Place Royale et le Funiculaire (au fond), Québec, QC, Canada. August 2010. Attribution: SaphirQC - Odette Tremblay
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Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's second-largest country by total area, with the world's longest coastline. Its border with the United States is the world's longest international land border. The country is characterized by a wide range of both meteorologic and geological regions. It is a sparsely inhabited country of 40 million people, the vast majority residing south of the 55th parallel in urban areas. Canada's capital is Ottawa and its three largest metropolitan areas are Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver.

Indigenous peoples have continuously inhabited what is now Canada for thousands of years. Beginning in the 16th century, British and French expeditions explored and later settled along the Atlantic coast. As a consequence of various armed conflicts, France ceded nearly all of its colonies in North America in 1763. In 1867, with the union of three British North American colonies through Confederation, Canada was formed as a federal dominion of four provinces. This began an accretion of provinces and territories and a process of increasing autonomy from the United Kingdom, highlighted by the Statute of Westminster, 1931, and culminating in the Canada Act 1982, which severed the vestiges of legal dependence on the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

Climate action[edit | edit source]

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Canada People's Climate Plan

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Cool It
Authors: Raffi Foundation for Child Honouring, Nov 28, 2018

Rates of acceptance (belief) for ongoing climate change[edit | edit source]

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According to a 2020 survey of the Canadian Nuclear Association, climate change concerns Canadians more than any other issue.

In a 2021 survey, Nanos Research found that 30% of Canadians reported that climate change was their top worry, 2nd place behind inflation (36%) and ahead of the COVID-19 pandemic (29%).

Canadians think the threat posed by climate change is higher than their United States counterparts do, but slightly below the median opinion of other nations included in a Pew Research Center survey in 2018. However the majority of Canadians in every electoral riding of every province in Canada believe that climate is changing.

Rates of acceptance (belief) for ongoing climate change are highest in British Columbia and Quebec, and lowest in the prairie provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. In a survey published by the University of Montreal and colleagues, national belief that the earth was warming was at 83%, while 12% of respondents said the earth was not warming. However, when asked if this warming is due to human activity, only 60% of respondents said "yes".

  • Energy Action Coalition, coalition of 50 youth-led environmental and social justice groups coordinating on state, regional, and national levels in the United States and Canada.

Policy assessments[edit | edit source]

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According to data in 2021, for giving the world a 50% chance of avoiding a temperature rise of 2 degrees or more Canada should increase its climate commitments by 57%.: Table 1  For a 95% chance it should increase the commitments by 160%. For giving a 50% chance of staying below 1.5 degrees Canada should increase its commitments by 215%.

Climate change in Canada[edit | edit source]

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Climate change in Canada has had large impacts on the country's environment and landscapes. These events are likely to become even more frequent and severe in the future due to the continued release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The number of climate change–related events, such as the 2021 British Columbia Floods and an increasing number of forest fires, has become an increasing concern over time. Canada's annual average temperature over land has warmed by 1.7 degrees Celsius since 1948. The rate of warming is even higher in Canada's north, the Prairies, and northern British Columbia. The country's precipitation has increased in recent years and extreme weather events have become more common.

Canada is currently the world's 10th largest greenhouse gas emitter, and has a long history of producing industrial emissions going back to the late 19th century. In 2019 transport and oil and gas extraction together emitted over half of the total. Canada's fossil fuel extraction industry has increased its greenhouse gas emissions by 21.6% since 1990.

Canada is committed to reducing its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 30% below 2005 levels by 2030 under the Paris Agreement. In July 2021, Canada enhanced the Paris Agreement plans with a new goal of reducing emissions by 40–45% below 2005 levels by 2030. Several climate change mitigation policies have been implemented in the country, such as carbon pricing, emissions trading and climate change funding programs. In 2019, the House of Commons voted to declare a national climate emergency in Canada.

Biodiversity[edit | edit source]

  • PlantWatch enables citizen scientists to get involved by recording flowering times for selected plant species and reporting these dates to researchers, who work to identify ecological changes that may be affecting the environment. Data is added to Web map showing bloom dates across Canada. link checked 15:03, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative[edit | edit source]

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Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative or Y2Y is a transboundary Canada–United States not-for-profit organization that aims to connect and protect the 2,000 miles (3,200 kilometres) Yellowstone-to-Yukon region. Its mission proposes to maintain and restore habitat integrity and connectivity along the spine of North America's Rocky Mountains stretching from the Greater Yellowstone ecosystem to Canada's Yukon Territory. It is the only organization dedicated to securing the long-term ecological health of the region.

Since 1993, more than 450 partner groups have joined forces to support the shared mission and vision. Y2Y's work is a collaborative effort of conservation groups, government agencies, Indigenous governments, landowners, wildlife scientists, planners, businesses, economists, and other individuals and groups interested in protecting native wildlife, ecological processes, and wilderness in the Rocky Mountains of North America. Existing national, state, and provincial parks and wilderness areas anchor the system, while the creation of new protected and special management areas provide the additional cores and corridors needed to complete it. This network is built upon the principles of conservation biology, various focal species assessments, the knowledge of local and traditional residents, and the requirements for sustainable economies.

Rewilding[edit | edit source]

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The Rewilding Institute is an organization concerned with the integration of traditional wildlife and wildlands conservation to advance landscape-scale conservation. It was founded by environmental activist Dave Foreman.

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The Rewilding Institute's mission is to work toward the survival and flourishing of large carnivores in North America by promoting the establishment of suitable habitats in the wilderness, which are permanently interconnected as to allow their natural movement. They believe that humans and large carnivores can and should co-exist in North America. They wish to undo the damage done by over-hunting, over-logging, and exploitation of natural resources. Through continent-scale conservation efforts, they hope to prevent further extinctions of large predators, and to restore them to their function of maintaining the ecological balance of animal life in the wild. They have proposed reestablishing wild populations of wolves in interconnected, protected habitats, so that they can resume their ecological role. As part of their program, they have worked to get wildlife crossings included in interstate highway projects.

