When Our Air Suffers, We All Suffer

 By Ryan Lythall As a ventilator-dependent person, last week was quite scary. Ottawa was under a poor air quality advisory for three days due to smoke about two hours away. It was my first experience with poor air quality in Ottawa. I heard reports of staying indoors. I had errands

Albertans should not be as worried about climate “alarmists;” They should be much more fearful about climate “deniers.”

 By George Petrolekas Provinces that rely on fossil fuel production for their economic well-being are at a crossroads. Decisions being made today will have an enormous impact on Canada’s future economic well-being. The various camps in the debate spurred by climate change can be grouped in two broad superficial categories

Living Green Starts at Home: EnviroCentre’s “Your Green Home” Course

 We’re no longer debating climate change–we’re talking about how to stop it. While the government gets backlogged in politics, why not start change at home? Creating a green lifestyle may sound overwhelming, but step-by-step, it is simple to live green. How do you start living green? EnviroCentre provides concrete steps

Election 2021: It’s now over to voters

 This is Sergio Marchi’s sixth article, in a weekly series of election analysis. He will provide one more wrap-up piece, reviewing the decision made by Canadians and how the leaders managed the 35 day campaign. Finally, the time has arrived for Canadians to speak — with their votes. But before they do,

Election 2021: O’Toole grabs the lead!

 This is the third article by the Hon. Sergio Marchi on the federal election. His pieces appear weekly. Campaigns do matter. Trudeau enjoyed a solid lead going into the election but two weeks on, he now quickly finds himself on the defensive. At the conclusion of my last article, I

An immodest proposal for change to climate change

 By Larry McCloskey Jonathan Swift proposed that poor Irish parents alleviate poverty by selling their babies to the aristocracy as a delicatessen in, “A Modest Proposal.” Just to be clear in these humourless politically polarized times, he was kidding; that is, his 1729 Juvenalian straight-faced satire was meant to provoke

Nuclear is essential in addressing most serious issue Canada faces

 By John Gorman, President and CEO of the Canadian Nuclear Association Before the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change was a key priority for Canadians and the federal government. That hasn’t changed. As the government looks to invest in an economic recovery, Canadians still rank climate change as the most serious issue we

Henny Penny: A Response to Michael Schellenberger

 By Dalen Ewald My quick take away from Michael Schellenberger’s article “Why Apocalyptic Claims About Climate Change Are Wrong” is that environmental journalists and advocates have been playing the role of Chicken Little . The difference is that this time, we are dealing with no mere acorn. Despite good intentions,

Do plastic bags in green bins defeat the purpose

 For nearly a decade, Ottawa has had a green bin program in place to deal with compostable items. Green bins are in our homes, our schools, and in businesses across the city. The purpose for their use has been to help reduce the amount of waste going into landfills, and

Art meets activism in Jesse Stewart’s exhibit at the OAG

 Ottawa-based artist Jesse Stewart is an award winning percussionist, visual artist and instrument builder whose audio-visual installation-based work crosses disciplinary boundaries, exploring the link between the visual and the sonic arts.  Jesse Stewart: Icebreaking examines the role of industry on climate change, as well as the related disappearance of ice. The exhibition includes artworks

IPCC refutes climate change hysteria

 Prime Minister Trudeau justifies his carbon tax saying empirical evidence shows that as a result of man-made climate change storms, floods, heat waves and rising sea levels are all quickly getting worse. Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s reply to a reporter if he thought climate change played a role in recent flooding was,

Canada must embrace nuclear to combat climate change

 By: John Barrett, President and CEO, Canadian Nuclear Association The Green New Deal, which is co-sponsored by popular U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, calls for a World War II-level mobilization against climate change that touches many policy areas outside of energy and innovation, such as universal health-care and combating economic inequality.

