Canada's Clean50 Top Project Awards: Our version of the Five I's: Innovative, Inspiring, Impactful, Informative, and able to be Imitated
The purpose of the Top Project Awards is to showcase innovative projects, and in the process, inspire other organizations to imitate the success of our winning projects to pursue the same or even greater impacts, while also demonstrating to Canadians the opportunities for prosperity in the low carbon economy. We also recognize valuable work that enables progress on climate action (think a federal hydrogen policy for example). While the last three cycles have seen us name 24 Top Projects, there is no actual limit established in advance. We will be looking for unique projects that best meet the criteria, and name as many as makes sense within that context. If you want a form to help prepare your answers, feel free to reach out to clean50 -at- deltamanagement dot com.
The Clean50 would not be possible without the generous support of all of our sponsors. The Top Project Awards are sponsored by award founder and steward, Delta Management Group.
For the 10th year, The Clean50 Top Projects Awards are sponsored by Canada’s leading clean tech, ESG and sustainability search firm, Delta Management Group.
If your submission is selected as a winner, this will ideally be the VERY short description of the project we use to describe it in our publication, and on the Clean50 website. It should include key results and impacts. You have 500 characters to work with.
Here’s one example from our 2014 archives:
“Two years ago, CN launched EcoConnexions, a program to engage its 24,000 CN railroaders in environmental action and stewardship. Central to the program – and to the principle of sustainability – is a spirit of partnership and collaboration. Through internal efforts and partnering with leading organizations to help, in the first 2 years, more than 7,000 CN employees attended EcoConnexions launch events, and 550 EcoChampions were trained. CN employees have since completed 209,000 “acts of green”, avoiding over 5,770,000 kgs of GHGs” …. As you can see the short description provided the “what”, the “why”, some of the “how” – and all the most important impacts.
Describe the underlying need, problem(s) or issue you sought to address when you undertook the project, and your objectives at the outset.
Take us through, in summary, step by step, as though continuing the story on from “After the research (if any) and setting our objectives”… We began by…
Tell us both what you achieved (and most critically, provide metrics where possible – and tell us how those metrics were measured) and how results compared to your objectives / solved the problem
Part of our motivation in recognizing great projects is to both inspire others to copy you – and also to help them do so with fewer mistakes than you made! No project flows perfectly (and frankly, if nothing went wrong, the project was just too easy and not deserving of an award!) and we often award points for transparent disclosure of pitfalls and work-arounds,
If so, please identify the organization, their individual team members, and the form of contribution they made
Impact
Innovation
Inform
Inspire
able to Imitate
License Agreement
Please read this carefully.
There is no cost to be considered, nor to win any Clean50 Award.
Nor do we require that finalists buy an expensive dinner for 8 people to attend an award ceremony as some Awards insist nominees do.
Winning individuals and projects are notified they have won and not dependent upon anything, other than as outlined below.
IF you win, you MUST sign a licensing agreement (but not pay anything) in order to be identified as an award winner. The agreement does NOT obligate you to pay anything UNLESS you yourselves choose to use the award to gain some commercial or reputational advantage.
The publicity we provide, the space on our website, and the reference in the Globe and Mail are all free. And there is no obligation for the organization to self-identify as a Clean50 Project Award winners, nor to attend the Summit.
HOWEVER – IF you win and IF you do want to self-identify as a Clean50 Top Project Award winner, only THEN will you be required to first pay a licensing fee (sliding scale of ~$1,500 for a for profit large corporation, less for smaller or a B Corps and $100. for a registered charity.) The fee is a one time payment for use of the Clean50 logo and entitles the organization to self-identify as a Clean50 award winner and use the logo in perpetuity,
Clean50 + The Globe & Mail: Share your information?
At some point following the Summit, – likely during Earth Week 2025 (week of Earth Day – April 21) The Globe and Mail is generously providing us with two pages in the Report on Business to tell the story of the Clean50 and recognize our sponsors, supporters and of course, the 2025 Clean50 champions, as well as the full list and pictures of the 2025 Clean50 individual honourees, the Clean50 Emerging Leaders and the Clean50 Top Projects.
The full story of each honouree in all categories will appear on our web pages and in the Summit Program.
The above is all at no charge to the individuals or organizations who won, and does not require payment of any licensing fees.
Beyond that, we expect there will again be 7-10 pages of special coverage of Clean50 winners as part of a Special Clean50 Report series in the Globe and Mail, to run during the same week, with several pages each day in the ROB, similar to those produced over the last 3 years (and visible from the Clean50 website). Some honourees or their employers may be interested in considering advertising participation in the section, either to congratulate the honouree – or to tell the organization’s bigger sustainability story.
As part of our arrangement with the Globe & Mail, we have enabled such advertising to be purchased at a very significant discount – and all of the paid advertising space will be matched by editorial content about the Clean50 and individual honourees / their organizations. Advertisers are provided significant opportunity to propose interesting topics for inclusion in the report, and in most cases, where good content can be found, written coverage of the advertiser’s story includes content equal to about 75% of the advertising space purchased.
Some participants elect to forego the advertisement and focus entirely on content.
The Clean50 organization obtains no direct financial benefit from the Special Report, but obviously sees great reputational value for the Clean50 and participants alike from the coverage the Special Report affords.
The timing between learning one is on the Clean50 list – and the deadline for committing to becoming part of the special report is sometimes very short. Please consider now…. If you win, would you wish to be contacted about further publicity? The response to this question has absolutely no bearing on judging – and will only be shared with senior representatives from the Globe (not our advisory team). Because of deadline issues you MAY be contacted before final determination of your Clean50 Award is made, so that if you are interested, the appropriate people in your organization can begin to consider the content of any message you may wish to share, should you ultimately make the list. Inclusion in the special report is limited to current and past Clean50 winners, their employers, and current sponsors. “Well Wishers” are welcome but not themselves eligible for coverage. Content is restricted to issues related to the objectives and those things measured by the Clean50, but not exclusively the accomplishments of the Honouree. The Clean50 has some editorial control, and exercises that to prevent “greenwashing” or inclusion of any story not aligned with Clean50 objectives / values, or issues likely to be controversial to Honourees (i.e. is nuclear power “clean” power?)
Costs typically run between 5K for an 1/8th of a page and 25K for a full page ad + 75% space match story. Past examples are visible on the Clean50 website.
