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The Council for Clean & Reliable Energy (CCRE) in partnership with the Waterloo Institute for Sustainable Energy (WISE), a leading innovation centre at the University of Waterloo, hosted its annual Technology Innovation and Policy Forum on Thursday, November 9, 2017. This event brought together technology developers and innovators, leading researchers and entrepreneurs, industry thought leaders, and policymakers to address the convergence of policy development with technology advances.

Event title: Disruptive Innovation Over the Wires - Business Models for Success

The main goal of this event was to shape the pathways of development for emerging disruptive technologies and to understand the impacts of microgrids embedded on a large scale within the existing distribution networks.

This two-day workshop was organized to explore various options for collaboration between University of Waterloo and University of Strathclyde to advance low-carbon energy initiatives.

WISE hosted the first of its kind Geothermal Symposium and featured distinguished speakers and experts in geothermal energy from across the globe. Participants also included innovators from academia, industry, funding and international agencies with student poster presentations.

The purpose of the event was to advance our understanding of the role of geothermal technologies in providing decarbonized energy to Canadian communities, particularly those in remote and cooler climates. The Symposium brought together technology developers and innovators, leading researchers and entrepreneurs, industry thought leaders, and policymakers to help shape a vision of geothermal energy integration into Canada’s energy future.

This invitation-only event spread over 2.5 days, brought together 40+ leading thinkers from research institutions, the private and public sectors, and NGO and finance organizations in order to identify and scope key areas where collaboration and innovation  are needed. An 'Innovation lab' model was utilized as a non-traditional, highly interactive and focused process for participants to work through in order to explore the energy access challenge space. The lab aimed to develop implementable work plans, built on the best practices knowledge, specific expertise, and dependable capacities of participants and other sectoral partners. The AE4H initiative supported the further development of these collaborative projects after the event. 

The purpose of the workshop was to advance our understanding of the role of circular economy and carbon reduction initiatives and to identify opportunities to build fiscal capital through the re-designing of ecosystem services infrastructure while respecting environmental limits. The workshop brought together an executive forum designed to encourage the exchange of ideas that will help create a roadmap to guide the future of waste management and resource recovery (including energy demand reduction) research in Canada.

This workshop was part of an international collaboration between Dalian University in China, The University of Waterloo in Canada, Imperial College London in the UK and the International Academy of Ecology and Life Protection Science in Russia. The collaboration explored strategies for green growth through providing a platform for researchers from the four institutions to share case studies that illustrate widely applicable strategies for furthering economic and environmental stewardship aims simultaneously. The workshop was the second in a series, following a meeting at Dalian University in China in 2015. The event featured presentations and panel discussions on three topics: Business Strategies for Green Growth; Cities, Infrastructure and Planning for Sustainability; and The Circular Economy. Speakers presented from the four institutions involved in the collaboration, as well as from external organizations in Canada.

 This is a ‘meet-up’ of academic, industry & government experts who come together to share insights & new ideas for our energy future.

Panel presentations, posters & discussions focused on:

• Energy Transitions For a Decarbonized Economy: How Fast and at What Cost?
• Low Energy Green Buildings: What Can Innovation Do?
• Energy Access for Canada's Remote First Nations Communities: If Not Now, When?

Prior to the annual Resource Recovery Partnership Workshop held on June 6 of same year, WISE along with partners at the Canadian Plastics Industry Association, the University of Waterloo and Lafarge arranged a webinar exploring the concept of energy from waste. This hour-long webinar featured Robert Cumming, Lafarge Canada Inc. and Briaan Lisk, Hawthorne Green Key Group.