According to a July 2011 Environment Canada report, entitled Canada's Emission Trends current Government actions are only expected to reduce greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions by about one-quarter of the reductions needed to meet the 2020 Copenhagen target.

Another July 2011 report, from the National Roundtable on the Environment and Economy (NTREE), entitled Response of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy to its Obligations under the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, analyzes obligations to reduce Canada's carbon pollution, under the 2007 Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act. The report finds Canada's emissions reduction policies are about half as effective as projected.

Still the Canadian Government continues to allow new coal-fired electricity, such as the Maxim Power plant in Alberta, while subsidizing the fossil fuel industry, and delaying meaningful action to reduce emissions.

More than 40 civil society organizations across Canada signed a letter calling on Environment Minister Peter Kent to avoid any coal plant being exempt from upcoming regulations, and to avoid licensing new conventional coal plants in Canada.

"Stephen Harper can't allow new coal-fired electricity plants to be built, ...and achieve his promise to reduce Canadian greenhouse-gas emissions 17 per cent by 2020. As a researcher of energy-economy systems, I say this with virtual certainty," said Mark Jaccard of Simon Fraser University.