Summer begins!
Welcome to Summer, 2024! While we’ve experienced a cool start to summer following from a mild spring here in the Bow Valley, May, 2024 was the hottest recorded. All the more reason for us to feel inspired by the work we’re doing at the Biosphere Institute. We extend an open invitation for your involvement throughout the summer. Here are a few upcoming events that we look forward to seeing you at:
Monthly Climate Conversations - June 26, 2024
Join us for our series of Community Climate Conversations! No prior experience or knowledge is necessary—come out to find community connections, inspiration, and answers to some of the climate solutions that apply to the Bow Valley!
Bow Valley Climate Action and the Biosphere Institute of the Bow Valley will invite participants to share their climate concerns and questions and will create a safe space where you can learn, share, be inspired - and work together to create climate solutions that address your concerns.
When: Wednesday, June 26, 2024, 7 to 9 PM.
What: A discussion of Climate Friendly Gardening: tips on growing in this mountain climate, while minimizing environmental impacts.
Where: Office of Biosphere Institute of the Bow Valley, second floor of the Senior's Center in downtown Canmore: 201-600 9th St. Canmore, AB.
No need to RSVP – just show up with your questions, concerns, hopes, and enthusiasm as, together, we explore our climate challenges and opportunities and work together towards solutions!
Canmore Brew Co. Charity Tap!
Throughout the month of June, come by the Canmore Brew Co. for a pint for a good cause!
Our friends at the Canmore Brew Co. will be donating a portion of the profits of their featured charity tap to the Biosphere Institute! We are so grateful for this partnership and thank all who have been diligently sipping beers on our behalf!
Clean Commute Challenge!
Some great prizes have been given away already, but the grand prize remains!
Every day in June that you cycle, walk, take public transit, or use any other form of low-carbon transportation, tag us to be entered to win a draw for some awesome prizes, including a night for two at the Chateau Lake Louise Fairmont, a $200 gift certificate to Basecamp Resorts, and some local swag. All you need to do is follow and tag @Biosphere.Institute on Instagram to be entered. There are unlimited entries per person.
Brit and Grace showcasing their winnings; a $50 voucher to the Banff Hospitality Collective by commuting carbon-free.
Further Ahead…
The 2024 Building for Sustainability Symposium is Now Live!
We are thrilled to announce that registration is now open for the second annual Building for Sustainability symposium, held 27-28 October 2024 in beautiful Canmore, Alberta! Save 20% with our Early-bird registration special of $199 and gain full access to all symposium events, including:
Keynote address from Vivian Manasc: Old Stories, New Ways - collaborating to create regenerative buildings
Elected leaders panel (Mayors and Reeve of Calgary, Banff, Canmore, and MD Bighorn): What our communities are doing to accelerate Building for Sustainability
Reducing carbon while increasing housing – ideas and strategies to achieve emissions-neutral buildings, a panel discussion moderated by Emissions-Neutral Building Information Exchange (ENBIX)
Your choice of 12 exceptional workshops, highlighting best practices in Alberta and elsewhere in Canada
Closing comments by students: What we Heard; our call to Action
Full event catering including: breakfast, lunch, snacks and refreshments provided by the Malcolm Hotel's renowned hospitality
Choose from an exciting list of pre-symposium field trips in the Bow Valley on Sunday 27 October
Canmore Folk Festival
The Canmore Folk Festival is just around the corner. Happening August 3-5, an array of music and arts will be descending unto the Valley! We’ll be setting up a booth and are looking for active climate enthusiasts to help volunteer of the festival. Please get in touch should you be interested.
From the field: Recent Events
Green Building Open House
The Bow Valley’s annual Green Building Open House kicked off this month’s event calendar on June 1st. Over 350 visitors took to the 10 properties open around the Valley. An immense thank you to our hosts and sponsors who made the tour possible! We had Some great properties on showcase and are very glad to have connected people looking to make sustainable adjustments to their home. Many of which can save you money in the long-run.
Click here to see the full photo archive.
Songs for Climate
The Digital Hobo and Marten Borch rocked the Canmore Brew Co. on June 8th. Big thanks to all who joined us in exploring how music can connect us in community and inspire us to imagine new worlds, ways of relating and taking climate action.
Earth Talks
Caitlin Miller spoke presented at the Canmore Public Library, delving into “Disaster Preparedness in a Changing Climate” on June 17th.
Learning from Caitlin’s talk, here are five key things anyone can do as an individual living in Canmore to prepare for an emergency or disaster:
1) Be informed. Sign up to Voyent Alert (Canmore.ca/voyent) and visit Canmore.ca/emergencypreparedness
2) Prepare an emergency kit.
3) Make a personal/family emergency plan.
4) When you see a fire, report it immediately to 311-FIRE
5) Book a FREE Firesmart assessment for your home. Visit Canmore.ca/FireSmart and download the “Firesmart begins at Home” app.
Visit Alberta.ca/BePrepared for some excellent resources, videos and readings available in multiple languages.
Opinion Piece
Climate Change: Thinking Global, Action-Plan Local
By Trevor Anderson
Hot-off-the-press: just last week in June, 2024, the United Nations published a landmark study addressing public opinion on climate. In collaboration with the University of Oxford, the study is the largest international climate public opinion survey to have ever been conducted, and aims to assess the global perception, concern, and action satisfaction on climate change. 87% of the world’s population was represented by surveying over 73,000 people across 77 countries. The survey is a second edition of an earlier, smaller one conducted in 2021. It inquires into people’s lived experiences of climate change, their perceptions there of, their desired action from elected officials, and what they’d like to see on the international stage in regard to climate cooperation.
The study comes after a dramatic year of climate related disasters in 2023, including Canada’s worst forest fire season in recorded history. As many of us heard, witnessed, and lived, over 18 million hectors were scorched and impacted the Bow Valley with extensive periods of smoke throughout the summer. One example of many climate related disasters that were globally common throughout 2023. As such, it’s not surprising that the views of Canadians in this study are largely aligned with the broader globe. Some interesting points of differentiation however, are evident within major personal decision points, national action, and international commitments as shown in the graphs below.
So, why is all of this relevant? 2024 is an immense year for politics: nearly half of the world’s population will be heading to the polls and Canada could be among them should an election be announced ahead of its October 2025 deadline. More locally however, the Town of Canmore will be presenting its draft Climate Emergency Action Plan to Council on July 2nd, 2024. This is climate leadership in action and is a piece of an immensely large puzzle. A puzzle that you as an individual get to have a say in. How do your views compare to the UN’s study? How are your views represented in the Town’s Draft Climate Emergency Action Plan? Where do you see yourself within the transformation that the Town of Canmore envisions? What opportunities do you think might arise from their proposed ideas that could make a difference in your own life? Click the link below to subscribe to project updates and stay in the know of climate action happening from the Town of Canmore. Reach out and connect with us at the Biosphere to learn more ways of getting involved.
