Municipalities:
Canada's Climate Battleground

Report
October 5, 2023

Canada’s undeniable reality is that the climate crisis is upon us. And with Canadian municipalities being home to over 80 per cent of the national population, our towns and urban centres are both hotbeds of emissions and epicenters of climate-related disasters. 

Since 2019, over 660 Canadian municipalities have declared climate emergencies, highlighting the increasing impacts of our rapidly warming climate. It’s clear that regions all across the country need to implement sustainability strategies, and fast. 

But with the enormous task, comes an opportunity for Canadian municipalities to step up and lead the way to net zero. With approximately half of Canada's GHG emissions influenced by municipalities, they hold the key to critical solutions to this immense challenge.  

Through Foresight’s deep-rooted connections within Canada’s cleantech ecosystem, we’ve identified that, while municipalities across Canada are eager to implement net zero strategies, many are facing major barriers that are hindering the process of adopting clean technology solutions to support progress toward their goals. 

Download the whitepaper to understand the key barriers that are hindering progress, as well as our proposed solution toward municipal net zero and sustainability goals.



The process included peer-to-peer discovery roundtables with municipal net zero champions, administrators, city management staff and project managers, engineers, and asset managers in eight provinces and territories from coast to coast. In parallel, we conducted one-on-one outreach with a variety of relevant stakeholders and rightsholders.