Globe Climate: Studying winter air pollution from the top of the CN Tower

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Good afternoon, and welcome to Globe Climate, a newsletter about climate change, environment and resources in Canada.

This last week marked two notable weather events.

Record-breaking snowfall in Cape Breton had residents of eastern Nova Scotia digging out from a massive winter blast. An astonishing 150 centimetres of heavy, wet snow prompted a local state of emergency.

Meanwhile, temperatures soared across Ontario, with Toronto breaking a daily record. The temperature cracked 11 C by 10 a.m. Friday at Toronto Pearson International Airport, nearly 5 degrees warmer than the average in December.

Now, let’s catch you up on other news.

Noteworthy reporting this week:

1. U.S. politics: Political fight intensifies over Biden’s pause on new LNG export permits; Biden’s LNG pause defended by Deputy Energy Secretary, predicting exports will still surge
2. Justice: Suncor fined $10.5-million by Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment
3. Green investing: Climate group says Canada’s biggest investors often fail to back shareholder proposals
4. Research: UN report reveals major declines in migratory species
5. Protest: Five arrested after environmental protesters spray paint Prime Minister’s Office
6. Snow: B.C. ski resorts struggle with lack of snow as warm weather persists
7. Weather: Nova Scotia still digging out after massive winter storm
8. Explainer by The Narwhal: Canada approved a major port expansion in endangered orca habitat – now it’s going to court

A deeper dive

Trying to get a look at how contaminants affect our health in the colder months

Ivan Semeniuk is science reporter for The Globe. For this week’s deeper dive, he talks about researching air pollution in the winter.

Chemistry – as any chemist or chef knows – depends on ingredients and on temperature. And while we tend not to think of it this way, the Earth’s atmosphere is one giant chemistry experiment to which we are adding ingredients on a daily basis.

This is especially true in the urban environment, where vehicles, industries and countless human-related activities are contributing a wide range of pollutants to the air we breathe – with implications for our health.

We tend to be more aware of these pollutants in the summer months, when a combination of heat and sunlight produces photochemical smog, a visual reminder of the chemicals we are putting into the air.

But air pollution doesn’t go away in the wintertime. It just changes in character, with different ingredients interacting at lower temperatures that lead to a different kind of exposure profile for city dwellers.

Last week, I accompanied air quality researchers from Environment and Climate Change Canada as they headed up – and then out onto – Toronto’s iconic CN Tower to gather data on city air pollution during the dead of winter.

Standing on the roof above the tower’s main observation level – a location entirely off limits to the public – was a heady experience. More than 100 stories above street level, the view resembles what you might see out of an airplane window shortly after takeoff.

Which is precisely why the scientists are using this location as part of their project, which they’ve dubbed “Study of Winter Air Pollution in Toronto,” or SWAPIT. While the research includes other installations across the city that are much closer to ground level, observations from the tower will provide a more integrated view of Toronot’s air and help scientists distinguish locally generated pollution from the background mix that drifts in from surrounding regions.

Results from the study will be used to characterize what kind of chemistry Toronto residents and other urban dwellers are breathing in during the winter months – and what that can tell us about risk factors associated with air pollution and how those may be changing as climate change shifts the character of Canadian winter.

Read the full story today

- Ivan

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What else you missed

• Alberta files formal response to proposed oil sands emissions cap
• Number of monarch butterflies at Mexico wintering sites has plummeted this year: experts
• B.C. environmental groups request review of tire chemical linked to salmon deaths
• EU scraps anti-pesticides proposal in another concession to protesting farmers
• Wind-power giants find little shelter from sector troubles
• Alberta to add firefighters for expected busy wildfire season, minister says
• Ocean system that moves heat gets closer to collapse, which could cause weather chaos, study says
• Climate change drives world to first 12-month spell over 1.5 C
• Delayed Alberta report shows little caribou progress despite federal deal
• B.C. snowpack about 40 per cent below normal, as Eby worries of ‘dramatic drought conditions’
• Alberta NDP leadership candidate says federal carbon levy is ‘dead’
• Mardi Gras beads are creating a plastic disaster in New Orleans. Are there green alternatives?

Opinion and analysis

Eugene Ellmen: Are Canadian banks greenwashing, misleading investors on sustainability-linked debt?

Sam Anderson: Our federation helped make Alberta rich in water. Now, that dam is breaking

Kelly Cryderman: The NDP’s effort to ban the promotion of Big Oil misses the mark

Janis Sarra: Canada’s securities regulators must finalize climate-disclosure rules without delay

Green Investing

Canada is moving closer to making sustainability disclosure for companies mandatory

Corporate Canada is moving a step closer to standardized sustainability reporting as an industry group charged with adapting international disclosure guidelines to the domestic economy finalizes its first drafts.

The Canadian Sustainability Standards Board, which comprises 12 accounting, management, legal and sustainability experts, is expected to sign off on three documents that will guide climate-related disclosures. The documents will go out for a 90-day public comment period starting in March.

• Religious investors urge Exxon to drop lawsuit against activist shareholders
• Business funding on climate action needs to ‘rise exponentially,’ RBC report says
• Dutch pension fund leading climate talks with Shell divests most oil investments
• HSBC partners with Google to hit US$1-billion climate tech finance goal

Making waves

Each week The Globe will profile a Canadian making a difference. This week we’re highlighting the work of Emily McMillan on nature-based climate solutions

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Hi, I’m Emily McMillan, executive director of Nature Canada, one of Canada’s longest-standing conservation charities.

When it comes to protecting nature, I love working on a huge canvas. One of our biggest national campaigns is nature-based climate solutions (NBCS). These involve protecting and restoring natural areas, such as forests and grasslands, that both capture carbon and protect us from the effects of climate change. Nature Canada offers an NBCS toolkit, a community of practice, and grants and training for municipalities and organizations across the country.

The wonderful thing about NBCS is that we are simultaneously tackling another global threat: biodiversity loss. By participating in NBCS, millions of people can connect their interest in nearby nature with the broader environmental problems. As such, these solutions have tremendous potential for tackling the powerlessness and despondency that individuals feel in the face of climate change.

I am proud that Nature Canada’s work is bringing the challenge of climate change down to the local scale, reorienting Canadians’ psychological compass so that it points toward hope and action.

- Emily

Do you know an engaged individual? Someone who represents the real engines pursuing change in the country? Email us at GlobeClimate@globeandmail.com to tell us about them.

Photo of the week

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Guides and Explainers

• Want to learn to invest sustainably? We have a class for that: Green Investing 101 newsletter course for the climate-conscious investor. Not sure you need help? Take our quiz to challenge your knowledge.
• We’ve rounded up our reporters’ content to help you learn about what a carbon tax is, what happened at COP28, and just generally how Canada will change because of climate change.
• We have ways to make your travelling more sustainable and if you like to read, here are books to help the environmentalist in you grow, as well as a downloadable e-book of Micro Skills - Little Steps to Big Change.

Catch up on Globe Climate

• Canadian scientists seek the future of batteries
• Why does winter look different than it used to?
• Sustainable ideas for your 2024 travel plans
• Urban planners avoid blocking the sun, but it’s time cities embrace shade instead

We want to hear from you. Email us: GlobeClimate@globeandmail.com. Do you know someone who needs this newsletter? Send them to our Newsletters page.