Canada’s Top Sustainability Award releases full list: Canada’s Clean50 for 2022

By: Gavin Pitchford, Executive Director, Clean50 / CEO of Award Founder & Steward, Delta Management Group 
Public Sector, R&D inventors and PEI politicians lead new additions
2 people on list a first ever for PEI: Premier Dennis King & Mayor Philip Brown
Toronto, September 29, 2021– The remaining 34 members of this year’s Canada’s Clean50 Awards list, and drawn from over 1000 nominations were announced today as climate-savvy leaders  pulled from every corner of Canada were recognized for their recent accomplishments, joining the previously announced Clean16 category leaders announced earlier this month.
Prince Edward Island is attempting to be the first province to become carbon-neutral, and steps taken by Premier King and Mayor Brown (Charlottetown) in support of that goal led to today’s announcement.   Federal employees Sarah Goodman (PMO) and Mollie Johnson (ADM, Natural Resources) were also called out for the extensive climate action both have enabled.
Other notables were drawn from less well known sources, particularly Canada’s burgeoning clean tech / research and development sectors.  Amongst other things, winners have derived new ways to eliminate or dramatically reduce one of Canada’s largest single sources of carbon pollution – oil extraction in Alberta.  Work done by all three of Carbon X prize finalist and Carbon UpCycling CEO Apoorv Sinha, Acceleware’s Geoff Clark, (both from Calgary), and Thomas of Etalim (Vancouver), is presently in advanced trials and all three advances should provide significant impact in reducing overhead GHG emissions from fossil fuel extraction for as long as we continue to mine them.
Other honourees in the R&D segment include the founders of BC’s Ecoation – creators of an AI-empowered robotic scanning device for greenhouses that has led to significant reductions in pesticide use and spoiled produce, and founders of Montreal’s Polystyvert, who have created a process to recycle polystyrene at previously unreached levels of recovery and purity, and which also supports the growing circular economy in Canada.
Many of the honourees are having a direct and measurable impact in eliminating carbon pollution from food waste, and buildings in particular, while others, such as Kirsten Marcia, are helping Alberta and Saskatchewan become renewable energy powerhouses by tapping rich sources of geothermal energy.  
“Canada needs to eliminate 730 MT of carbon pollution from our annual output – Over the past year, Canada’s 2022 Clean50 have made a significant start on that target – with much more to come” said award Executive Director Gavin Pitchford.  “If we have any hope of hitting our targets, it’s people like these who we will have to thank”.   
The full list of Canada’s 2022 Clean50, Clean50 Emerging Leaders and Lifetime Achievement Honourees appears below and details can be found on the Clean50 website: www.clean50.com/ 
Media contact:           Gavin Pitchford          gpitchford@deltamanagement.com
416-925-2005 / 774-330-6606           https://clean50.com
Clean50 List for 2022
(Presented alphabetically by category, and then within category)
Advocates
  • AFN Team: Tonio Sadik, Ph.D., Curtis Scurr, Ms. Jamie Lavigne & Graeme Reed, Assembly of First Nations (Ottawa, ON)
  • Christopher Hilkene, Pollution  Probe (Toronto, ON)
  • Eric St-Pierre, LLB, Trottier Family Foundation (Montreal, QC)
Angels
  • Jeanette Jackson, Foresight (Port Coquitlam, BC)
  • John Adams, NGIF Capital Corp  (Ottawa, ON)
Buildings
  • Purpose Building Team: Peter Halsall. P. Eng., Douglas Webber. P. Eng., Eric Chisholm. P. Eng. & Luka Matutinovic. P. Eng., Purpose Building (Toronto, ON)
  • Ms. Regan Smith, Manulife Investment Management (Toronto, ON)
Cities
  • Mayor Philip Brown, City of Charlottetown (Charlottetown, PE)
  • Justin Readman, City of Kitchener (Kitchener, ON)
Clean Tech
  • Dr. Sankar Das Gupta, Electrovaya Inc (Mississauga, ON)
  • Matt Harper, Invinity Energy Systems (Vancouver, BC)
Consultants & Enablers
  • Elliott Cappell, WSP Canada (Toronto, ON)
  • Sabina Russell. P. Eng., Zen and the Art of Clean Energy Solutions Inc. (Vancouver, BC)
  • Paul Shorthouse, The Delphi Group / Circular Economy Leadership Canada (Ottawa, ON)
Education & Thought Leaders
  • Shaun Loney, Encompass Coop (Winnipeg, MB)
  • The Narwhal Team: Carol Linnitt, Ph.D. &  Emma Gilchrist, The Narwhal (Victoria, BC)
  • Fate Saghir, CPA CMA, Mackenzie Investments (Toronto, ON)
  • Shilpa Tiwari, Ph.D., Citizen Relations (Toronto, ON)
Manufacturing & Transportation
  • Emmanuelle Toussaint, Nova Bus and Prevost, part of the Volvo Group (St-Eustache, QC)
Primary Resources
  • Martha Hall Findlay, Suncor Energy (Calgary, AB)
Public Sector
