OTTAWA - Arnold Schwarzenegger's environmental adviser suggests the Canadian government's climate-change plan should be terminated -- or at least significantly improved.
Terry Tamminen will accompany the California governor during a three-day trip that begins later this month to Toronto, Vancouver and Ottawa, where Schwarzenegger is expected to meet Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
He says the Conservative government is making the same mistake as the Bush administration in the U.S. by failing to take urgent action.
"I don't think the plan itself is commensurate with the threat,'' Tamminen said in an interview.
"That's the same problem we have here in the United States. Our federal government is not responding when they talk about volunteerism and the kinds of timetables that it takes to reduce greenhouse gases.
"Our federal governments are, frankly, asleep at the switch.''
His criticism of the plan follows rebukes from former U.S. vice-president Al Gore, Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki, and from the head of the international body that oversees the Kyoto treaty.
Despite being a Democrat who raised money for Gore, Tamminen helped the Republican Schwarzenegger campaign for governor and later became a member of his cabinet and his chief policy adviser.
He now travels as a lecturer, author and environmental consultant but still advises Schwarzenegger on the environment.
Tamminen said he has hasn't studied the Tory plan in depth but is familiar with it and considers the greenhouse-gas targets far too timid.
"Just like (in the U.S.), it's not the federal government taking a leadership role,'' Tamminen said.
"Both of our countries ... need to take this problem more seriously and we've got to develop more aggressive targets.''
Although the U.S. government never ratified Kyoto, California hopes to make it much closer to its targets than Canada under a law Schwarzenegger approved last year.
A spokesman for Canada's environment minister said the government shares Schwarzenegger's goals. But he said Canada is at a disadvantage with California because of years of Liberal foot-dragging.
"Our situation is somewhat different than California's," said Mike Van Soelen, a spokesman for Environment Minister John Baird.
"The reality is our government is finally getting things done when the previous Liberal government didn't do a thing in 13 years."
Tamminen said state and provincial governments have succeeded where national ones have failed, and applauded examples set by Manitoba and British Columbia.
B.C. plans to join several U.S. states under a carbon-trading system proposed by Schwarzenegger. It is also co-operating with California to install a string of futuristic hydrogen fuelling stations down the West Coast to encourage alternative-energy vehicles.
Officials in Schwarzenegger's office said he has no plans to chide Canada publicly over its record but will not shy away from any topic raised during his trip, which begins May 29.
"I don't think the governor is prepared to preach to anyone,'' said one official.
"But there needs to be a free exchange of ideas.''
The main purpose of Schwarzenegger's trip is promoting California high-tech companies in the green and biotechnology sectors.
One of the companies Tamminen points to is Tesla Motors, which is launching a new-generation electric car that can hit 250 kilometres an hour and delivers about 350 kilometres on a battery charge.
The Tesla Roadster currently sells for US$100,000 but the company plans to introduce mid-range and entry-level sedans.
Environmentalists in Canada have blasted governments here for inaction: the Liberals who took years to implement a climate-change plan, and the Tories for warning that Kyoto would destroy the economy.
The Tories recently scrapped the much-maligned climate plan they tabled last year and introduced a new one that sets greenhouse gas reduction targets at 11 per cent above 1990 levels by 2020.
Reaching that goal would require a 20 per cent emissions cut from 2006 levels but still leave Canada far behind its Kyoto accord commitments, which require a six per cent cut below 1990 levels.
California's Global Warming Solutions Act promises a 25 per cent cut by 2020, which would reduce emissions to their 1990 levels.
Schwarzenegger romped to easy re-election last fall as he bucked a national anti-Republican trend in what has traditionally been among the most liberal of U.S. states.
Tamminen says his well-earned reputation as an environmentalist has resonated with Californians. He says the boss has answered skeptics -- including some of his own friends in Democratic circles.
"(My friends said), `What the hell are you doing (with Schwarzenegger)? I mean, he's a Republican. He can't possibly be sincere. You're giving cover to George Bush.','' he said.
"A lot of people were skeptical because he was a Republican. And also because the image was of a cigar-chomping, Hummer-driving action guy -- not necessarily a warm and fuzzy, save-the-spotted-owls guy. ...
"And I said, 'Well I think Arnold's the real deal and I think he'll prove it to you.' And I think he has.''
He said Schwarzenegger's commitment to green causes was inspired by his own arrival on the California coast from Austria almost 40 years ago.
"He had this vision of clean beaches and beautiful mountains,'' Tamminen said.
"Instead he found his lungs and eyes burning from smog. He'd walk on ... Muscle Beach, work out, and he'd see trash on the beach.''
Tamminen met Schwarzenegger while he was still a Hollywood action hero who dabbled in green causes with non-government organizations.