We need a new kind of weather forecast

 Photo credit: John Badman/The Telegraph via AP By: Michael Wolfson The tornadoes that recently hit the Ottawa area cannot be blamed specifically on global climate change. But they are consistent with the long-predicted pattern of increasingly frequent and severe extreme weather events, highlighted in the most recent report of the International

Climate change is a global health emergency: Federal pipeline needs independent assessment, global health leaders say

 By: Tim K. Takaro and Jennifer Miller After a summer that saw over 90 heat-related deaths in Quebec, drought-impacted crops across the Prairies, and large swaths of Western Canada and Ontario ravaged by wildfires and shrouded in smoke, many of the world’s leading experts gathered in San Francisco at the

Canada should not stray from climate commitments in face of criticism

 Things look bleak these days for the Trudeau government’s Pan-Canadian Framework on climate change (PCF). The framework represents Canada’s primary compliance path with the Paris Climate Accord, requiring provinces to establish a price on carbon or have one imposed by Ottawa. Opposition Conservatives have railed against the plan in the

Make Every Day Earth Day

 Today is Earth Day, an internationally recognized day were citizens of the world are encouraged to think about our impact on the environment, climate change and conservation. Though it is great that we have a designated day to devote to these issues, we believe that little things you do in

Film Review: An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power

 Synopsis: A decade after An Inconvenient Truth (2006) brought climate change into the heart of popular culture comes the follow-up that shows just how close we are to a real energy revolution. Stars: Al Gore, George W. Bush, John Kerry Directors: Bonnie Cohen, Jon Shenk

For Catherine McKenna, Green is the Gold

 It has been a year since Catherine McKenna walked down the driveway at Rideau Hall and was sworn in as the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. The general public was allowed on the grounds to soak in excitement and the atmosphere was electric. This was a hard fought battle

What’s Happening North of 60

 Canada is a country born from colonization. This process, and the residential schools that followed, have had monstrous effects on First Nations peoples, effects that we are only beginning to acknowledge through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. But the colonization of the North, for the First Nations, Métis and Inuit

Prime Minister Trudeau… So Far, So Good… But Soon, The Rubber Hits Road.

 By all counts things are going well for Canada’s new Liberal government. Aside from Prime Minister Trudeau’s brief off-side when he unintentionally elbowed NDP MP Ruth Ellen Brosseau in Parliament, leading to a possible Oscar or “Golden Raspberry” for her and Thomas Mulcair for best performance for feigned outrage. It

Walking with Abel: Journeys with the Nomads of the African Savannah

 Author: Anna Badkhen Riverhead Books, New York, 2015 Reviewed by Don MacLean Anna Badkhen’s wonderful book Walking with Abel: Journeys with the Nomads of the African Savannah documents her journeys with members of the nomadic Fulani, perhaps the largest group of nomads living today. The Mali-based Fulani migrate across the

The Planet is Dying of Consumption and Only Citizens can Halt the Process

 At the 2015 Paris Climate Conference, COP21, the focus has been on promises countries make to reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. These macro level commitments are always made with varying degrees of sincerity because few political leaders will be willing to cause real or even perceived damage to their

Change

 Photo courtesy of Jean-Marc Carisse. Voters Decided It Was Sunny Ways Rather Than Rainbows and Unicorns Ten years is a long time for any government to be in power. Stephen Harper led Canada through some tumultuous times. He deserves a great deal of credit for guiding Canada through the 2008

The Politics of Love Thy Neighbour

 When did Christianity in Canada become so linked to political and social conservatism? When did so many Christians, especially the loudest and most organized, embrace censorship, resistance to gay equality, denial of climate change, opposition to vaccinations and an angry obsession with abortion? There are, of course, myriad believers in Christ who do not think and act thus but ask

Will climate refugees in Canada finally spur action on climate change?

 Photo Credit: Eric Wüstenhagen Ryan Meili and Mahli Brindamour A young child arrives at the hospital emergency room in respiratory distress, his asthma worsened by smoke exposure. An elder has uncontrolled blood pressure because there wasn't time to get her medications when the evacuation orders came through. Scabies and other illnesses related