Project

Energy Future Forum

About the Project

The Energy Future Forum (EFF) is a pan-Canadian and multi-year initiative that is working to address climate action and our energy future around one table. Its mission is to develop practical measures that help Canada meet or exceed our 2030 emissions targets on the way to a net zero future, and that strengthen an innovative economy, deepen shared prosperity and enhance national unity. EFF includes leaders from business and government, along with academic, environmental and Indigenous organizations, comprising participants from five regions. EFF is determined to see this collaborative effort map out an ambitious set of actions that are environmentally sound, economically beneficial and publicly acceptable.

Reports

Media

Events

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Event Past
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The Canadian High-Level Gas Summit

The Gas Summit is co-presented by the Public Policy Forum and McCarthy Tétrault. THIS EVENT IS BY INVITATION ONLY In a world seeking out clean energy supplies, Canada’s natural gas fields continue to intrigue international investors. Global energy companies view Canada’s fields as among the most attractive energy sources in...
March 10
Report

The $100 Billion Difference

Relative Costs of Two Net Zero Approaches

Released: Thursday May 11, 2023

In launching its Energy Future Forum in 2019, the Public Policy Forum set out as its mission “to develop practical measures that help Canada meet or exceed our 2030 emissions targets on the way to a net zero future, and that strengthen an innovative economy, deepen shared prosperity and enhance...
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Report

The Strength of Green Steel

Boosting competitiveness, decarbonizing supply chains, seizing geopolitical advantage

Released: Thursday April 20, 2023

To reach net zero, the world—Canada included—will need a lot more product from one of its most emissions-intensive industries. Wind turbines, transmission towers and solar panels will require 2.8 billion tonnes of steel worldwide by 2050, or the equivalent of 40,221 Golden Gate bridges, Bloomberg projects. But at present, the...
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Report

A Leadership Blueprint for Canada’s High-ESG Gas

Serving the Public and Global Good

Released: Thursday August 18, 2022

FOREWORD Climate actions, despite their obvious importance, aren’t as easily done, as said. That should be clear enough in looking at the stresses Europe, despite its best intentions, began experiencing even before the invasion of Ukraine. Like many others, Europe, in its quest to be a leader in emissions reductions,...
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Report

Do We Really Want to Make Canadians Poorer?

What Shutting Down Its Oil and Gas Sector Would Cost Canada

Released: Wednesday July 27, 2022

By Don Wright While Canada must shoulder its fair share of the burden of the global need to decarbonize, it is important we do so with a full understanding of the repercussions of different policy choices. This is important for two reasons. First, properly costing the various options to decarbonize...
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Report

A Leadership Blueprint for Canada’s Net-Zero Energy Transition

Released: Tuesday March 15, 2022

The time has come for Canada to set out a clear, realistic and attainable plan to meet its climate objectives in a way that reflects our national interest and the global good. The Leadership Blueprint for Canada’s Net-Zero Energy Transition does exactly that. For more than two years the Energy...
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Report

Capturing a Carbon Opportunity

Carbon Management Working Group Paper - August 2021

Authors: Carbon Management Working Group
Released: Thursday August 26, 2021

If the climate challenge confronting Canada is evident, so too is the economic opportunity out there to be captured. The twin objectives are clear and measurable: We must meet our 2030 GHG emission reduction targets on the way to a net-zero future by 2050, and we must do it in a manner that ensures jobs, growth and a strong economy. The good news is that a sightline to that future – one where a national carbon management strategy is critical to meeting our objectives – is coming into clear focus.
Read the Paper
Report

We Want Real Partnership

UNDRIP Gives Us the Means

Authors: Alicia Dubois, Tabatha Bull, Mark Podlasly, J.P. Gladu and Kim Baird
Released: Friday July 16, 2021

In April 2020, the Energy Future Forum convened a plenary session on the critical importance of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and full Indigenous participation and ownership in Canada’s energy development. The following is a blended transcript edited for clarity and conciseness of Indigenous economic leaders Alicia Dubois, Tabatha Bull, Mark Podlasly, J.P. Gladu and Kim Baird. These leaders spoke about their vision for economic reconciliation, the challenge of access to capital and the opportunity UNDRIP presents to catalyze economic development by making real partnership a prerequisite for any project to move forward in...
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Report

A Keystone of Carbon Could be Our 21st-century Auto Pact

The centrepiece of a proposed climate change partnership should be a cross-border carbon capture, transportation and storage network.

Authors: Edward Greenspon and Dale Eisler
Released: Thursday November 26, 2020

Canada desperately needs to matter more in the United States. After a run-up in the decade after NAFTA, our share of U.S. imports has fallen from roughly 16 per cent to 12 per cent since the Great Recession, leaving us behind both China and Mexico. Auto production, which for decades held fast well above the level guaranteed in the 1965 Auto Pact, was part of the descent.
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Report
Close up of green plant leaves

Nature-based Solutions: Some of the Answers to Climate Change Come Naturally

Energy Future Forum Position Paper

Released: Wednesday November 11, 2020

There is a broadly based consensus in Canada that includes governments, Indigenous peoples, environmental groups, industry and other stakeholders that nature-based solutions will play a crucial role as Canada works to meet its climate change objectives. The Energy Future Forum (EFF) believes the agreement presents a rare and unique opportunity – one that Canada must seize as part of its climate change suite of policies.
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Report

The Solution Set: Carbon Capture & Direct Air Capture

Series | Energy Future Forum Discussion

Released: Thursday May 7, 2020

Carbon capture has a powerful allure. If there's too much CO2 in the atmosphere, why not remove the excess, and store it deep underground or use it in manufacturing other products? It sounds like a considerable solution on the way to a net zero carbon economy by 2050.
Read about how carbon capture could help us on the way to a net zero carbon economy
Article

Opinion: Without bold action, we’re going to miss a key climate and economic opportunity

Friday September 3, 2021
Op-ed by Janet Annesley and Michael Bernstein, co-chairs of the Public Policy Forum’s Energy Future Forum – Carbon Management Working Group. The recent sixth assessment report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) contained a critical message most people missed. Every scenario the IPCC modelled show governments and...
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Article

Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage — The Time is Now

Energy Future Forum

Monday March 1, 2021
This paper reflects a strong consensus within the Energy Future Forum that any achievable pathway to national climate and economic objectives must include a significant contribution from carbon capture technologies and from utilization and storage. In any post-COVID, “green stimulus” planning, support for CCUS expansion is even more pivotal than before.
Read more now
Article

Opinion: How Canada could strike a grand bargain on climate and energy

As featured in the Globe and Mail

Wednesday February 5, 2020
OPINION: Needed: A grand bargain on climate and energy. How: The Energy Future Forum brings together the players — from oil and gas producers to environmentalists, governments, bankers, utilities, academics and Indigenous leaders. The Mission: To find ways Canada can meet or exceed its targets under the Paris climate agreement on the way to a net-zero future, while strengthening the economy and enhancing national unity. When: Now.
Read the op-ed piece
Article

Groups from Across Canada Join Initiative to Get Climate and Energy Policy Working Together 

Monday December 16, 2019
The Energy Future Forum (EFF), a new pan-Canadian initiative to develop policy answers that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and strengthen the economy, was officially launched on Dec. 16 at a meeting in Toronto. It's an "unprecedented effort to find common cause in addressing Canada’s climate and energy challenges,” said PPF's Edward Greenspon.
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Tags: Atlantic Canada Canada Climate Disruption & Technology Economy Energy & Resources Environment & Climate First Nations Governance & Democracy Growth Indigenous Inuit Metis Northern Canada Ontario Quebec Regulation Technology Western Canada
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