Canada's Environmental Voice
The average Canadian spends 26 minutes getting to work each morning, according to Statistics Canada. Considering that we’re a nation of drivers (82 per cent of commuters travel to work by car), it’s no wonder most metropolitan areas are plagued by traffic congestion and poor air quality. Reduce your commuter […]
So we keep waiting. Ontario’s environmental community had reason for optimism when Kathleen Wynne assumed leadership of the Ontario Liberal Party in January 2013, knowing the new premier was more progressive than her predecessor Dalton McGuinty and perhaps more inclined to want to beef up the Liberals’ green cred.
As the snow (finally!) melts and warmer weather arrives many Canadians are looking forward to the opening of local patios so they can enjoy a refreshing beverage outdoors. Those beer and wine drinkers have seen a perceptible rise in local, sustainable, organic options in recent years. Much like the coffee industry, […]
Within today’s instantaneously disposable culture, buildings are often thoughtlessly constructed using mass-produced curtain wall and structural systems while capitalizing on consumers’ fleeting needs for ephemerality and ambiguity of space and place. Given the demands of the marketplace, how and why would anyone ever design an architectural program based on localized […]
Sharing is about maximizing the use of products, services and ideas in order to minimize overall consumption by a community. This principle has a surprising number of applications – people can and do share just about anything. It’s also nothing new; sharing books, movies, equipment and hand-me-downs has been common […]
For nearly five years, Sustainable Waterloo Region (SWR) has been convincing companies and organizations around Kitchener, Waterloo and Cambridge, Ontario, to instigate a cultural shift that would help sew environmental responsibility into the way Canada’s 10th most populated urban area grows and evolves.
There’s no doubt that our economy has been built upon acquisitiveness. Since the Second World War, incessant growth has been based on mass production; mass production has been based on creating and channeling demand; and demand has been based on the desire to have or own. We are trained from […]
This series was originally posted in five separate parts, now published here together for easier reading. This is a blog series about growth, sustainability and our planet. It is a thought experiment on whether or not the idea of a pro-growth environmentalist is an oxymoron.
Long before going green became a trend, luthiers were passionate seekers of prized pieces of reclaimed wood. A fallen tree in the forest was viewed as a creative opportunity and specific species of wood were sought out with the belief that they held magical tonal qualities within their very DNA.
Last year, we posted 9 Simple Ways to Save the Planet in our Green Living blog. The post suggested eating less meat, stating that “an estimated 18 per cent of worldwide greenhouse gas emissions can be attributed to livestock production.” We’ve since learned that the impacts of meat are much worse […]
