Alberta
Alberta’s environmental leaders recognized
The Alberta Emerald Foundation (AEF) announced the shortlist for the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards this week. Since 1992, the Emerald Awards have showcased over 350 recipients and 850 finalists who are raising the bar in addressing environmental and climate change issues. These environmental awards celebrate excellence across all sectors, making them unique not only in Alberta but also in Canada.
This year’s shortlist was chosen by a third-party panel of volunteer judges, each bringing expertise from numerous sectors across Alberta. Judges selected the shortlist, consisting of 39 organizations, projects, and individuals from across the province, from 51 nominations. During their deliberations, the judges also determined who from the shortlist will take home an Emerald Award in each of the 15 award categories.
“Those represented in this year’s shortlist demonstrate the incredible dedication that Albertans have toward protecting our environment and taking action against climate change” says The AEF’s Executive Director, Marisa Orfei, “The diversity in the shortlist is also astounding, there’s small grassroots organizations, large corporations, and everything in between. We’re also incredibly proud to have 17 communities across Alberta represented in this year’s shortlist, including Drayton Valley, Grande Cache, Canmore, and many more.”
Here are the organizations, projects, and individuals recognized in The 32nd Annual Emerald Award shortlist:
Air Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that improve air quality.
- Blindman Brewing First-in-Canada CO2 Capture and Utilization (Lacombe, AB)
Business Category – Showcasing an organization engaged in commercial, industrial or professional activities that have demonstrated a meaningful commitment to an environmentally sustainable future.
- Reimagine Architects – 26 Years Building Sustainable Futures (Edmonton, AB)
- Eco-Flex Recycled Rubber Solutions (Legal, AB)
- Envirotech Geothermal – Alberta’s smartest way to Net Zero! (Sherwood Park, AB)
Community Group or Nonprofit Category – Recognizing associations dedicated to furthering a particular social cause or advocating for a shared point of view that has demonstrated a significant commitment to the environment through their actions.
- Alberta Bike Swap – supporting the circular economy before it was cool (Calgary, AB)
- Project Forest: Rewilding Canada, One Forest at a time (Edmonton, AB)
- Alberta businesses are building a better Business-as-usual with Green Economy Canada (Edmonton, AB & Calgary, AB)
Education Category – Acknowledging those that have raised the bar by showing leadership and creativity in educating students of all ages about environmental matters.
- Eagle Point-Blue Rapids Parks Council Environmental & Outdoor Education Program (Drayton Valley, AB)
- Future Energy Systems: Exploring Our Energy Future With The Community, Our Students, And More (Edmonton, AB)
- Evergreen Theatre: A 32-Year Legacy of Inspiring Environmental Awareness & Action Through the Arts (Calgary, AB)
Energy Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that positively support the evolution of our province’s energy systems.
- Calgary’s Residential Solar Calculator (Calgary, AB)
- Bow Valley Green Energy Cooperative, empowering community to transform Alberta’s energy (Canmore, AB)
- Metis Nation of Alberta Climate Change Action Plan (Edmonton, AB)
Government Category – Recognizing all levels of government whose ongoing commitment sets the example of environmental leadership and advocates sustainability as a major consideration in governance.
- Environmental Achievements of the City of St. Albert (St. Albert, AB)
- Violet Grove’s Constructed Floating Wetlands System with Aeration (Drayton Valley, AB)
- Nose Creek Watershed Partnership – Celebrating 25-Years of Watershed Planning, Policy and Action (Mossleigh, AB)
Infrastructure Category – Recognizing environmental advancements in the ways we design, build, and travel.
- Solar Aquatic Systems Wastewater Treatment (Drayton Valley, AB)
- SSRIA: Transforming the AEC Industry Towards a Net Zero Built Environment (Edmonton, AB)
- Ecoplast Solutions: Building Houses from Recycled Plastic Bottles (Lloydminster, AB)
Land Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that demonstrate excellence in sustainable land use.
- The City of Calgary’s Willow Plantation for Marginal Land Improvement and Carbon Capture (Calgary, AB)
- Ledcor Highway Maintenance Yard Upgrades (Edmonton, AB)
Lifetime Achievement Award – Celebrating environmental leaders who, throughout their lifetime, have made contributions of outstanding environmental significance.
- Dirk and Nanja of The Barrelman Inc.: 25 years of protecting land and water through local action that inspires (Calgary, AB)
Public Engagement & Outreach Category – Recognizing programs and initiatives that educate and empower the broader public by teaching the necessary skills to make informed environmental decisions and take responsible action.
- GreenLearning’s Eco 360 program: Transitioning to a circular economy for plastic waste! (Drayton Valley, AB)
- My Green Closet: Sustainable Lifestyle and Slow Fashion Platform (Edmonton, AB)
- Calgary Climate Symposium: How The City of Calgary Engages and Educates Albertans on Climate Change (Calgary, AB)
Shared Footprints Award – Recognizing those who have exemplified land and water stewardship, built shared knowledge, improved air quality, reduced land disturbances, and encouraged ecotourism.
