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PRAC Being Climate Smart

Workshop Report

March 31, 2017

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Table of Contents

Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 2

Participation ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 3

Presenters and Trade Show Exhibitors ............................................................................................................................................... 4

Round Table Discussion and Results ................................................................................................................................................... 8

Workshop recommendations ........................................................................................................................................................... 10

Appendices........................................................................................................................................................................................ 11

Workshop Evaluation Results ........................................................................................................................................................... 16

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Introduction

Eco-West Canada, in collaboration with Manitoba Climate Change and Air Quality Branch (CCAQ), collaborated on a one-day workshop “Being Climate Smart: Evidence-based decision making for municipalities” on March 21, 2017, at the Canad Inns Destination Centre in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba.

The overall goal of the workshop was to increase knowledge on climate change impacts and to provide municipalities with information, best practices and tools to help increase municipal resilience to extreme weather events.

This report provides an overview of the workshop and its participants, presenters and round table discussion results. Included is the hand-out document provided to all attendees and the workshop evaluation survey results.

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Participation

Eco-West Canada contacted over 220 municipal contacts by email, using Eventbrite. Promotion of the workshop was also done by the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) and by various social media means.

There were 75 participants at the workshop including speakers and other participants. The participant breakdown is:

25 Councillors

4 Mayors/Reeves

9 Chief Administrative Officers

4 other municipal staff

Over 20 municipalities were represented:

City of Morden

City of Portage-la-Prairie

City of Winkler

LUD of Notre-Dame-de-Lourdes (RM of Lorne)

Municipality of Emerson-Franklin

RM of Alexander

RM of Cartier

RM of Elton

RM of Morris

RM of Norfolk-Trehern

RM of Ritchot

RM of St. Clements

RM of Thompson

RM of Victoria

RM of Wallace-Woodworth

Town of Altona

Town of Morris

Town of Virden

Village of Dunnottar

Village of St-Pierre-Jolys

Other organizations represented include:

Brandon University – Rural Development Institute

La Salle Redboine Conservation District

Manitoba Conservation District Association

Pembina Valley Water Coop

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Presenters and Trade Show Exhibitors

The workshop included 7 presenters:

Danny Blair, Prairie Climate Centre: Climate Change Projections for Decision-Makers

Dr. Blair noted that the year 2016 was the warmest on record (1880-2016) and there is an overwhelming amount of evidence indicating that global warming/climate change is attributable to greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. Unfortunately, most people in the Prairie Provinces do not yet fully know how the climate of the region is expected to occur in the coming decades and how these changes may affect them. The Prairie Climate Centre at the University of Winnipeg has created an online atlas (climateatlas.ca) to raise awareness about the changes that are projected for the region, and to provide decision-makers with the easy-to-understand and locally-relevant climate data they need to make their communities and operations more resilient to the risks presented by climate change.

Derek Murray, Scatliff + Miller + Murray: Planning for Climate Change – Water on the Land The presentation contrasted the differences between traditional stormwater retention ponds and those built as constructed wetlands. Comparisons included construction costs, short and long term maintenance costs and environmental benefits. Advances in green technologies with regard to sewage lagoons were also discussed.

Dany Robidoux, Eco-West Canada: Adaptation and Climate Resilience - Translating knowledge into action “Climate resilience is the ability to survive and prosper in the face of the new climate reality. Adaptation is a key tool to achieving climate resilience, and is about making informed, forward-looking decisions. Implementing effective adaptation measures will save lives, minimize damages, and lower costs over the long term for individuals, businesses, organizations and government.’’ Although the scope and magnitude of the impacts related to severe climatic events varies from one community to another, communities and municipalities can become more resilient through the sharing of relevant knowledge and lessons learned with their peers.

Hank Venema, Prairie Climate Centre: Green infrastructure project in Virden and area Dr. Hank Venema introduced the concept of precision green infrastructure for climate adaptation, climate mitigation and other economic development objectives. Precision Infrastructure extends the precision agriculture concept to larger geographic regions and for larger-scale sustainability objectives. It also applies green infrastructure design principles for large-scale application on agricultural landscapes. Precision infrastructure based on multi-functional

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surface water retention networks addresses fundamental climate risks and opportunities including higher temperatures, more heat units, and higher frequency oscillation between flood and drought conditions. The full value proposition of precision infrastructure investments includes flood and drought resilience, irrigation, water quality improvements, greenhouse gas mitigation and precision harvesting of high-value biomaterials. A case study from Manitoba demonstrates the logic for aggregating large numbers of precision infrastructure projects to access global capital markets, including through the Climate Bonds Initiative certification process.

