 38% of Canada’s GHG emissions, it would receive 38% of the transfer money. Moving forward, the amount of the transfer could be adjusted to reward those who realize the largest reductions in emissions, creating a positive incentive to act.

Rather than this transfer money being handed over to provincial governments, the funds would go to newly established just transition agencies — one in each province and territory — jointly governed by the federal government, provincial/territorial and local governments, and, vitally, Indigenous nations from each province, with civil society representatives too from labour, business and academia/NGOs.

This would ensure the transfer money isn't simply absorbed into provincial budgets or used to displace other infrastructure or training funds. It would ensure the money is used for its intended purpose.

There are already models for a joint structure like this in Canada, such as the Port Authorities. It may be that a separate transfer should be made directly to Indigenous communities.

The benefit of structuring the transfer around local just transition agencies (locally governed) is that it provides assurance that the projects undertaken are sensitive to the realities and needs of each locale. Each province/jurisdiction has its own GHG profile and its own local labour market/training needs and realities.

In some jurisdictions, the focus is on fossil fuel workers; in others the issue is more one of transitioning agriculture or the auto industry. This model would allow for such differences.

There is a long list of worthwhile projects such a transfer could fund.

The key is that this transfer would represent real dollars for actual transition and new jobs (not vague assurances and the historic false promises of just transition).

And there could be other conditions tied to the transfer: ending fossil fuel subsidies; minimum apprenticeship placements for women and Indigenous people; minimum royalty rates charged to fossil fuel companies; and no new fossil fuel infrastructure.

It could also, over time, be tied to demonstrated reductions in GHGs. An innovation such as this could be a linchpin within an overall transition plan that is fair and just.

You may already know that along with a Just Transition Transfer, the Climate Emergency Unit had been calling for a government-funded Youth Climate Corps.

The Just Transition Transfer is one way that a Climate Corps could be funded at scale.