- Edmonton River Valley Conservation Coalition: Working Together to Protect the North Saskatchewan River Valley (Edmonton, AB)
- Highfield Regenerative Farm (Calgary, AB) Waste Management Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that innovate the repurposing, reduction, and disposal of waste in an environmentally-conscious way. Earth Warrior (Edmonton, AB)
- Revolutionizing Recycling with [Re] Waste: Transforming Waste Management for a Sustainable Future (Edmonton, AB)
- Microgreens Club – A Zero Waste Initiative (Calgary, AB)
Water Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that demonstrate excellence through the monitoring, management and/or stewardship of water and watersheds.
- Forest industry collaboration cultivates sustainability around vital wetland ecosystems (Edmonton, AB)
- LakeKeepers: Community-Based Monitoring of Alberta’s Lakes (Edmonton, AB)
- Safe water and water sustainability in Alberta (Calgary, AB)
Wildlife & Biodiversity Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that protect and conserve natural habitats and wild species.
- Aseniwuche Winewak Nation’s Caribou Patrol Program: 11 years of saving Alberta’s caribou (Grande Cache, AB)
- Friends of Fish Creek Provincial Park Society – Sikome Beaver Coexistence Project. (Calgary, AB)
- The Edmonton Urban Coyote Project: Collaborative Research and Education for Coexistence with Wildlife (Edmonton, AB)
Youth Category – Recognizing people, 25 years of age and under, who have made meaningful contributions and have taken positive action to improve the environmental health of their community.
- Monica Figueroa: Edmonton youth climate activist (Edmonton, AB)
- Strathmore High School Community Greenhouse (Strathmore, AB)
- Energy & Environmental Sustainability Projects in Action at New Myrnam School (Myrnam, AB)
The recipients in each category will be named at the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards ceremony on June 7, 2023, at the Citadel Theatre in Edmonton, Alberta. Emerald Award Recipients receive:
- A $2,000 grant to support their work or to donate to an environmental charity of their choice
- A profile of their work through The AEF’s Sharing Stories program, which includes the Emerald Documentary Series, What On EARTH Can We Do? podcast, and Emerald Speakers Series
- A certificate and Emerald Awards recipient digital logo to commemorate their achievement
The Awards will also be live-streamed through the AEF”s YouTube Chanel to allow people from across the province to attend. Tickets for the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards ceremony can be purchased here.
The Alberta Emerald Foundation (AEF) is a registered Canadian charity with the unique mission to tell Alberta’s environmental good news stories to uplift, educate, and inspire our province toward meeting environmental and climate change goals.
Research suggests that when we learn about what real environmental and climate change solutions look like and how they’re being implemented in our communities, it increases our ability and desire to take action in our own lives. By providing real-life examples of these solutions through our various storytelling programs, the AEF helps Albertans take the next step toward environmental protection and climate action. With every person that we reach through our programming, we’re helping Alberta reach its broader environmental and climate change goals.
Click to learn more about the Alberta Emerald Foundation.
Helping builders by putting an end to housing delays
Alberta’s new Stop Housing Delays online portal will allow developers, municipalities and other housing partners to report red tape and unnecessary home-building delays.
Alberta’s government is focused on ensuring Albertans have access to the housing they need, and that means working to streamline processes, cut red tape and reduce delays that are slowing housing construction down. As part of this work, government has launched a new online portal to help in these efforts.
The Stop Housing Delays online portal is now available for developers and municipal authorities to help identify areas that are preventing fast and efficient residential construction. This portal will help government identify and address barriers to building homes across the province.
“The Stop Housing Delays portal will allow Alberta’s government to hear directly from developers, municipalities and other partners on where delays are happening in the construction process. This will help identify and remove barriers, ultimately getting homes built faster and continuing Alberta’s record home-building pace.”
“Alberta’s government will continue to work with municipalities and find solutions to speed up the home-building process. The Stop Housing Delays portal will give us another tool to inform those discussions and identify areas where we can improve the pace of home building.”
Once developers, municipalities or industry partners have submitted their issue using the online form, government will collect and assess the information provided. Alberta’s government will be taking a collaborative, cross-ministry approach to ensure the appropriate departments are working together to find solutions where possible. Solutions may range from minor changes to policy reform.
Alberta’s government continues to support builders and encourage new residential housing construction by reducing red tape, incentivizing housing construction and supporting innovative strategies to build homes faster than ever.
“This webpage is an excellent opportunity to gather knowledge and further eliminate red tape. Government has been persistent in our approach of cutting red tape and removing roadblocks, and this will help to speed up residential construction. I look forward to hearing from developers and our other partners on how we can help get projects moving and Albertans in homes.”
Alberta continues to see strong housing starts and increases while other provinces across Canada are seeing a reduction in housing starts. The first half of 2024 saw 9,903 apartment unit starts in the province. This marks the highest amount in any half year in Alberta’s history, breaking the previous record of 9,750 set in 1977. Albertans will benefit from 33,577 new housing starts from January through September 2024, up 35 per cent from the same period last year. Alberta’s government remains focused on working with industry and non-profit partners to ensure that the province’s growing population has access to the housing it needs.