Tim Sopuck, Manitoba Heritage Habitat Corporation: Surface Water Management: Is there a Brighter Future for Manitobans? Looking back at the history of surface water management, where the focus has been on drainage, the question going forward is complicated by what we know about the impacts of climate change. Can we do a better job of surface water management, especially knowing that we must adapt to more extreme events, and the reality that the last 150 years of plumbing is adding to the challenge?

More storage of water, on-farm and at the sub-watershed scales, will be required. This will assist with management of extremes of flooding and drought, both of which are expected to become worse over time. Water retention activities can be in the form of wetland restoration as well as creation of farm and community-scale water retention projects. At a sufficient density, these projects will reduce flood peaks, as well as provide water sources, especially for agriculture, in dry years. These activities also capture nutrients and other contaminants in surface waters, thereby improving water quality and biological diversity. Economic opportunities may also accrue from the harvest of biomass materials in these areas.

When surface water management is considered, attention also needs to be paid to management of uplands. More perennial cover – hay, forage, natural habitats, buffer strips – as well as conservation tillage, will provide significant benefits to surface water management and climate change adaptation.

Nicki Albus, Manitoba Emergency Measures Organization Training Program Manager: Integrating Climate Change into Municipal Emergency Preparedness Programs

Nicki Albus stated that Emergency Preparedness Programs are based on the concept of ‘all-hazards’, yet there is no special requirement to prepare for climate change. Despite this gap, first responders and emergency managers are dealing with the immediate impacts of climate change simply by its nature. The “surprise!” nature of climate change impacts drag emergency managers and responders into the mix sometimes based merely on the fact that we follow an adaptable incident management structure. Climate change may not be a traditional focus of emergency management but that is evolving into a short term/near future look at what we can do on a parallel track with other climate change studies.

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Some steps to strengthen preparedness programs at the municipal level with a view to climate change include: changing the historical thought process by basing plans on current information, providing science to the local level, strengthening mutual aid agreements, collaborating on mitigation efforts, and including the public in decision making.

Gavin van der Linde, Eco-West Canada: New Green Municipal Funds - FCM funding programs

Gavin van der Linde described how significant shifts in weather patterns are already underway in many regions of Canada. Storms of greater intensity and frequency, record-setting droughts and larger-than-normal surges in sea levels pose particular challenges for municipalities. In addition to these challenges resulting from climate change, many of the municipal services that residents use every-day—drinking water, sewage treatment and roads—rely on infrastructure that is near or past its intended lifecycle and was never designed to withstand rapid changes in climate patterns. The Municipalities for Climate Innovation Program (MCIP) is a five-year, $75-million program that helps municipalities prepare for, and adapt to, climate change, and to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs). Delivered by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) and funded by the Government of Canada, MCIP is available to all municipalities and their partners. The type of initiatives the program supports include:

- The assessment of the vulnerability to flooding of buildings in a neighbourhood. - Ways to reduce GHG emissions from waste collection trucks by optimizing routes and

reducing the frequency of garbage and recycling pick-up. - Plans to encourage residents to use less polluting forms of transportation by encouraging

cycling, walking and transit. - The impact of a municipal policy change, such as a no-idling policy.

MCIP aims to maximize the impacts of new federal investments in municipal infrastructure. During its five-year lifespan, the program will enable more than 600 municipalities and partner organizations to build their capacity to reduce GHG emissions and adapt to climate change.

