Green Technology Industry Leaders Roundtable

Vancouver Economic Development Commission
June 15, 2009, 12:00 – 2:00 p.m.
Shangri-La Hotel, Vancouver, BC 

Summary/Key Points
  • Vancouver has a major opportunity to brand itself as a green city, and has significant assets on which to build
    • Goals need to be clearly articulated, and tangible results are needed if city is to live up to its brand promise
  • The immediate imperative is advancing demonstration projects that will showcase the region’s innovative firms, and build capacity:
    • Many projects already underway: at UBC and elsewhere
    • Projects can help train City staff and change the culture from one of restrictive regulation to one of strategic innovation and problem-solving
  • The private sector is in the business of implementation, and needs a municipal partner committed to the same
    • The City of Vancouver has the opportunity to tap into world-leading expertise to achieve its Greenest City goals, as well as grow the local economy and provide green jobs
    • Firms will put their talents to use elsewhere if implementation is difficult in Vancouver.  Leading green tech firms are fielding ongoing requests from other cities, particularly in the U.S., to move to their jurisdictions
  • Through its Greenest City Action Plan, the economic development strategy being developed by VEDC, and other activities, the City is moving quickly to put in place policies and actions that will be more supportive of green technology firms.  Information about the City’s work in this area needs to be distributed more widely

Attendees

Frank Came, BCEIA
Maureen Connelly, BCIT
Tom Douglas, Discovery Parks
Bruce Irvine, HB Lanarc
Phil Heard, VEDC
Bruce Hemstock, PWL Partnership
Neil Huff, Tekion
Jonathan Kassian, VEDC
Eileen Kennan, Bing Thom Architects
Julien LaFaille, Office of the Chief Technology Officer, BC Hydro
Alex Lau, Golden Properties, Greenest City Action Team (GCAT) member
Lee Malleau, VEDC
Gail McBride, PowerSmart, BC Hydro
Blair McCarry, Stantec
Linda Nowlan, VEDC Board member, GCAT member
Dan Paris, VanCity Enterprises
Eamonn Percy, CEO, Power Tech Labs
Jonathan Rhone, Nexterra
Jeetesh Rup, Sauder School of Business, UBC
Melina Scholefield, Sustainability Group, City of Vancouver
Julian Taylor, Intuit Strategies & VEDC
John Tylee, VEDC
James Tansey, Centre for Sustainability and Social Innovation & Offsetters
Juvarya Warsi, Light House Green Building Centre 

Proceedings
 
Phil Heard opened the meeting at 12:15 p.m. noting that ensuring a strong green sector in Vancouver was vital for 3 reasons:
  • It is the fastest-growing sector of the world economy
  • Vancouver has strong assets on which to capitalize
  • This area will be critical to our ability to address climate change, here and abroad
VEDC was working to support the City of Vancouver’s Greenest City Action Team (GCAT), and had assembled industry participants to provide input into the GCAT’s actions and a green economy strategy that would also be an important part of VEDC’s economic development strategy for the City of Vancouver. VEDC had produced sector profiles and a Google-maps accessible map of demonstrated green technologies in the region, available here. Participants were happy with the quality of the report.
 
Using Demonstration Projects to Advance the Sector
Jonathan Rhone (CEO, Nexterra Energy) and Dr. James Tansey (CEO, Offsetters; Sauder School of Business) gave an overview of progress in the British Columbia clean tech industry.  While Vancouver has been a great place to innovate, many companies have had to look elsewhere to find jurisdictions that were willing to take the risk of being early adopters. 
 
However, the BC industry is starting to coalesce, with the provincial government, BC Hydro, the universities and firms beginning to develop partnerships. Dr. Tansey described the Living Laboratory experiment at UBC, where a non-residential community with high building turnover will be used as a demonstration platform for new technologies with climate benefits, showcasing local tech offerings and simultaneously training students. No city has yet claimed the “clean tech test bed” space, and Vancouver has an opportunity to do so.
 
Achieving this vision will require overcoming a culture at City Hall that is widely perceived as resisting implementation of innovative technologies and processes. Participants felt that the City could benefit enormously by training inspection and permitting staff, and becoming a center of excellence in municipal government innovation. This would help build the sense of excitement around creating a green city, and the private sector would be able to pursue innovative solutions without fear of costly processing delays and automatic rejection of permit applications.
 
A number of major activities to make changes in this area were already underway at City Hall, including but not limited to the work of the Greenest City Action Team and the Sustainability Office. While recognizing that perceptions cannot be quickly changed until clear results could be shown, it was important for the City to share more information about changes underway.
 
Branding a Green City, Setting Goals
Linda Nowlan spoke about the Greenest City Action Team, which has commissioned a review of Green Tape in the city as part of its Quick Start recommendations, which includes some ongoing initiatives such as  a review of regulatory barriers to constructing Living Buildings within the city, such as the new Van Dusen botanical gardens building. She noted that other cities had clearly articulated their “green” brand, whether it is San Jose’s “clean tech capital” 2020 plan, or London’s “low carbon capital”. 
 
The private sector noted that it was nearly impossible to hypothetically predict all barriers, and that what was really needed was a process of learning by doing that started with a willingness to see projects through to completion. Participants noted that those cities that truly deliver on their brand promise will be those who succeed. Currently, companies in Vancouver are having trouble attracting talent, who are looking at jurisdictions being targeted by stimulus packages. This makes the demonstration project imperative that much more pressing.
 
UBC’s project showed the ability of institutions to use projects to make a quantum leap forward – GE had previously been looking everywhere but BC, but its partnership with Nexterra presented an opportunity not only to implement a project, but to give UBC more hands-on involvement in the clean tech space.
 
Credibility was identified as key – try new things, show off your successes, and never hide your mistakes. Attention-getting projects are a key to advancing the markers immediately, and over the longer term broader implementation must follow if larger targets are to be met. One relevant example was Portland’s incenting of green roofs in order to reduce stress on its municipal sewer infrastructure, which operates in the same way as Vancouver’s.
 
2010 will provide an opportunity to show off Vancouver’s achievements. On a simple level, setting targets that conform to recognized standards will help with communicating achievements internationally. It will also be important that the Greenest City be a project with widespread buy-in, meaning that a diverse array of participants will need to be engaged. This will require creating an experience
 
Next Steps
A follow-up meeting to discuss progress was proposed for the fall. By that time the Greenest City Action Team and the green economy part of VEDC’s economic development strategy should be firmed up enough to discuss in detail.  
 
The meeting was adjourned at 2 p.m.