Ozone: How does it impact you?
Aish Ravi Shankar — June 22, 2022
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At Sierra Club Ontario, our work mainly focuses on protecting the Great Lakes ecosystem, increasing awareness about air pollution, and promoting Green Energy adoption in Ontario. Sierra Club Ontario also works on very local issues, in coordination with smaller communities in Ontario.
Members of our Peel Group were out at Bike the Creek this past weekend to support sustainability in the Peel region and talk about their work with the Sierra Club.
Bike the Creek is an annual Peel-based cycling event to promote a culture of active transportation in the community.
Peel members supported the event's Eco Station to make the event as waste-free as possible. Members also provided guidance to the public on recycling and composting best practices.
It's that time again!
We are excited to announce that our National Hike for Nature is coming up at the beginning of July.
This is Sierra Club Canada Foundation's annual peer-to-peer fundraiser where you can raise funds for our Ontario Chapter, just by taking a hike!
The Sierra Club (both in the U.S. and Canada) is part of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), winner of the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize.
In Memory of Alicja Rozanska.
From John Bacher:
The health of the great lake of Ontario, which is a Seneca translation of the words Beautiful Clear Lake, is one of the significant issues facing the province for which it is named. In the watershed of the Great Lakes live most of Ontario’s people. The health of the Great Lakes and its tributaries are threatened by the curses of urban sprawl and expressways.
The World Environment Day is tomorrow. What is it and what can you do to help?
With Ontario election 2022 well underway we asked the major provincial political parties a series of questions on the environment. Below you will find their answers.
In Memory of Alicja Rozanska.
From John Bacher:
Critical environmental indicators, which should send warning signals at the polls, are the fate of native cold-water fisheries. These are important warning signals of pollution since self-supporting cold-water fisheries will not survive in polluted environments. What should send alarm bells off on election day is the fate of Lake Simcoe’s Lake Trout.
This is a key election for the environment and the future of Ontario. We can no longer afford to wait for the government to catch up on meaningful climate action. Sierra Club Canada Foundation is demanding stronger legislation that prioritizes people, the environment, and a liveable future.
Below you will find the actions our members are calling for. You can reference this document for discussion when local candidates come to your door. Ask your local candidates what they plan to do to tackle the issues Ontarians are facing.
Sierra Club Canada Foundation's Ontario Chapter has joined a coalition of over 125 groups across Ontario in calling upon candidates in the upcoming provincial election to treat climate change as an emergency.
This election is critical for Ontario and for Canada. Now more than ever, we need strong action and leadership on climate change.
The Ontario Climate Emergency Campaign encourages diverse groups from every sector to urgently work together towards our shared climate action goals.
We are looking for a new Ontario representative to join our Board of Directors.
We are also recruiting new committee members to join our national committees.
Interested? Click to learn more.
In Memory of Alicja Rozanska.
***Scroll down to reach out to local councilors
From John Bacher:
It is an old but true saying that photographs express threats to the natural world more vividly than the most eloquent warning. Some of these images recently emerged, which captured the beauty of the portion of the Thundering Waters Forest in Niagara Falls, on the eve of its destruction for a subdivision.
Environmental racism is ingrained into the colonial systems of Canada. This is a fact. And the reality of the colonial systems we have in place disproportionately affects Black, Indigenous and other people of colour in a multitude of ways, at every level, in almost every space. That is the way colonial systems are designed.
Our Breathe Easy campaign recently hosted a webinar with Health Canada's Dr. Errol Thomson to learn about the effects of air pollution on our health
In Memory of Alicja Rozanska.
The Federation of Tiny Township Shoreline Association (FoTTSA), a group of concerned citizens from Tiny Township, organized a protest to bring attention at Queen’s Park Legislation on United Nations World Water Day (March 22, 2022) about the quality of aquifers being threatened by aggregate mining in North Simcoe County. Around noon, the last speaker at their rally which had scientists, activisits, citizens, politicians and Native people speaking out for the protection of their aquifers, was Native elder Danny Beaton, a Turtle Clan Mohawk.
In Memory of Alicja Rozanska.
From John Bacher:
Over the past week and a half, there has been a Carolinian tree massacre by bulldozer underway in Niagara. A preliminary report, completed on August 11, 2021, by Nash Colville of Colville Consulting Inc. provides a rough description of the damage.
The Niagara region's new Official Plan threatens to promote urban sprawl, degrading key habitats for endangered species and impacting the region's thriving agricultural community.
These plans have been made without any scientific due diligence to assess the impact of pushing development outside of urban areas.
Dr. John Bacher recently spoke to the region's Planning and Economic Development Committee to stress three key points.
From John Bacher:
In her last report before her office was shut down by the provincial government of Premier Doug Ford, Ontario’s Environment Commissioner, Dr. Diane Saxe, drew attention to what she termed “Southern Ontario’s Disappearing Forests.” She urged that, “Conserving forests must become a top priority in land use planning.” Since “each incremental loss has a big impact on the services the forests provide to society and the wildlife they support.”
The Ontario government is proposing a plan to implement changes to the Environmental Assessment Act. These changes would not only make it easier for companies to launch experimental technologies that claim to recover fuel and/or chemicals from waste, but they would also remove important public oversight from these controversial projects.