Environment quality[edit | edit source]

FixMyStreet Canada

Community involvement[edit | edit source]

  • Every One Every Day Kjipuktuk/Halifax, added 15:16, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Participatory Canada, added 15:18, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
  • Strong Towns "supports thousands of people across the United States and Canada who are advocating for a radically new way of thinking about the way we build our world. Strong Towns is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. Our work is performed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Please share with others to use for good." added 16:00, 30 November 2020 (UTC)

Community currencies activism[edit | edit source]

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Commons Currency Project, Imagining a Great Lakes Commons Currency

Community energy[edit | edit source]

Delivering Community Power, Canadian Union of Postal Workers plan to turn every post office in Canada into a hub for a just green transition.[1]

Cycling activism[edit | edit source]

Canada Bikes, the national voice for commuter, touring and recreational cycling - Critical Mass bicycle rides in Canada

Ethical consumerism[edit | edit source]

The Buy Nothing Day site through the Adbusters Media Foundation - Fairtrade settlements in Canada

Food activism[edit | edit source]

Face Your Farmer on pinterest - Open Food Network, Canada - Solar cooking resources in Canada - Wikipedia category: Food markets in Canada

Hunters' and Trappers' Committee in Aklavik, Northwest Territories[edit | edit source]

For thousands of years, Inuit communities in far northern Canada lived seminomadically, surviving off of whatever wild game they could hunt. But starting in the mid-20th century, climate change, colonialism, and economic changes had a devastating impact on people in places like Aklavik. Caribou herds shrank and migration patterns changed. The Inuit were forcibly resettled in prefabricated towns and their sled dogs culled by authorities. As demand for seal and fox furs fell and resettlement accelerated, hunters were forced into employment or into nine-to-five jobs, reducing both time and money for hunting.

With fewer hunters, food had to be flown in at exorbitant prices — as much as $38 for a bag of grapes that would cost only a few dollars in the south. As a result, the Aklavik Hunters' and Trappers' Committee and several other groups across the Arctic have established community fridges, where hunters or people who have been fishing drop off surplus meat. The hunters are reimbursed for certain fees and the food is distributed to people in need, following a centuries-old Inuit tradition of delivering one's surplus catch to the elderly and isolated. Canada's largest Inuit advocacy group, the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, has launched a food security mapping project to track similar initiatives across the Arctic.[2] Aklavik Hunters and Trappers Committee – Community Harvesters, itk.ca

Reduce, reuse, repair and recycle[edit | edit source]

PAREdown

Sharing[edit | edit source]

Halifax Tool Library[edit | edit source]

Halifax Tool Library (HTL), is a tool lending library based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Members pay an annual subscription and may borrow specialized tools for home repair, maintenance, building projects, community projects, gardening and landscaping. The HTL is a Non Profit community organization. The HTL offers standard, Student/Low-Income option, and organizational memberships to non-profits and small businesses. The HTL is supported by Dalhousie University student union, Ecology Action Centre, Parker Street food & furniture bank, Forest Friend, Bike Again, North Brewing Company, Catalyst, Fusion HFX, Deiter's tool and Saw. W

Other initiatives[edit | edit source]

Canadian Cohousing Network - Canadian Senior Cohousing

Urban sustainability[edit | edit source]

8-80 Cities, Canadian based non-profit organization with an international outlook, promote walking and bicycling as activities and urban parks, trails and other public spaces as great places for ALL.

Depave Paradise

RAIN, urban stormwater program designed by Green Communities Canada to maximize community engagement and action.

Resources[edit | edit source]

Networks and sustainability initiatives[edit | edit source]

Events[edit | edit source]

2014

June 7 100in1day, transform your city (Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, Halifax)

May 26 Bike Day in Canada is about bringing together the public, cycling organizations and members of all three levels of government across Canada, to ride on the same day. The day is dedicated to highlighting the importance of cycling in Canada as a healthy, affordable and environmentally friendly form of physical activity, transportation and tourism.[3]

Visions[edit | edit source]

  • IMAGINING 2080, Jayne Engle, Published in Dark Matter Laboratories, Nov 6, 2023, provocations.darkmatterlabs.org. Dark Matter Labs team works with partners, clients, and collaborators across the world, researching and developing new institutional support frameworks for collaborative system change.

Commons[edit | edit source]

Great Lakes Commons, a grassroots effort to establish the Great Lakes as a thriving, living commons — shared and sacred waters that we all protect in perpetuity.

Apps for sustainability[edit | edit source]

Apps for Climate Action Contest winners, September 16, 2010

Public interest law resources[edit | edit source]

Ecojustice Canada, Canadian non-profit environmental law organization that provides funding to lawyers to use litigation to defend and protect the environment. W

Video[edit | edit source]

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Other resources[edit | edit source]

News and comment[edit | edit source]

see separate article: Canada news

Campaigns[edit | edit source]

Near you[edit | edit source]

Montreal - Toronto - Vancouver
Alberta - British Columbia - Manitoba - Ontario - Quebec - Saskatchewan

Back to top

External links[edit | edit source]

Wikipedia categories: Environment of Canada, Environmental issues in Canada

References[edit | edit source]

FA info icon.svg Angle down icon.svg Page data
Keywords countries, visions
Authors Phil Green
License CC-BY-SA-3.0
Language English (en)
Related 0 subpages, 999 pages link here
Aliases Canada
Impact 1,185 page views
Created January 11, 2014 by Phil Green
Modified November 14, 2023 by Phil Green
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