A woman has her hair blown by the wind during a snowstorm in Quebec City December 22, 2013. Mathieu Belanger/Reuters It's a Canadian tradition: on the first day of spring that actually feels a bit like spring, we pile out of our homes in T-shirts, desperate to feel the sun on our hibernated skin, even if we can still see our breath.

Here's a modern spin on the tradition: that day now comes in January instead of May.

On a freakishly warm (and increasingly common) winter day this year, I found myself walking the streets of downtown Saskatoon.

Every happy soul I walked past was wearing light attire and a bewildered grin. I had different versions of the following exchange with at least three strangers:

"Crazy weather, huh?"

"Oh, yeah. If this is global warming.....I'll take it!" (wink optional)

Here's our secret: Canadians love climate change. Our climate is miserable, so why wouldn't we want to change it?

It's not something we like to talk about. After all, we Canadians pride ourselves on our image as a uniquely progressive nation, a neutral helper to less fortunate countries. And our environment — our majestic woodlands and our rugged rocky mountains — is a big part of the brand.

This puts us in an awkward position, because we are one of the few places on Earth that stands to gain tremendously from global warming.

More nice days are coming. A study published this year in the journal Climate Change, led by Princeton University researcher Karin van der Wiel, predicts that as global temperatures are pushed to extremes, the planet will, on average, lose 4 days of mild weather per year by 2035.

Not Canada. Instead, we will gain between 5 and 25 mild days per year in most parts of the country.

People take part in a free weekly yoga class on the front lawn of Parliament Hill in Ottawa. Chris Wattie/Reuters That’s the least of it. Pleasant weather is just the retail end of Canada’s climate change perks. An assessment from our federal government lists the many “opportunities” climate change will present to Canadian agriculture:

“...an expansion of the growing season to go along with milder and shorter winters. This could increase productivity and allow the use of new and potentially more profitable crops....These warmer temperatures would also benefit livestock production in the form of lower feed requirements, increased survival rates of the young and lower energy costs. Climate change could improve soil quality.”

However, the biggest boon to Canada as the world approaches permanent catastrophe is our wealth in natural resources: specifically, fossil fuels and freshwater. According to UCLA geographer Laurence C. Smith, climate change could turn Canada into a “global superpower” by 2050.

We have enormous reserves of bitumen buried in Alberta’s tar sands, which we extract and refine into oil through a process that itself produces immense carbon pollution. Beyond that, the melting of the Arctic has already opened up new shipping lanes and will eventually grant us access to vast quantities of natural gas beneath the North Pole.

To top it all off, we are uniquely protected from danger. As global warming creates climate refugees, food riots and civil war, the only border Canada shares is with our closest ally, the most hyper-militarized country in history.

The actions of Canada, as opposed to the image of Canada, prove that we have chosen to fully exploit our position. In 2015, Canada had the third-worst environmental protection record in the world, according to the Centre for Global Development. Canada has the worst climate change record in the developed world, according to Climate Action Network Europe. None of this will likely improve with the introduction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Our prime minister, Justin Trudeau, enjoyed favorable global press when his government pressed other countries to adopt ambitious limits on global temperature increase at the Paris climate conference. But he simultaneously chose not to change Canada’s own pollution targets from the level set by his predecessor, a Conservative who had an explicit agenda to aid the oil industry in any way.

A few months after Paris, Trudeau offered the following reassurance in a speech to the oil and gas industry:

“No country would find 173 billion barrels of oil in the ground and just leave them there.”

This begs the question: can you really be a“nice guy” if you profit from the world’s misery?



Jesse Brown is the author of The Canadaland Guide to Canada (published in America), available now from Touchstone. He is also a journalist, public irritant, and host of the #1 Canadian podcast CANADALAND. He lives in Canada with his family.