Environmental issues used to be at the forefront of the collective Canadian consciousness: it was a huge issue in the lead up to the last federal election (I mean the real one in October, not the will-they, won’t-they soap opera we’ve been treated to recently.)

The issue of a building a greener Canada has, of course, falling to the side after the global economy attempted a high dive into a drained pool. The public at large loses its taste for green initiatives when things are looking dire economically – after all, conventional wisdom is that you can either help the economy, or help the environment, right? It’s a zero-sum game.

Well, like a lot of conventional wisdom, this idea is pretty big on convention and short on actual wisdom. In reality, not only can we give the Canadian economy a jump-start – we can make sure that the booster cables are attached to a renewable energy source.

How? Through feed-in tariffs. It’s concept pioneered by Germany, and had helped make that country into a green energy superpower. In brief, feed-in tariffs are laws that require energy companies to purchase a certain amount of their electricity for a premium from green sources.

Germany’s feed-in tariffs have had the pleasant side effect of encouraging microgrids: instead of large, centralized power companies, smaller individual and community operations have started up. Villages set up solar panels and turbine farms to power their homes and sell the excess back into the grid. Farms and ranches convert animal waste into bio fuel, and use the by-products as fertilizer.

Now, back here, Canada is like Toyland for the renewable energy sect. We have huge tracts of land ideal for wind generation, rivers for hydro, a large ranching industry that produces a literal crapload of biofuel. On top that, in the very northern reaches of the country, we have places where the sun doesn’t stop shining for months at a time. But with all of those resources, we’re still lagging behind in the green energy game. With only 5% of our landmass, Germany is producing 12.5 times the wind energy we do.

Ontario, so far, has been the only province to really experiment with feed-in tariffs, although others are starting their own. The program was, unfortunately, a spectacular failure. Not because the rewards weren’t high enough to get individuals interested – in fact, Ontario’s tariffs were nearly excessive. Instead, the problem was one of infrastructure – individuals were building turbines and solar collectors, but the province wasn’t willing to build the powerlines that would hook these people up to the grid and allow them to sell their excess juice. (The same infrastructure that large, centralized plants don’t seem to have any problem getting built for them.) Without any ability to get connected, microgrids withered on the vine and the initiative failed.

But now, were in a time where the economy has to be jump-started. To do this, the Conservative government will be introducing a budget with healthy amount of infrastructure spending. Increases funding of hard services is one of the basic ways to jumpstart a flagging economy – these labour-intensive projects put money into the pockets of workers and suppliers – with more money in the pockets of these workers, more is spent in the service industry, and the whole economy gets a boost. To climb back of the likelihood of a looming recession, Canada is going to need a new New Deal – public works projects like highways, treatment centres…and power lines.

Right now, the financial situation in this country puts the economy and renewable energy in a rare symbiotic position – both are in need of greater infrastructure to grow. P.E.I, Quebec, B.C, and Saskatchewan are all wither considering or implementing feed-in tariffs – the Harper government should consider allocating some of those economic stimulus funds to encouraging decentralized power production all over the country.

The costs associated with the tariffs are minimal – looking back to the Germans, they are now to the point where 12% of their power consumption is produced through renewable means, and it has ended up raising the average power bill slightly over $2 a month. But this cost would be more than paid for in the economic boost Canada would see not just from infrastructure spending, but through a growth in a new, green industry. Estimates tag the jobs created by renewable energy in Germany to be around the 215,000 mark – more people than are directly employed by the auto industry in Canada, which was so vital to the country that it warranted a $4 billion bailout (which is likely to grow).

We’d not be asking for much under the tree – just some funding in the January budget for infrastructure and a push to institute feed-in tariffs country-wide. Because anytime we can get a little greener while giving the economy a boost – well, that’s pretty much a Christmas miracle.