Alberta’s environmental leaders recognized

The Alberta Emerald Foundation (AEF) announced the shortlist for the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards this week. Since 1992, the Emerald Awards have showcased over 350 recipients and 850 finalists who are raising the bar in addressing environmental and climate change issues. These environmental awards celebrate excellence across all sectors, making them unique not only in Alberta but also in Canada.

This year’s shortlist was chosen by a third-party panel of volunteer judges, each bringing expertise from numerous sectors across Alberta. Judges selected the shortlist, consisting of 39 organizations, projects, and individuals from across the province, from 51 nominations. During their deliberations, the judges also determined who from the shortlist will take home an Emerald Award in each of the 15 award categories.

“Those represented in this year’s shortlist demonstrate the incredible dedication that Albertans have toward protecting our environment and taking action against climate change” says The AEF’s Executive Director, Marisa Orfei, “The diversity in the shortlist is also astounding, there’s small grassroots organizations, large corporations, and everything in between. We’re also incredibly proud to have 17 communities across Alberta represented in this year’s shortlist, including Drayton Valley, Grande Cache, Canmore, and many more.”

Here are the organizations, projects, and individuals recognized in The 32nd Annual Emerald Award shortlist:

Air Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that improve air quality.

Blindman Brewing First-in-Canada CO2 Capture and Utilization (Lacombe, AB)

Business Category – Showcasing an organization engaged in commercial, industrial or professional activities that have demonstrated a meaningful commitment to an environmentally sustainable future.

Reimagine Architects – 26 Years Building Sustainable Futures (Edmonton, AB)
Eco-Flex Recycled Rubber Solutions (Legal, AB)
Envirotech Geothermal – Alberta’s smartest way to Net Zero! (Sherwood Park, AB)

Community Group or Nonprofit Category – Recognizing associations dedicated to furthering a particular social cause or advocating for a shared point of view that has demonstrated a significant commitment to the environment through their actions.

Alberta Bike Swap – supporting the circular economy before it was cool (Calgary, AB)
Project Forest: Rewilding Canada, One Forest at a time (Edmonton, AB)
Alberta businesses are building a better Business-as-usual with Green Economy Canada (Edmonton, AB & Calgary, AB)

Education Category – Acknowledging those that have raised the bar by showing leadership and creativity in educating students of all ages about environmental matters.

Eagle Point-Blue Rapids Parks Council Environmental & Outdoor Education Program (Drayton Valley, AB)
Future Energy Systems: Exploring Our Energy Future With The Community, Our Students, And More (Edmonton, AB)
Evergreen Theatre: A 32-Year Legacy of Inspiring Environmental Awareness & Action Through the Arts (Calgary, AB)

Energy Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that positively support the evolution of our province’s energy systems.

Calgary’s Residential Solar Calculator (Calgary, AB)
Bow Valley Green Energy Cooperative, empowering community to transform Alberta’s energy (Canmore, AB)
Metis Nation of Alberta Climate Change Action Plan (Edmonton, AB)

Government Category – Recognizing all levels of government whose ongoing commitment sets the example of environmental leadership and advocates sustainability as a major consideration in governance.

Environmental Achievements of the City of St. Albert (St. Albert, AB)
Violet Grove’s Constructed Floating Wetlands System with Aeration (Drayton Valley, AB)
Nose Creek Watershed Partnership – Celebrating 25-Years of Watershed Planning, Policy and Action (Mossleigh, AB)

Infrastructure Category – Recognizing environmental advancements in the ways we design, build, and travel.

Solar Aquatic Systems Wastewater Treatment (Drayton Valley, AB)
SSRIA: Transforming the AEC Industry Towards a Net Zero Built Environment (Edmonton, AB)
Ecoplast Solutions: Building Houses from Recycled Plastic Bottles (Lloydminster, AB)

Land Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that demonstrate excellence in sustainable land use.

The City of Calgary’s Willow Plantation for Marginal Land Improvement and Carbon Capture (Calgary, AB)
Ledcor Highway Maintenance Yard Upgrades (Edmonton, AB)

Lifetime Achievement Award – Celebrating environmental leaders who, throughout their lifetime, have made contributions of outstanding environmental significance.

