Our green research success stories

Canada has committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.

To help meet this goal, the NRC's Construction Research Centre and Energy, Mining and Environment Research Centre lead the Low-carbon assets through life cycle assessment initiative, a collaboration between federal government departments, academia, non-government organizations, industry and low-carbon asset experts from across Canada.

The initiative aims to develop a science-based approach for supporting the selection of construction materials and designs that offer the lowest carbon footprint with the lowest total cost.

The Advanced Manufacturing program team is leading the Canadian Lightweight Initiative on Polymer Glazings.

Known as CLIP Glazings, this initiative gathers partners from industry across the transportation supply chain and the public sector to develop high performance polymers to replace conventional glazings for cars and buses, made from tempered or laminated glass.

The use of lighter and more durable material makes it possible to reduce the weight of vehicle glazings by around 50%, which improves energy efficiency for both combustion engine and electric vehicles.

Pulses grown in Canada are considered sustainable, and assessing Canadian pulse processing methods to limit water use, improve energy efficiency and reduce negative impacts on the environment requires credible and representative data.

The NRC's Aquatic and Crop Resource Development Research Centre, in collaboration with the University of British Columbia, are creating a national life cycle inventory database, which will include pulse proteins like beans, lentils and peas. Pulse processing companies will help generate industry-level datasets and confidential sustainability assessments.

This database will enable life cycle analysis with the help of McGill University to identify sustainability gaps and process improvements to support both environmentalism and economic development.

Sustainable forest management requires high-quality information on tree species, biomass and growth rates. The ability to do this is limited not by data, but by the ability to extract this information from very large, complex datasets.

The NRC's Digital Technologies Research Centre, through the Digital Health and Geospatial Analytics Cluster Support program is working on deep learning algorithms that can extract this information from a wide range of remote sensing and other geographic data. This work has the potential to improve forest management practices and measure the impacts of climate change.

24% of Canada's greenhouse gas emissions come from everyday transportation-related activities. The electrification of public transportation is an important step to meet national sustainability goals while targeting one of the largest sources of GHG emissions.

In collaboration with Transport Canada and the Toronto Transit Commission, the Automotive and Surface Transportation Research Centre is conducting North America's largest electric bus trials in the City of Toronto. This research brings Canada closer to a green public transit system.

Since 2016, the NRC has undertaken the Climate-Resilient Buildings and Core Public Infrastructure (CRBCPI) Initiative, with $42.5 million in funding support from Infrastructure Canada. Over the past 5 years, the initiative has worked to develop decision-support tools such as national model codes, guides, standards, and climate design data, which will help ensure buildings and core public infrastructure are designed and built to withstand the effects of climate change in Canada. More information about the project outcomes to date are available on the CRBCPI webpage.

Methane is responsible for 30% of the global rise in temperatures and for about 13% of Canada's total greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing methane emissions will help combat climate change. Detection and measurement are essential to quantifying the current state and future reductions. Our experts from the Metrology Research Centre and from the Advanced Electronics and Photonics Research Centre have been developing laser-based technologies to detect greenhouse gases. The mid infrared region of the spectrum has sharp absorption peaks for many pollutants, and our researchers developed spectroscopic sensors that can detect the peaks associated with methane and quantify the concentration of methane with very high sensitivity.

To help Canada reduce plastic waste and create business opportunities in the new sector of sustainable products, NRC experts in polymers developed formulations, prototypes and applications using a 100% bio-based and compostable polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA)-based resin produced by Bosk Bioproducts. This collaboration has enabled the company to manufacture entirely compostable bioplastics made from pulp and paper industry waste. The commercialization of Bosk's first line of products on a pre-industrial scale was announced in April 2021.

Microplastics are everywhere, and although at times they can barely be seen with the naked eye, the threat they pose can't be ignored. Under the Innovative Solutions Canada (ISC) program, the NRC launched a challenge to address this threat. More specifically, Canadian companies are challenged to propose a solution that will enable researchers to better identify microplastic particles in our waters. Two companies received Phase 1 funding as a result of their proposal. If successful with their proposed solution, these companies could receive Phase 2 funding to develop a prototype. This challenge shows the positive impact of collaboration between the Government of Canada and industry on innovative technology.

Ocean heating tracks the evolution of climate change. This knowledge is essential in improving climate change quantification and predictions. Ultra-accurate thermometry is required to monitor ocean temperature change, but measuring the temperature in oceans is quite challenging. Given its crucial importance in quantifying global warming and in predicting the future climate evolution, the monitoring of deep-ocean temperature changes can be enhanced by increasing the level of accuracy in its measurement. This is where the NRC's Metrology Research Centre can help to make sure the measurements are as accurate as possible.

Aviation is one of the fastest-growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions driving global climate change. The NRC's Metrology Research Centre is working on a pioneering study to investigate the impacts of sustainable aviation fuel on aircraft engine emissions and performance to reduce greenhouse gas and black carbon emissions. Using sustainable aviation fuels will result in significant life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions reductions. It will also have immediate impacts on non-CO2 emissions, such as black carbon, which are a large part of the total climate effects of aviation emissions.

The Advanced Electronics and Photonics Research Centre develops novel components in support of the telecommunications industry's ever-increasing data rate requirements. This technology is the backbone of the digital economy where physical transactions are replaced by virtual ones, reducing the need for physical transport. Growing demands for data have dramatically increased power consumption in data centres. In response, the Centre is also developing a new generation of semiconductor laser technologies that allow the transport of data with less power, helping to decrease carbon emissions per transmitted bits.

Since Canada has more than 200,000 kilometres of coastline and a vast network of rivers, the NRC's Ocean, Coastal and River Engineering Research Centre has been studying how to refine and quantify the country's extensive water resource opportunities. Once the most promising sites are identified and verified, extraction technologies such as tidal, river or wave-energy converters can be deployed to produce useful energy to power urban centres and remote communities. Reducing our dependence on fossil fuels will serve to reduce ocean acidification which will create a healthier ocean.