Impact

Quebec recently passed legislation and regulatory plans to accelerate school bus electrification by March 2024. The Greater Montreal Climate Fund and Propulsion Quebec have offered a solution for operators and managers, which are driven by local climate targets and community priorities. The Digital Guide for Operators maps the full value chain of electric school buses, defines the governance structure and more. This guide also specifically targets less-resourced, smaller-fleet owners.

In its development phase and through conversations with HCi3’s advisory group members, key stakeholders and partners, it was recognized that HCi3’s first grant program would need to differentiate itself from other existing local funding programs. HCi3 framed their grant program around challenge statements to address specific gaps in the market with a focus on GHG reductions at scale, community benefits, equity and partnerships.

Green Development Standards are one of the most powerful climate actions municipalities can take. TAF recognizes that assisting the scale out of this policy is a high-impact opportunity. In response, they set a target to cultivate and support champions in cities across the region and assist them in establishing their own local policies. In 2020 and 2021, they attracted and supported five separate grant initiatives and undertook multiple actions to support the policy’s adoption. TAF developed and promoted key recommendations to ensure that the design of standards are as high as possible.

The City of Vancouver’s 2016 Zero Emissions Building Plan plotted a path to make almost all new buildings in Vancouver zero-emissions buildings by 2030. The Zero Emissions Building Exchange (ZEBx) was launched in July 2018 and is Canada’s first Centre of Excellence focused exclusively on decarbonizing the building sector. ZEBx’s valuable offerings such as case studies, playbooks, videos, podcasts and more have had a successful reach. One of their most popular capacity-building initiatives is their monthly Decarb Lunch webinar with often over 200 attendees. This series showcases leading low-carbon projects, policies and emerging technologies.

Ottawa has committed to the ambitious goal that 90 per cent of all new passenger vehicles will be electric vehicles by 2030. The challenge of slow adoption can be eased with this project. The EV Experience breaks down barriers to access and shifts the perception of electric vehicles. Their approach makes it easy for Ottawans to learn about EVs, while offering three main components: a website, educational test drive events, and EV car shares.

During the Climate Innovation Fund’s stakeholder engagement process, it was made clear that to accelerate change, they needed to improve the value case for energy efficiency and demand response technologies, as well as improve data collection and access to private financing. Fifty-three buildings are participating in this first iteration of the program, which will use cutting edge extrapolation and visualization approaches. Through co-funding and partnerships between several organizations, the Climate Innovation Fund is enabling and crowding funding into the local market in Calgary and Edmonton, which are crucial to accelerating emissions reductions.