Dirk and Nanja of The Barrelman Inc.: 25 years of protecting land and water through local action that inspires (Calgary, AB)

Public Engagement & Outreach Category – Recognizing programs and initiatives that educate and empower the broader public by teaching the necessary skills to make informed environmental decisions and take responsible action.

GreenLearning’s Eco 360 program: Transitioning to a circular economy for plastic waste! (Drayton Valley, AB)
My Green Closet: Sustainable Lifestyle and Slow Fashion Platform (Edmonton, AB)
Calgary Climate Symposium: How The City of Calgary Engages and Educates Albertans on Climate Change (Calgary, AB)

Shared Footprints Award – Recognizing those who have exemplified land and water stewardship, built shared knowledge, improved air quality, reduced land disturbances, and encouraged ecotourism.

Edmonton River Valley Conservation Coalition: Working Together to Protect the North Saskatchewan River Valley (Edmonton, AB)
Highfield Regenerative Farm (Calgary, AB) Waste Management Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that innovate the repurposing, reduction, and disposal of waste in an environmentally-conscious way. Earth Warrior (Edmonton, AB)
Revolutionizing Recycling with [Re] Waste: Transforming Waste Management for a Sustainable Future (Edmonton, AB)
Microgreens Club – A Zero Waste Initiative (Calgary, AB)

Water Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that demonstrate excellence through the monitoring, management and/or stewardship of water and watersheds.

Forest industry collaboration cultivates sustainability around vital wetland ecosystems (Edmonton, AB)
LakeKeepers: Community-Based Monitoring of Alberta’s Lakes (Edmonton, AB)
Safe water and water sustainability in Alberta (Calgary, AB)

Wildlife & Biodiversity Category – Recognizing projects and initiatives that protect and conserve natural habitats and wild species.

Aseniwuche Winewak Nation’s Caribou Patrol Program: 11 years of saving Alberta’s caribou (Grande Cache, AB)
Friends of Fish Creek Provincial Park Society – Sikome Beaver Coexistence Project. (Calgary, AB)
The Edmonton Urban Coyote Project: Collaborative Research and Education for Coexistence with Wildlife (Edmonton, AB)

Youth Category – Recognizing people, 25 years of age and under, who have made meaningful contributions and have taken positive action to improve the environmental health of their community.

Monica Figueroa: Edmonton youth climate activist (Edmonton, AB)
Strathmore High School Community Greenhouse (Strathmore, AB)
Energy & Environmental Sustainability Projects in Action at New Myrnam School (Myrnam, AB)

The recipients in each category will be named at the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards ceremony on June 7, 2023, at the Citadel Theatre in Edmonton, Alberta. Emerald Award Recipients receive:

A $2,000 grant to support their work or to donate to an environmental charity of their choice
A profile of their work through The AEF’s Sharing Stories program, which includes the Emerald Documentary Series, What On EARTH Can We Do? podcast, and Emerald Speakers Series
A certificate and Emerald Awards recipient digital logo to commemorate their achievement

The Awards will also be live-streamed through the AEF”s YouTube Chanel to allow people from across the province to attend. Tickets for the 32nd Annual Emerald Awards ceremony can be purchased here.

The Alberta Emerald Foundation (AEF) is a registered Canadian charity with the unique mission to tell Alberta’s environmental good news stories to uplift, educate, and inspire our province toward meeting environmental and climate change goals.

Research suggests that when we learn about what real environmental and climate change solutions look like and how they’re being implemented in our communities, it increases our ability and desire to take action in our own lives. By providing real-life examples of these solutions through our various storytelling programs, the AEF helps Albertans take the next step toward environmental protection and climate action. With every person that we reach through our programming, we’re helping Alberta reach its broader environmental and climate change goals.

Click to learn more about the Alberta Emerald Foundation.

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Alberta’s move to ‘activity-based funding’ will improve health care despite naysayer claims

Published on May 8, 2025

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From the Fraser Institute

By Nadeem Esmail

After the Smith government recently announced its shift to a new approach for funding hospitals, known as “activity-based funding” (ABF), defenders of the status quo in Alberta were quick to argue ABF will not improve health care in the province. Their claims are simply incorrect. In reality, based on the experiences of other better-performing universal health-care systems, ABF will help reduce wait times for Alberta patients and provide better value-for-money for taxpayers.

First, it’s important to understand Alberta is not breaking new ground with this approach. Other developed countries shifted to the ABF model starting in the early 1990s.

