Two new polls released Wednesday indicate that people across Canada, including Albertans, support faster implementation of the country's new industrial carbon pricing system, and that voters in swing ridings in Quebec and British Columbia oppose federal subsidies for a new fossil fuel pipeline.
In a deal finalized earlier this month, Prime Minister Mark Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced that the province's implementation of the industrial carbon price will be delayed from 2030 to 2040 and capped at $130 per tonne-and an actual price floor of $110, according to analysts at the Winnipeg-based International Institute for Sustainable Development. The previous federal government's carbon pricing schedule called for a threshold of $170 per tonne in 2030.
Polling for Sierra Club Canada by Abacus Data found that only 22% of Canadians supported the pricing delay, compared to 47% who opposed it, the club said in a release. In Alberta, 33% supported the delay while 43% favoured a 2030 deadline.
"These polling results show Canadians support holding oil and gas companies to account for their pollution," said Sierra Club Executive Director Gretchen Fitzgerald. But "the oil and gas industry has played the federal government like a fiddle. Weakening industrial carbon pricing should never have been on the table in this negotiation."
Abacus also found that:
42% of Albertans and 39% of all Canadians said any new West Coast pipeline should be paid for by private investors, compared to 34% in Alberta and 28% Canada-wide who favoured federal financing.
69% across Canada, 62% in Alberta, support government regulations to limit oil and gas companies' greenhouse gas emissions.
Abacus conducted its online survey of 1,920 Canadian adults in English and French from May 14 to 20, 2026, so it was in the field when Carney and Smith announced their agreement May 17. The margin of error (MOE) for a comparable probability-based random sample of the same size is 2.23%, 19 times out of 20. It'll be larger for data that is based on sub-groups of the total sample.
Separately, polling by Liaison Strategies for Climate Action Network Canada found that 68% of Liberal voters in 11 swing ridings, six in Quebec and five in British Columbia, would oppose federal funding for a new pipeline or any other fossil fuel expansion projects.
Opinion ran 50% in favour of a new pipeline and 42% against, the polling found. Some 59% said they'd be less likely to support an MP who supported taxpayer money to new fossil infrastructure, 58% wanted federal funding to prioritize clean energy projects, and 73% said affected Indigenous nations should be able to give their consent before a project goes ahead.
"Voters in critical ridings for the Liberal Party want the federal government to prioritize renewable energy, Indigenous consent, and solutions that shift our dependence away from costly oil and gas," CAN-Rac Executive Director Caroline Brouillette said in a release. "They do not want billions of taxpayer dollars wasted on a market failure of a pipeline-and they'll hold their MPs accountable."
Liaison surveyed a combined sample of 6,260 respondents across 11 federal ridings in British Columbia and Quebec in April 2026, using Interactive Voice Recording technology. The results had a margin of error of 1.24%, 19 times out of 20.
Source: The Energy Mix