Roger Rempel, Climate Group, Risk Sciences International: The Critical Need for Community Climate Resilience: Overview of community impacts, with approaches and tools to reduce disruptive climate risks Roger Rempel’s presentation highlighted that municipalities are entering an era of highly disruptive changes: growing urbanization, growth in senior populations, autonomous vehicles and manufacturing, and shifts to sustainable energy. Of these changes, none are more disruptive than climate change. The presentation outlined the physical impacts of climate change to the built environment, related critical services and health/well-being in communities. When climate ranges shift away from historical ranges experienced in the past, this causes changes in the operating environment for engineered assets and environmental systems. The impacts from these changes do not increase linearly, resulting in small changes potentially inducing escalating property and asset

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damage. The response to these impacts is resiliency planning and identifying climate vulnerabilities through credible assessment. The presentation introduced several frameworks to assess a municipality’s climate risk, ranging from qualitative to data-driven processes, emphasizing that there are different approaches that can be applied successfully depending on the data holdings that are available. Even screening level assessment through workshops will provide useful insight into community vulnerabilities, allowing a prioritized plan to reduce community climate risks. Roger also provided a summary of currently available tools in climate change impact assessment, including RSI’s Climate Change Hazards Information Portal (CCHIP) – a tool now used extensively across several departments within the Government of Canada, the Prairie Climate Centre’s Climate Atlas, and other specialized tools. Some of these tools can be obtained through funding via the National Disaster Mitigation Program.

Industry experts were also on-hand to highlight state-of-the-art green technology and offer real solutions to common municipal concerns:

AC/DC Utility – Renewal energy solutions

Eco-Solutions - organic, environmentally safe de-icing, dust control, fertilizer and pesticide products

Manitoba Conservation District Association

Winnipeg Environmental Remediations Inc.

Sycamore Energy – Renewable energy solutions

Manitoba Sustainable Energy Association

XP3 Fuel Additive

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Round Table Discussion and Results

Following the presentations, participants were grouped by table to answer six questions that would then help to inform the approach that Manitoba municipalities could take to support their climate adaptation efforts. These questions and the responses provided by participants are stated below.

1. What have been the most significant climate or weather-related impacts in your community in the past 3-5 years?

Loss of agricultural land

Soil erosion

Crop loss or drainage

Roads - washout

Flood 2011-2014

Flooding 2011, 2013, 2014

Flooding – economic impact

Landslide from soil saturation

Extreme weather: snow storms causing road closures, hydro outages, ice storms

Intense storms: rain, snow, wind

Snow storms emergency

Drought – water supply

2. What are key challenges, barriers, constraints for communities to implement climate smart practices? Either mitigation or adaptation.

Funding

Finance

Conservation products

Knowledge

$$$

money: education, training, resources (lack of land and tools), acceptance, “buy-in” of climate change and what the solutions should be

strengthen building regulations to design on private property

3. What factors need to be in place in your community to help you be climate smart? (Allows you to adapt and be resilient.)

Environmental conscience

Plan

Education for council and staff and tax payers

Money

Education

Resources to understand what areas should be considered – priorities

$$$

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Plans to implement

Workforce, human resource to implement

Financial incentive

Public awareness

Education – planning district, individual

4. Who should be leading climate adaptation in MB? What are their roles?

P3s: Public, private, gov’t partnership

Conservation districts to educate

Provincial government to implement (direction), to fund

People (younger group) setting an example through living

Grass roots – full involvement of people

All levels of government: o Federal and provincial there for advisory and funding o Municipal should be there for identifying the local needs and priorities

5. What is currently being done in your community that is contributing to resiliency and how?

Redundancy of hydro/power

Interconnection of water pipelines

Increasing knowledge on topic

Planning waste water treatment plant

Planning green waste water lagoon

Town and RM are working with Eco-West to update our climate change adaptation plan & obtain funding towards the establishment of water retention areas, etc.

After each event, flooding, snow storms, etc., we have learned more and used that information for the next event

6. How would you integrate resiliency planning into existing planning frameworks?

Water stewardship

Conservation district

With development plan (planning districts)

Resiliency should be a higher priority so it doesn’t get removed by cost cutting measures

What other climate events can impact us

Continue to integrate “no build” zones into identified flood low level areas as identified in our development & zoning by-laws as being around water or surface water sensitive areas

Incorporate more building restrictions, i.e.: no basements

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Workshop recommendations

Municipalities want to do their part regarding climate change. Feedback provided from participants demonstrate that they are knowledgeable on climate change and mostly believe in the science. While there is confusion around some terminology, including climate change adaptation and mitigation, more information needs to be provided on concrete actions instead of high level theory or definitions. All participants who responded to the workshop evaluation indicate a willingness to participate in similar future workshops based on concrete actions. The value for future forums would be based on real life scenarios and examples from Manitoba communities impacted by climate-related disasters and how the communities mitigated the disasters. Example of situations to be highlighted could include the Vita fires, flooding in Brandon and the Elie F5 tornado. Future workshop collaborations with the FCM on asset management, climate adaptation and mitigation funding programs and past projects would also be extremely valuable for municipalities and would allow them to learn about best practices from around Canada.