  • Sarah Goodman, MBA, Prime Minister’s Office, Government of Canada (Vancouver,BC)
  • Mollie Johnson, Government of Canada, Natural Resources (Ottawa, ON)
  • Premier Dennis King, Province of Prince Edward Island (Charlottetown, PE)
Renewable Energy
  • Sean Drygas, Colliers International (Toronto, ON)
  • Kirsten Marcia, DEEP Earth Energy Production Corp (Saskatoon, SK)
Research & Development
  • Geoff Clark, MBA, Acceleware Ltd. (Calgary, AB)
  • Ecoation Team: Dr. Saber Miresmailli, Ph.D., Maryam Antikchi, Ecoation (North Vancouver, BC)
  • Polystyvert Team: Solenne Brouard Gaillot, Marianne Lépinoit & Prof. Roland Côté, Ph.D., Polystyvert Inc. (Montreal, QC)
  • Apoorv Sinha, Carbon Upcycling Technologies Inc (Calgary, AB)
  • Thomas Steiner, Ph.D., Etalim (Burnaby, BC)
Retail & Consumer
  • LOOP Mission Team: Julie Poitras-Saulnier, David Côté, LOOP Mission (Montreal, QC)
  • Teresa Schoonings, Bimbo Canada (Etobicoke, ON)
Technology & Telecom
  • Jennifer Sicilia, RYCOM Corporation (Vaughan, ON)
Traditional Energy Generation
  • Northland Power Team: Mike Crawley, CEO, Pauline Alimchandani, CFO, Northland Power Inc. (Toronto, ON)
  • Neetika Sathe, Alectra Inc. (Toronto, ON)
  • Katherine Sparkes, RPP, Independent Electricity System Operator,  (Toronto, ON)
Clean50 Backgrounder and logistics
The Canada’s Clean50 award program and Summit were founded in 2011 by Canada’s leading clean tech and sustainability executive search firm, Delta Management Group, and CEO Gavin Pitchford, in response to a trend the firm noted when performing executive searches on behalf of clients.
While there was growing acknowledgement that climate change was real, and that broad solutions were needed, most were working exclusively within their own industry silos and not sharing information.  Having identified the issue, Delta created the Clean50 Awards as a way to identify leaders from every sector, and then hosted the Summit as a way to bring those same leaders together.
Each fall since 2011, the “Canada’s Clean50 list” has marked the accomplishments of 50 sustainability leaders in 16 categories.  Recently, the list has expanded to identify Emerging Leaders, Top Sustainability Projects, and to recognize Canadian business and climate heroes with Lifetime Achievement awards.  98% of each year’s honourees attend the Clean50 Summit in person, and numerous past winners come back to continue to play a role in deliberations, learn new things, and be inspired. 
The last remaining 2020 Clean50 Awards, the Top Project award winners, as well as the project selected as Top Project of the Year will be made public on October 4th, following a vote by Summit participants at the conclusion of the Summit on October 1st.    
Including small teams and Emerging Leaders, The Clean50 Award Alumni list now numbers over 800 of Canada’s climate-change-fighting rock stars, and the Summit has led to numerous cross-sector and intra-silo collaborations.  In addition, the Honourees’ stories have inspired hundreds of Canadians to do more, and in many instances, simply take the inspiration and build upon, and scale what the honourees had already proven could be done.
Most honourees have agreed to be interviewed, and the Clean50 team are pleased to facilitate this.
The underlying purpose of the award program was to identify, recognize and – most importantly – connect sustainability leaders from across Canada.  We believe a solution for climate change will take input from every sector of Canadian life, and that cross-sector collaboration will be critical to achieving any measurable success. The Summit was created to accelerate this process.  
All Clean50 Honourees are committed to attend the in-person Clean50 Summit 11.0 in Toronto on October 1, 2021 to tackle climate problems and identify out-of-the-box solutions, as well as find opportunities for future collaboration. With 30 Working sessions during the day, 3 different groups of 12 thought leader participants will propose and discuss transformational responses to 10 different climate change challenges.  Cross-sector collaboration in the implementation of innovative solutions is vital if Canada is achieve net zero carbon emissions in transportation, from buildings and by consumers, fast enough to save humanity. The Clean50 Summit provides both the inspiration and the forum. The work sessions are capped by an awards dinner and a vote for Project of the Year based on submissions made during the day. 
All Summit participants, site and catering staff will comply with Ontario’s Covid regulations and will be both fully vaccinated, and will also pass two (2) rapid test immediately before entering the venue.  Every element of the event will be conducted in the most environmentally friendly and safest possible manner.