“This portal is a valuable tool for industry to highlight gaps, barriers and delays that may need to be prioritized and addressed by either local or provincial governments. Real solutions can only emerge through transparency, open communication and collaboration. This is an important step toward identifying the unique challenges each region and municipality faces in delivering attainable housing.”
Quick Facts
- Housing starts for January – September 2024 compared with January – September 2023
- Provincewide: 33,577 compared with 24,904 (up 35 per cent)
- Edmonton: 13,359 compared with 9,099 (up 47 per cent)
- Calgary: 17,414 compared with 14,141 (up 23 per cent)
- Lethbridge: 599 compared with 148 (up 305 per cent)
- Red Deer: 314 compared with 146 (up 115 per cent)
- Data shows Alberta had 10,699 purpose-built rentals, making up 32 per cent of all housing starts.
- Since 2019, Alberta’s government has invested almost $850 million to build more than 5,100 units and close to 900 shelter spaces. This includes projects we have committed to, that are in progress and that are complete.
- Together with its partners, Alberta’s government is supporting $9 billion in investments into affordable housing to support 25,000 additional low-income households by 2031.
Related information
(Left to right: Stéphane Germain, president of GHGSat; John Adams, president and CEO, NGIF Capital and NGIF Accelerator and managing partner of Cleantech Ventures; Rebecca Schulz, Minister of Environment and Protected Areas; Scott Volk, director of emissions and innovation, Tourmaline Oil; Justin Riemer, CEO of Emissions Reduction Alberta)
New funding will advance technologies that turn Alberta’s natural resources, such as bitumen, into materials of the future.
Alberta is Canada’s third-largest producer of manufactured goods and materials and first in clean technology innovation. At the same time, manufacturing companies around the world are looking for ways to make products like concrete, plastics, food, wood, chemicals and machinery more efficient, more durable, easier to recycle and better for the environment.
Alberta’s government is investing $40 million from the industry-funded Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction (TIER) program to advance technologies that will turn everyday items that would otherwise be wasted or dumped in landfills into modern, low-emission products. These technologies will help create jobs, reduce emissions and help Alberta’s manufacturing industry lead the world.
“We have the resources, expertise and entrepreneurs needed to create some of the most advanced materials in the world. This funding competition will help develop new and exciting technologies that reduce emissions, create jobs, reuse waste and keep growing our economy.”
Advanced materials are increasing in global demand. They are new or significantly improved materials that provide a distinct advantage in performance when compared to conventional materials. Advanced materials have already been used to create new construction materials, improved batteries and fuel cells and lighter, stronger aircrafts, bicycles and golf clubs, among other products.
Led by Emissions Reduction Alberta, Alberta’s new funding competition will support scale-up, pilot, and demonstration and first-of-kind commercial technologies that improve the extraction, production, manufacturing, and performance of new and existing materials and products in Alberta. It is open to a wide a range of applicants including researchers, businesses, municipalities and Indigenous communities.
“Enhancing existing products and developing new materials with superior performance while embracing circular economy strategies will help deliver deeper emissions reductions, enhance supply chain resiliency and strengthen industrial competitiveness. This funding, sourced from Alberta’s TIER regulation, is critical and the possibilities are endless.”
The focus of this funding is to help create technologies that turn resources into modern, new products. This includes emerging technologies extracting high value metals like vanadium, titanium and lithium found within natural resources such as bitumen and creating novel, carbon-absorbing materials. These can then be used to improve everything from construction material and consumer electronics to aircrafts and hockey sticks.
“Emerging technology solutions, such as creating advanced carbon products from bitumen, are critical to lowering emissions and creating jobs in the province. Alberta Innovates is pleased to support this call and work closely with Emissions Reduction Alberta to realize a new future for Albertans.”
“By transforming our abundant natural resources into advanced, low-carbon materials, we are not only driving emissions reductions but also creating valuable opportunities for industry growth and export potential. The Government of Alberta’s investment through Emissions Reduction Alberta’s Advanced Materials Challenge demonstrates a commitment to building a resilient economy that harnesses Alberta’s strengths in new and sustainable ways.”
Quick facts
- Applications for the Advanced Materials Challenge close on Wednesday, January 22, 2025, at 5 PM MST.
- Successful applicants are eligible for up to $5 million.
- Applications are open to innovators, technology developers, commercial and industrial building owners, municipalities, Indigenous communities, small and medium-sized businesses, research and development organizations, universities, and not-for-profit organizations.
- Applications are open to emerging technologies. While technology solutions can originate from anywhere globally, they must be piloted, demonstrated or deployed in Alberta.
- The TIER system uses industry dollars to help Alberta facilities find innovative ways to reduce emissions and invest in clean technology to stay competitive and save money.
- Full details on the Advanced Materials Challenge can be found on Emissions Reduction Alberta’s website.
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