2020 Clean50 Summit Statement

Last Thursday, on October 3rd, 120 business, academic, and environmental leaders from across Canada, gathered in Toronto for the 9th annual Clean50 Summit, discussing a wide range of climate solutions.

Climate Policy Discussions: About 20% of the Clean50 Summit participants were subject to policies that prevented them from discussing political issues in public or are public servants.  The remaining 96 delegates each spent several hours deliberating and identifying the policy frameworks that could enable Canada to meet its climate commitments under the Paris agreement (and hold global warming to less than 1.5 degrees Celsius),  and determining a criteria against which the four platforms could be assessed.  Subsequent groups then evaluated and scored the climate action plans of the four main parties in the upcoming Federal election against those criteria.

The scores awarded by the different working groups were averaged and rounded to the nearest 5%, with results as follows: Greens 75%, Liberals 70%, NDP 60%, CPC 30%.

A summary of all Climate Action policies put forward by each party are available on the Clean50 website: www.clean50.com/canadavotes2019/

The Summit concluded with a discussion about how the group’s conclusions might best be summarized in the following statement, made available for individual participants and members of the Clean50 to endorse:

We believe the emerging low carbon economy presents tremendous economic opportunities for Canada, as it addresses the climate challenge. The Green, Liberal and NDP climate action plans clearly reflect that reality.

18-25 year olds will make up the largest voting block for the first time in Canadian history. Many are demanding transformative economic and environmental action, and we stand with them.

As many members of the Clean50 did last April, we again urge Canadians to make climate action the single most important issue in this and every other election, at all levels of government.