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Appendices

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Workshop Evaluation Results

Scale: Poor 1 2 3 4 5 Excellent

Total responses

1. Materials provided ..................................................... 0 0 6 7 5 18

2. Content of workshop sessions .................................... 0 0 3 10 5 18

3. Speakers/presenters

a. Danny Blair, IISD .............................................. 0 0 3 5 10 18

b. Scatliff + Miller + Murray ................................ 0 0 1 12 5 18

c. Dany Robidoux, Eco-West Canada ................. 0 0 6 7 5 18

d. Hank Venema, Prairie Climate Centre .. .......... 0 0 4 6 8 18

e. Tim Sopuck, MB Heritage Habitat Corp. ......... 0 2 6 4 5 17

f. Nicki Albus, EMO ............................................ 0 2 4 8 4 18

g. Gavin van der Linde, Eco-West Canada ........... 0 0 4 5 5 14

h. Roger Rempel, Climate Group ........................ 0 1 3 7 4 15

4. Relevancy of issues to your Municipality .................... 0 0 6 7 6 17

5. Length of workshop ..................................................... 0 2 5 8 4 19

6. Variety of workshop sessions ..................................... 0 1 8 5 5 19

7. Price ............................................................................ 0 1 3 4 7 15

8. Trade show exhibits .................................................... 0 3 8 5 2 18

9. Workshop facilities ..................................................... 0 2 5 9 3 19

10. Workshop timing ....................................................... 0 1 4 8 5 19

11. What were your goals in attending the workshop? E.g. learn, network, make better decisions, etc.… - To stay abreast of current data

- Information

- Gain more knowledge about climate

change and the effects

- Learn

- Make better decisions

- Network

- Better decisions

- To learn so am able to make better

decisions

- Learn and discuss options

- Network, learn a general overview of

climate change, hurdles to come

- Listen

- Not sure. First one for me.

- Learn about available programs and

funding

- Learn, network

- Learn about programs, funding

- Learn

- Learn and network

- Learn and make better decisions

- Very informative

- Good initiative for Eco-Ouest to organize

this session

- Learn, proceed with our project, lagoon,

pond!

- Meet municipal leader

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12. Did you achieve your goals? ……………………………Yes No Total responses

18 0 18

13. What did you like least about the workshop? Why?

- High on problems, low on solutions and possibilities

- Perhaps too lengthy

- Some material was duplicated

- Was quite repetitive. Information was good but maybe should have had speakers collaborate

beforehand.

- Some of the material was a little dry

- Lunch

- Great speakers, good facility – not too many people

- Lunch… $50 for craft dinner??? But good presenters

- Similar info by 3 presenters

- length

14. Would you like more information about climate change adaptation going forward?

………………………………………………………………………Yes No Total responses

10 3 13

15. Would you attend a similar climate change-related workshop in the future?

………………………………….……………………………………Yes No Total responses

16 0 16 - maybe

If yes, what kind of topics would you like to see addressed?

- Some nearby stories from ongoing problems documented to resolve - Same - Practical application - Pro-active actions for water management - How to reduce carbon footprint, greenhouse gases, etc. - More on the science of global warming - More of the same - Very informative! But we need to inform the public (news, tv, radio, open to public) - Advantages of climate change - Climate change and human migration

16. Do you need assistance in accessing funding opportunities for climate adaptation initiatives?

………………….…………………………………………………Yes No Total responses

5 6 11

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If yes, please specify the type of assistance: - always - grants

17. Other comments?

- Nice room layout

- Lunch was carbs

- Something more dietary savvy

- Lots of information. Kind of heavily weighted to present argument about reality climate change. Perhaps

more what do we do now.

- Copies of presentation at conference would assist in following along with presentations

- Great conference

- Very good session

- Like I said, we need to inform the public!

- It was great! Thanks for inviting me. Look forward to doing this again!

- Nice packages

- Heard Dany Blair 2x before

- Roger Rempel presentation: way too much detail

- Trade show was great but not related to sessions

- Roger Rempel presentation: very long!