Funder/Project Team
Partners: Steve Plante, (PI), Université du Québec à Rimouski. Liette Vasseur, Brock, co-applicant.
Funding: MEOPAR
Description
The project works to both develop tools for communities and non-governmental organizations to enhance their resilience and adaptive capacities when facing climate and environmental changes, while also examining the implementation of adaptation plans by municipalities and the barriers for implementation. This study was a first analysis of the level of implementation in Quebec. It is now followed by case studies in Quebec and Ontario.
Funder/Project Team
Partners: Creek Shore Farms and Ecological Farmers Association of Ontario.
Funding by: Seeding Food Innovation (SFI), grants of George Weston Limited; Liette Vasseur is a collaborator (2016 – 2018).
Description
This project is related to the habitat management project already being experimented in China. It includes intercropping of cruciferous crops (e.g. Cabbage or broccoli) with onion (as a deterrent for pests such as the diamondback moth).
Funder/ Project Team
The project is funded by the Green Funds of the Québec Ministry of Sustainable Development, Environment and the Fight against Climate Change and managed by the Regroupement des organismes de bassins versants du Québec (ROBVQ, Coalition of Watershed Organizations of Québec).
Description
Water is more than just a resource, it is essential for life. As underlined in Goal #6 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 (a proposal containing 17 goals with 169 targets covering a broad range of sustainable development issues), access to clean water and protecting its related ecosystem are needed to achieve sustainable development.
Combined with Goal #13 (take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts), the objective of this project is to ensure knowledge transfer and experience sharing among different communities that must adapt to new climatic realities affecting water management. Over the next three years, the team will help eight “leader” communities assess vulnerabilities and develop adaptation plans to better adapt to changes and protect their water related-ecosystems.
Funder/Project Team:
Project lead: Catherine Potvin, UNESCO Chair for Dialogues on Sustainability, McGill University; December 2016—May 2017.
Description
This is a project requested by Natural Resources Canada to examine the opportunities and challenges regarding the capacity of Canada to transition towards a low carbon energy economy. UNESCO Chairholder Liette Vasseur contributed to the section on governance, social acceptability and transition in this project.
Description
Woodlands of Sunset Long-term Care (LTC) Facility is located on Pelham St. in Welland, ON and is managed by the Niagara Region. What makes this LTC facility unique is that adjacent to it there are wetlands and forests on property which are also owned by the Region. In the spring of 2015, the then President of the Family Council, Roman Kruczynski approached ESRC to explore the possibility of a joint initiative with the university and especially the ESRC. This is a perfect example of the collaborative character of the UNESCO Chair, Liette Vasseur, where members and non-members of the ESRC, as well as community partners such as the NPCA (Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority) and Niagara College have come together to create community sustainability.
Funder/ Project Team:
Marine Environmental Observation Prediction and Response Network (MEOPAR), with additional support from the Town of Lincoln and Brock.
Liette Vasseur; Meredith Caspell; Bradley May; Sam Gauthier; Pulkit Garg; Jocelyn Baker; Alex Marino
Description:
The three-year project between Brock University and the Town of Lincoln is aimed at helping the community understand how to deal with the impacts of climate and environmental changes and examining potential avenues of solutions for future development along the shore. It follows on the heals of the Brock-Lincoln Living Lab partnership announced in October 2017.
Background information:
The MEOPAR-Town of Lincoln Research Community Sustainability Project launched on Thursday, Nov. 29.
The three-year project between Brock University and the Town of Lincoln was aimed at helping the community understand how to deal with the impacts of climate and environmental changes and examining potential avenues of solutions for future development along the shore. It followed on the heels of the Brock-Lincoln Living Lab partnership announced in October 2017.
Liette Vasseur lead the study for the Ontario component of a larger project by Université du Québec à Rimouski, which is examining how various coastal communities can deal with and share ideas on the impacts of climate and environmental changes.
The project received $280,000 in funding from the Marine Environmental Observation Prediction and Response Network (MEOPAR), with additional support from the Town of Lincoln and Brock. MEOPAR is an independent, not-for-profit organization funded by the federal government as a National Centre of Excellence that supports research and trains students in the area of marine risk and resilience.
Lincoln suffered around $1 million in damage as a result of back-to-back spring storms in 2017 that caused massive flooding from Lake Ontario. The storms led to the Town’s first-ever voluntary evacuation notice for residents living near the Lake Ontario shoreline, and caused significant damage to Charles Daley Park and sewer systems in Jordan Station and Campden.
Vasseur said climate change scenarios over the next decade are projecting continuous sea level rise and increases in extreme weather events. This will amplify the severity and frequency of flooding in coastal communities like Lincoln, which is continually growing with more people living near the Lake Ontario waterfront. For the Town of Lincoln, the research provided crucial information about current and future risks.
Funder/ Project Team:
OSC3 was supported by the AgriScience Program under Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Canadian Agricultural Partnership (an investment by federal, provincial, and territorial governments) and over 70 partners from the agricultural community.
Liette Vasseur, PI; Mehdi Sharifi; Miranda Hart; Kathryn Carter; Lisa Wambold with contributing Partners: BC Wine Grape Council; Heather Laundry’s Vineyard; Southbrook Vineyards; Brock University
Description:
Project title: Unique Cover Crops, Rootstocks and Irrigation Techniques for Canadian Vineyards
The research team used cover crops, rootstocks, and novel irrigation strategies to enhance vineyard resilience in the face of climate change and increase its economic and environmental sustainability.
This project focused on Baie-Saint-Paul and the Upper St. Lawrence Estuary and its expected heightened exposure to hazards like earthquakes, strong tides and ice jams in the face of climate change. INtercomparison of scalE and DImensionality of predictioN tools for multi-risk assessment: erosion, coastal floodINg, icE jamming (INEDINE) developed a comprehensive set of multidisciplinary methodologies and tools for Baie-Saint-Paul, to aid in anticipating changes and defining best practices to reduce risk to the local community. This work was led by Principal Investigators Damien Pham Van Bang (Institut national de la recherche scientifique) and Ioan Nistor (University of Ottawa), with co-PIs Marc Richer-Laflèche (INRS), Jacob Stolle (INRS), Sébastien Nobert (Université de Montréal) and Liette Vasseur (Brock University).
