Building the Future: How smart public infrastructure decisions can cut pollution, save money and support a clean economy is a provocative new report from Clean Energy Canada, co-funded by Metcalf and the Echo Foundation.

The federal government has made a commitment to invest $180 billion in infrastructure over the next 12 years and has introduced a ‘Climate Lens’ for decision-making around infrastructure spending. Building the Future makes a compelling case for marrying the investment in public infrastructure projects with strategies to reduce our emissions: using public infrastructure spending to build the clean growth economy presents a huge opportunity for Canada. There remain multiple challenges, however, in the implementation and overall uptake of some of these initiatives; in particular, there is a lack of data or information to inform evidence-based decision-making in infrastructure.

To develop and apply the technical tools needed to address these gaps and challenges, Clean Energy Canada staff engaged with The Treasury Board of Canada through its Greening Government Secretariat and the National Research Council over a six-month period. The policy recommendations found at the end of  the report are largely based on research collected during these multi-stakeholder interviews.

Building the Future concludes on a cautiously optimistic note, “commending the Government of Canada for its work to date”, while underscoring the “need to work in partnerships with provinces, territories, and municipalities, as well as industry stakeholders”.