Vancouver City Savings Credit Union, colloquially known as Vancity, wanted to expand its sustainable-financing operations, the chief executive of its banking subsidiary told Canada's National Observer, and CoPower offered a great opportunity to do so.
In a hangar-like space an hour from Montreal, workers in safety glasses carefully jockey huge aluminum arches into rows, like ribs, before switching on a whining drill to screw them into place.
The federal environment minister must now decide whether to approve or reject the proposal, after a panel said it is in the public interest — but with significant concerns about environmental impact and interruption of Indigenous hunting practices.
Its reputation has been bruised by a simmering fight with disgruntled franchisees and has faced staunch criticism for how it handled a planned increase in Ontario's minimum wage to $15 per hour by 2019. (That issue was made moot by Doug Ford's Progressive Conservative government cancelling the previous Liberal government's legislation.) What's next?
A paper milling company from Finland says it can make a plastic-free coffee cup for pennies more per cup, which could help solve the problem of the mixed-material cups otherwise ending up in landfills or oceans.
Coast Funds, a financing group created and overseen by First Nations in the Great Bear Rainforest and Haida Gwaii, has invested tens of millions of dollars in hundreds of sustainability projects and created over 1,000 permanent jobs in local communities, according to the group's recently released report.
Amid all the talk of data sharing and citizen empowerment at a global summit in Ottawa, there was no mention that Canada is home to one of the most opaque, secretive rule-making bodies in the world: the International Civil Aviation Authority.
The shift to a low-carbon economy is "underway" and sectors like oil and gas, as well as the banks that loan money to them, are exposed to risks from climate change that could spill over into destabilizing "fire sales," the Bank of Canada said Thursday.