... for the Canadian economy
Most Indigenous peoples and nations are not opposed to resource development. In fact, almost every Indigenous community is involved at some level in forestry, commercial fishing, agriculture, oil and gas or mining already. What we are opposed to is being left out. For over a century, resources were extracted from our territories without our say…
And stop undermining our role as a trusted resource supplier
In early June, the economics team at the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) published a revised forecast for Canada and the 10 provinces. The good news is that notwithstanding slowing global growth, soaring inflation and escalating geopolitical tensions, Canada seems reasonably well positioned to navigate its way through the rest of 2022 and into next…
Engineering projects explore three ways to turn a component of bitumen into carbon fibre
Carbon fibre is strong, light and resistant to corrosion, making it ideal for composites used in various products. Think of wheelchairs, bikes, buses, construction materials and more. Unfortunately, it’s expensive to produce. That’s a problem three researchers in the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Engineering – Cagri Ayranci, Kevin Hodder and Zhi Li – are trying to solve by…
Underpinning it all, like the safety net to a secure supply, will be fossil fuels
The kingdom of Queen Elizabeth I was humming along quite nicely when, around the mid-1500s, Her Majesty caught wind of an environmental crisis in the offing. The forests were disappearing. Wood was the first energy source and had been so for millenniums. But kilns of industry and hearths of homes had been eating up the…
Discovery that technology is viable moves it closer to becoming part of a low-carbon economy
University of Alberta research is making new strides in discoveries about capturing and storing carbon – while yielding a high-value end product from carbon dioxide. A process that injects the greenhouse gas deep below ground, then circulates it to extract heat and geothermal energy, has proven viable in a feasibility study by U of A…
Vital learning experience – a rite of passage for the past 50 years – reimagined for safety and sustainability
By the time Ben Strelkov started high school, the self-described “city kid” assumed that once he was in the workforce, he’d be confined to an office, doing basically the same thing every workday. His summer job following Grade 10 shattered the illusion. “I spent the whole time in northern Alberta – building trails, helping communities…
Nano humus works like a sponge that attaches to and holds cadmium, a common byproduct of mining
A low-value byproduct of the coal mining process is proving highly effective at helping reclaim the land and water used in mining, University of Alberta research shows. Nano humus, a substance extracted from coal mine deposits and then crushed to a black, powdery material, has “outstanding physical and chemical properties” that remove heavy metals from…
University's analytical facilities and expertise are second to none, as are its collaborative ties with industry
In the early 2000s, one of the large islands that make up the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, Banks Island, was buzzing as teams from the world’s top diamond companies trudged around the barren tundra looking for evidence of diamonds. One organization encountered a big enough hint of what might lie below that they had equipment on…
Wind and solar power won't magically eliminate the threats to our environment
Baruch Spinoza, a 17th-century philosopher, said the future and anything we can say about it is imaginary. He was right. Despite our best efforts to foresee what the future will bring, we really don’t know what is forthcoming until the future becomes the present. The challenge of climate change has focused our attention on what…
The work of the $4-million endowed position will help inform forest companies as they sustainably manage land for timber and biodiversity
Robert Froese can tell you the exact moment he knew forestry would be his lifelong career. He was an undergraduate student at the University of British Columbia, standing in the forest with his classmates. “My professor went crashing into the woods … and he came back with a big Douglas-fir branch,” said Froese. “It was rainy…