United Nations 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals

SDG 7: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all

Engagement with key bilateral partners and multilateral fora to support global energy security that is rooted in low carbon, responsibly sourced energy, innovative clean energy technologies and modern, reliable infrastructure that supports inclusive growth.

Canada is a leader in the global energy transition and a preferred partner for energy trade and investment. In this position, not only will Canada support enhanced global energy security by directly providing reliable, sustainable affordable and secure energy to the world, but Canada will also engage with the global community to support access to, investment in and use of clean energy and enabling technologies. For example, Canada has pledged financial support to the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) Clean Energy Transitions Programme. Further, Canada is working with the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) to launch a global platform to transition remote communities to renewable energy.

These efforts contribute to:

Global Target 7.1 – By 2030, ensure universal access to affordable, reliable and modern energy services.

Global Target 7.3 – By 2030, double the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency.

Global Target 7.a - By 2030, enhance international cooperation to facilitate access to clean energy research and technology, including renewable energy, energy efficiency and advanced and cleaner fossil-fuel technology, and promote investment in energy infrastructure and clean energy technology.

Notably, Canada uses its advocacy to ensure efforts with respect to SDG 7 also support the achievement of SDG 13, to ensure productive discussions and solutions.

Advanced the discussion on energy efficiency with our European partners via a series of workshops held under the Canada-EU High Level Energy Dialogue.

Canada actively supports the International Energy Agency and its mandate to promote sustainable, reliable, affordable, and secure energy globally. Within the IEA, Canada chairs the Committee on Energy Research and Technology and officially participates in 22 of its technology collaboration programmes. Canada also supports the IEA’s Clean Energy Transitions Programme, which helps developing countries enhance their capacity to develop and deploy clean energy technologies.

With Canada’s leadership role in Mission Innovation (MI), NRCan chaired the MI Steering Committee and, with the United States and Saudi Arabia, launched MI’s Carbon Dioxide Removal Mission at COP 26.

Canada has a global leadership role to increase energy efficiency and accelerate the clean energy transition, working with international partners. NRCan is one of the Vice-Chairs of the International Energy Efficiency Hub (EE Hub), a platform that facilitates collaboration, succeeding the former International Partnership for Energy Efficiency Collaboration (IPEEC).

SDG 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts

Growing Canada’s Forest (GCF): Planting Two Billion Trees initiative.

This initiative will grow Canadian forests by planting two billion trees incrementally over 10 years through multi-stakeholder Canadian partnerships, such as Parks Canada, large municipalities with urban forest management programs, and tree planting delivery organizations. These partnerships will contribute to reforestation to regenerate forests devastated by pests or fire, afforestation to create new forests, forest restoration to support species at risk, and urban tree planting Growing Canada’s Forests.

These efforts contribute to:

Global Target 13.1 - Strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and natural disasters in all countries.

Global Target 15.2 - By 2020, promote the implementation of sustainable management of all types of forests, halt deforestation, restore degraded forests and substantially increase afforestation and reforestation globally.

Domestic Goal 15 - Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss.

Initiative enhances biodiversity and forest resilience to climate change by planting the right tree in the right place, contributing to the restoration of habitat for wildlife, storm surge management, and increased resilience to climate-related hazards for communities, including resilience to wildland fire and flooding. It also benefits the health of communities through cleaner air and water.

In 2021-22, 2 Billion Trees supported the planting of approximately 28.9M trees from over 150 species on more than 500 sites across Canada. Through the Natural Climate Solutions Fund horizontal initiative, this program develops robust GHG reductions reporting methods and guidance for tree planting for restoration of habitat for species at risk and of interest.

SDG 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts

Engagement with key bilateral partners and multilateral fora such as UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change), G7/G20, Clean Energy Ministerial and Mission Innovation (CEM/MI), IEA, and International Renewal Energy Agency (IRENA)  to advance international support for shared energy policy priorities related to climate change and, in particular, climate change mitigation.

As one example indicative of the existing and ongoing work in this regard, NRCan engages in the Advisory Board of the UNFCCC Climate Technology Centre and Network (CTCN) and leads for Canada in technology negotiations under the UNFCCC.

This initiative contributes to:

Global Target 13.3 - Improve education, awareness-raising and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation, impact reduction and early warning.

Global Target 13.b - Promote mechanisms for raising capacity for effective climate change-related planning and management in least developed countries and small island developing States, including focusing on women, youth and local and marginalized communities. Acknowledging that the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is the primary international, intergovernmental forum for negotiating the global response to climate change.

Notably, Canada uses its advocacy to ensure efforts with respect to SDG 13 also support the achievement of SDG 7, in order to ensure productive discussions and solutions.

Senior NRCan representatives actively and effectively participated in collaborative meetings across a number of key committees and working groups of multilateral organizations addressing energy issues, including the G7, G20, IEA, CEM, MI, IRENA, NEA, etc.

SDG 15: Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

Continue to support the international collaborative project moja global (that includes other countries and a variety of funding and scientific/technical organizations) to maintain and refine software and tools to measure, report and verify (MRV) land-based (such as agriculture, forestry, etc.) greenhouse gas emissions and removals. By using moja global software, countries, particularly developing countries, can avoid a drain on their human resources and can embed the MRV system into their existing government systems. Regular updates in line with the latest developments in science and international agreements make the maintenance of the MRV system affordable, reliable, well documented and easily understood. Its professional management gives governments and other users confidence that the tools can be trusted to inform important policy functions and that it can be sustained in the long-term as a tool to meet the Paris Accord commitment of net zero emissions in the second half of the century. Canada supports this initiative both technically through carbon modelling expertise, as well as funding to broaden uptake of the MRV approach in other countries.

These efforts contribute to:

Global Target 15.2 - By 2020, promote the implementation of sustainable management of all types of forests, halt deforestation, restore degraded forests and substantially increase afforestation and reforestation globally.

Global Target 13.2 - Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies, and planning.

The moja global project aims to enhance Canada’s environmental reputation by promoting domestic and international collaboration on open-source tools to estimate emissions and removals from forests and harvested wood products, and developing uncertainty estimates. Moja global continued to develop open-source software. Canada's Carbon Budget Model (CBM-CFS3) is a key component of Generic Carbon Budget Model (GCBM). Through this collaboration, the department advanced and implemented the GCBM on the Full Lands Integration Tool (FLINT) platform to support developing countries in the establishment of advanced measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) systems to quantify forest sector carbon balances. In 2021-22, the department delivered a workshop to present FLINT and GCBM to participants from 58 countries.

A series of self-guided online training videos were developed. By March 2022, the training videos were downloaded 29 times across 7 countries. French and Spanish versions are under development.