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Mastronardi said his natural gas delivery charges, where he said the carbon tax is hidden, will double from about $120,000 a year to $240,000. Large carbon dioxide producers are exempt from the tax in the first year and overall will pay far less per acre over six years, he said.

Growers want to meet with Wynne and if they can’t resolve the issue, Mastronardi said the next step would be getting enough farms together for a legal challenge of the program, which he said discriminates against smaller operations.

“The only way I can get in (the program) is if I open up my steam valves and shoot everything off into the atmosphere and burn the fuel up but come on, that’s ridiculous,” Mastronardi said. “It doesn’t make any sense. That’s why we’re up in arms here.”

Photo by Dan Janisse / Windsor Star

Matt Marchand, president of the Windsor-Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce, said cap and trade will harm the greenhouse industry that has an economic impact in the billions of dollars.

“The ultimate conclusion of cap and trade for now is that we’re going to export jobs into coal-producing jurisdictions like Ohio and others, and import pollution,” Marchand said.

The program makes no sense especially now that Donald Trump is the new U.S. president and has shown little interest in cap and trade programs, Marchand said. It means Ontario greenhouses will have extra costs their competitors won’t have and as greenhouse operations expand to spots such as Ohio, Ontario jobs will be exported to states that are using coal, he said.