Indeed, after years of paying their hospitals a lump-sum annual budget for surgical care (like Alberta currently), other countries with universal health care recognized this form of payment encouraged hospitals to deliver fewer services by turning each patient into a cost to be minimized. The shift to ABF, which compensates hospitals for the actual services they provide, flips the script—hospitals in these countries now see patients as a source of revenue.

In fact, in many universal health-care countries, these reforms began so long ago that some are now on their second or even third generation of ABF, incorporating further innovations to encourage an even greater focus on quality.

For example, in Sweden in the early 1990s, counties that embraced ABF enjoyed a potential cost savings of 13 per cent over non-reforming counties that stuck with budgets. In Stockholm, one study measured an 11 per cent increase in hospital activity overall alongside a 1 per cent decrease in costs following the introduction of ABF. Moreover, according to the study, ABF did not reduce access for older patients or patients with more complex conditions. In England, the shift to ABF in the early to mid-2000s helped increase hospital activity and reduce the cost of care per patient, also without negatively affecting quality of care.

Multi-national studies on the shift to ABF have repeatedly shown increases in the volume of care provided, reduced costs per admission, and (perhaps most importantly for Albertans) shorter wait times. Studies have also shown ABF may lead to improved quality and access to advanced medical technology for patients.

Clearly, the naysayers who claim that ABF is some sort of new or untested reform, or that Albertans are heading down an unknown path with unmanageable and unexpected risks, are at the very least uninformed.

And what of those theoretical drawbacks?

Some critics claim that ABF may encourage faster discharges of patients to reduce costs. But they fail to note this theoretical drawback also exists under the current system where discharging higher-cost patients earlier can reduce the drain on hospital budgets. And crucially, other countries have implemented policies to prevent these types of theoretical drawbacks under ABF, which can inform Alberta’s approach from the start.

Critics also argue that competition between private clinics, or even between clinics and hospitals, is somehow a bad thing. But all of the developed world’s top performing universal health-care systems, with the best outcomes and shortest wait times, include a blend of both public and private care. No one has done it with the naysayers’ fixation on government provision.

And finally, some critics claim that, under ABF, private clinics will simply focus on less-complex procedures for less-complex patients to achieve greater profit, leaving public hospitals to perform more complex and thus costly surgeries. But in fact, private clinics alleviate pressure on the public system, allowing hospitals to dedicate their sophisticated resources to complex cases. To be sure, the government must ensure that complex procedures—no matter where they are performed—must always receive appropriate levels of funding and similarly that less-complex procedures are also appropriately funded. But again, the vast and lengthy experience with ABF in other universal health-care countries can help inform Alberta’s approach, which could then serve as an example for other provinces.

Alberta’s health-care system simply does not deliver for patients, with its painfully long wait times and poor access to physicians and services—despite its massive price tag. With its planned shift to activity-based funding, the province has embarked on a path to better health care, despite any false claims from the naysayers. Now it’s crucial for the Smith government to learn from the experiences of others and get this critical reform right.

Nadeem Esmail

Senior Fellow, Fraser Institute

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Group that added dozens of names to ballot in Poilievre’s riding plans to do it again

Published on May 7, 2025

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

The ‘Longest Ballot Committee’ is looking to run hundreds of protest candidates against Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre in an upcoming by-election in the Alberta.

A group called the “Longest Ballot Committee” is looking to run hundreds of protest candidates against Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre in an upcoming by-election in the Alberta Battle River–Crowfoot riding, just like they did in his former Ottawa-area Carelton riding in last week’s election.

The Longest Ballot Committee is a grassroots group that packs ridings with protest candidates and is looking to place 200 names in the Battle River–Crowfoot riding. The riding was won by Conservative-elect MP Damien Kurek who garnered over 80 percent of the vote, but has since said he is going to vacate his seat to allow Poilievre to run a by-election and reclaim his seat in Parliament in a Conservative-safe area.

In an email to its followers, the committee said “dozens and dozens” of volunteers are ready to sign up as candidates for the yet-to-be-called by-election. The initiative follows after the group did the same thing in Poilievre’s former Carelton riding which he lost last Monday, and which saw voters being given an extremely long ballot with 90 candidates.

The group asked people who want to run to send them their legal name and information by May 12, adding that if about 200 people sign up they will “make a long ballot happen.”