Planet Haliburton

Abhilash Kantamneni (Abhi) is an Efficiency Canada research manager specializing in energy poverty and low-income energy efficiency. His community-based approach to energy efficiency, civic engagement and capacity building has earned him wide recognition including being named a ‘40 Under 40 Energy Leader’ by the Midwest Energy News and a Canada Storyteller Award by SSHRC-CRSH. Abhi has a Master of Science in Physics, and in Compute...

This episode features a conversation about approaches to dealing the mountains of garbage being generated by our linear “Take, Make, and Waste” economy with Dr. Calvin Lakhan, Director of the “Waste Wiki Project” at York University. As calls for a “circular” economy that views “garbage” as a wasted “resource” have gained popularity, the notion of “Extended Producer Responsibility” or EPR has become a key waste management strategy. ...

The 28th annual UN-sponsored Climate Summit or COP28 is now history. These annual spectacles are chocked full of contradictions and there’s no shortage of controversy about was – or wasn’t - accomplished by thousands of conference delegates from close to 200 countries between November 30th and December 13th in Dubai. While the last episode of Planet Haliburton was a COP28 “Pre-Mortem”, this one is its “Post-Mortem” sequel. Mitchell...

2023 is shaping up to be the hottest year on record with all the consequences that holds for all life on the planet.

With the 28th annual UN-sponsored “Conference of the Parties” or COP28 under the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), delegations from the 197 countries will be descending on Dubai, one of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), from November 30th – to December 12th.

In the lead up to this year’s climate ...

2023 is on pace to be the hottest year in Earth’s climate record and the list of climate-driven extreme weather events and other disasters is growing by the day. The human toll has been astonishing and promises to only get much worse as warming, driven by the highest concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere in at least 4 million years, continues to rise year after year.

The gap between the emissions cuts climate scienti...

Few issues have galvanized opposition to the Doug Ford government’s climate and environmental policies as his messing with the boundaries of the Greenbelt - despite his repeated promises not to do so. This episode of Planet Haliburton challenges Ford’s affordable housing rationale for withdrawing 7400 acres from the Greenbelt and delivering over $8 billion in increased land value to a few well-connected developers. In addition, we ...

This episode features a conversation with Dianne Saxe, an environmental lawyer for over 50 years, who became Ontario’s 3rd (and last) independent Environmental Commissioner in 2015 with the unanimous support of all members of the Legislative Assembly. Before being fired by Premier Doug Ford in 2019, Saxe and her team produced some 17 climate, environment, and energy reports and conducted hundreds of public educational presentations...

On this episode of PH we look at the impact of climate change on the Trent Severn Waterway, the risks posed by increased extreme weather events, less predictable water levels and what can be done to minimize the associated risks.

Bruce McClennan, the vice chair of the Coalition for Equitable Water Flow, discuss two new videos on these issues produced by the Coalition to raise awareness and encourage active adaptation planning.

The...

On this episode of PH we look at the impact of climate change on the Trent Severn Waterway, the risks posed by increased extreme weather events, less predictable water levels and what can be done to minimize the associated risks.

Ted Spence , the chair of the Coalition for Equitable Water Flow, discuss two new videos on these issues produced by the Coalition to raise awareness and encourage active adaptation planning.

The Trent Se...

On this episode of PH we look at the impact of climate change on the Trent Severn Waterway, the risks posed by increased extreme weather events, less predictable water levels and what can be done to minimize the associated risks.

Ted Spence and Bruce McClennan, the chair and vice chair of the Coalition for Equitable Water Flow, discuss two new videos on these issues produced by the Coalition to raise awareness and encourage active ...

Canadians have been told time and again by government and industry reps that the country’s vast crown-held forests have huge surplus carbon storage capacity for sequestering the country’s ever-growing volumes of extracted, transported, burned and/or exported oil and gas production. Michael Polanyi, with Nature Canada, joins me for a discussion about his research demonstrating that the government’s own numbers fail to add up and, in...

Big Foreign Oil’s Canadian Political Meddling

The political fallout surrounding China’s alleged interference in Canadian elections has taken up a lot of media airtime recently.

But there is a one very powerful source of foreign political interference that has so far escaped any significant scrutiny – Big Foreign Oil’s efforts to shape Canada’s climate and energy politics.

This episode of PH features a conversation with Gordon Laxer...

BirdLife's State of the World's Birds 2022 report documents that “nearly half of the world's birds are on the decline, and the National Audubon Society warns that two-thirds of the over 600 North American species it recently assessed are, and will continue to be, threatened by the climate we are in the process of seriously disrupting. Birds Canada identifies 5 major on-going threats to bird populations in this country, including: t...

This episode features an update on the Highlands Corridor Project, an ambitious local undertaking to create and protect a continuous wetland and wildlife corridor across the southern part of Haliburton County and beyond.

Canada has committed to increasing its protected spaces and intact ecosystems from the current level of 12% to 25% by 2025 and 30% by 2030. Currently, less than 11% of Ontario’s land mass is protected, so we have ...

In this episode of Planet Haliburton we take a close look at hope - what it is, where it comes from and the central role it can play in challenging the devastating impact human extractive practices can have on a vulnerable biosphere that supports all life on the planet.

And we do that with one of Canada’s most well-known and revered progressive author/activists, Maude Barlow. Maude has been on the front lines of many of the key civ...

This week,Terry Moore speaks with Elizabeth Fournier author of f The Green Burial Guidebook: Everything You Need to Plan an Affordable, Environmentally Friendly Burial.

In many respects the only real certainty in life is death. All living things die and human beings are not exceptional in that regard. That hasn’t stopped many humans, however, from thinking and behaving as if we are somehow outside of the rules governing the larger ...

This episode of Planet Haliburton, features a conversation about “energy poverty” with Tina Jackson, the Executive Director of the Central Food Hub and co-founder of Heat Bank Haliburton County.

It’s no secret that Haliburton County has one of the highest rates of poverty in Ontario, if not the country, as well as serious levels of food insecurity, precarious employment and a crisis in the supply of affordable housing. Less recogni...

Overshadowed by the February 24th Russian invasion of the Ukraine, the release of latest UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Report on Monday February 28th, came with renewed calls for urgent climate action.

UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, says that the evidence contained in the “Climate Change impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability” Report is unlike anything he has ever seen, calling it an “atlas of human su...

This episode of Planet Haliburton takes stock of Premier Doug Ford’s climate change record with David Robertson from “Seniors for Climate Action Now” (SCAN) in February 2022 - less than four months before the June 2nd Ontario Provincial Election.

Premier Ford has, from the day he was elected, proven to be an implacable opponent of anything having to do with serious climate action.

While Ontario is not a significant oil and gas pro...