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The debate over whether to ban plastic bags, continue to charge for them, or to simply let retailers decide, rages on.

British Columbia led a first round of consultations on their next steps on climate change mitigation and adaptation, called the Climate Leadership Plan. With over a thousand submissions received the second round of consultations has been extended to April 8th, 2016. If you are interested in the submissions to date, QUEST BC has compiled them here.

The Rockefeller family made their fortune, with many others,  in the burgeoning oil industry of the 19^th century, and profited immensely from their investment until recently. In 2014, the heirs to the fortune announced plans to divest from fossil fuel over concerns about climate change. At the time, they called it their “moral duty”.

March 22^nd was the United Nation’s World Water Day, and in keeping with that theme, I wanted to share this moving series of photographs by Mustafah Abdulaziz, an American photographer who has spent the last few years travelling the world capturing how different people interact with our most precious resource.

Basic income has been getting a lot of media attention lately, largely due to the Ontario liberal government’s plan to include a pilot project in their latest budget. Basic income action groups are happening on local and regional levels, and more and more, people are beginning to demand a better solution for social assistance for those in transition than existing programs provide.

The Liberal government tabled their first budget today, and the numbers are very promising for sunnier days. While they delivered on most of their election promises to boost development of the green economy, it was the fact that one third of the 5 billion dollars allocated to infrastructure will be earmarked for green projects that stood out. The budget states that 2.9 billion will go to climate change initiatives, including policies to reduce emissions in the transportation and energy sectors and a price on carbon.

As I sit here on a sunny Saturday morning, trying to face the ‘tyranny of the great white page’, I stumbled across this brilliant TEDTalk, entitled, Inside the mind of a master procrastinator. All creatives, colleagues, students, and fellow procastinators should listen to this, and it’s hilarious as well as insightful about the ‘dark playground’.

This article talks about how all of BC's reductions in greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) will be wiped out by new LNG developments. BC is not alone, a new coal mine is opening in Cape Breton in May. Realistically, governments are often locked into a priori decision-making, technological lock-in and path dependency, but how does one get out of this trap?

One in seven Canadians live in poverty and there are an estimated 150,000 to 300,000 people homeless. Last year close to 900,000 Canadians used food banks every month, with over one third of those children. Basic income is getting a lot of media attention lately, largely due to the Ontario government’s plan to include a pilot project in their recent budget.

I am sharing with you today an exciting new network in British Columbia, the LEO Network, that enables indigenous and other communities to share their observations of unusual environmental change or health concerns in their communities. It enables a connection with broader networks of subject matter experts and other people who can help to understand the changes happening. It builds upon the well tested beta model in Alaska which has been endorsed by both President Obama and the Arctic Council.