Frontier issue 6

Office of the Vice President Research

A Journal of Research and Discovery > Issue 06 > Spring/Summer 2009

THE GREEN GUIDE How UBC is tackling the challenges of sustainability

SpecieS at riSk Why biodiversity loss could jeopardize stable ecosystems

iNtO tHe Deep Sustaining healthy fisheries and oceans

UrbaN UtOpiaS The practical implementation of sustainable communities

iDeNtity UNDer Siege Is climate change putting cultural identity at risk?

04 Pellet powerThe demand for cleaner-burning biofuel is on the rise. Tony Bi and the Clean Energy Research Centre believe wood pellets may meet that demand

06 A convenient truthFrom high-carbon to carbon-friendly: The Local Climate Change Visioning Project is giving the public tangible options to curb the effects of climate change at home

07 The politics of progressWill Canada reach its Kyoto emissions targets by the 2008 to 2012 commitment period? According to Kathryn Harrison, the answer isn’t as straightforward as it may seem

08 Undermining emissionsGreg Dipple and his team are uncovering how accelerating a carbon mineralization process could help mines offset their own emissions

10 A fine balanceDoes biodiversity matter? Find out why UBC’s Biodiversity Research Centre is convinced that it does

12 Sea changeHow UBC’s Fisheries Centre is working to ensure the long- term stability of both fisheries and the ecosystems that they depend upon

17 Return of the native The sea otter is re-settling into the waters off the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Kai Chan is examining the full implications of its return to the long-term health of that ecosystem

18 Sustaining the swell As population numbers boom, the Sustainability by Design Project is striving to realize a sustainable vision for Vancouver livability

19 For want of water Significant water shortages are expected in the Okanagan by 2050 as a result of climate change. John Wagner is strategizing the fair distribution of this precious resource

20 Spare the air Air pollution in the Fraser Valley is improving as a result of air quality management measures. Douw Steyn and Mike Brauer are furthering inquiry to develop solutions that ensure the best air quality for all

21 On the brink Climate change’s impact on local communities is more than just environmental. Ralph Matthews reveals the societal and cultural implications of this 21st century reality

A MESSAGE FROM THE VIcE PRESIDEnT RESEARcH

Sustainability is an increasingly important avenue of research, despite its somewhat ambiguous definition. The term “sustainable” is often confusingly applied to environmental solutions, economic growth, community planning – even management structures. In the absence of a universal definition, it is easy to wonder whether sustainability is just a buzzword.

It is precisely this ambiguity that makes sustainability such an appealing research theme. It offers a broad, inclusive platform for collaborative discussions that transcend traditional boundaries between disciplines. How else can we address global climate change, for example, than by considering the roles of poverty, politics and culture?

While UBC Vancouver is widely recognized as a model for a “green campus,” UBC is also a hive of sustainability-themed research. This issue of frontier offers a sampling of research into climate change, global fisheries, livable communities, and species biodiversity. Despite the variety of disciplines, these research themes maintain a common thread: to promote forward-thinking decisions that consider the environmental, economic and social implications of our actions through time.

Sustainability may not offer a panacea, but it does encourage us to take an optimistic glimpse beyond the short term. As the human population grows, our collective challenge is to discover concrete ways to live and work in a world of finite resources, while remaining mindful of the consequences of our actions for our planet, its species and our future.

Dr. John Hepburn, Vice President Research

Spring/Summer 2009

Cover photo > Andrew Trites, UBC Above > Rashid Sumaila, UBC

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When i arrived at Ubc in 1992, climate change research looked quite different than it does today. in fact, what used to be a primarily scientific exercise on proving the validity of human-induced climate change has progressively matured into a cross-disciplinary, multinational approach to finding sustainable local and global solutions to this crisis.

indeed, climate change is undoubtedly the most significant environmental crisis that the planet currently faces. the intergovernmental panel on climate change (ipcc), an organization that assesses the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant for the understanding of the risk of human-induced climate change, has indicated that global emissions need to be reduced by 50 to 80 per cent by 2050 from 2000 levels in order to keep global average temperature increases below 2.5 degrees. the magnitude of this lofty target has not been lost on many researchers in sustainability, particularly those at Ubc.

in the pages ahead, you’ll discover a few of the myriad examples of Ubc’s contribution to climate change research. For example, Stephen Sheppard is using 3D modeling to bring local climate change action to life for communities while tony bi and colleagues are engineering new emissions-friendly alternatives to fuel with wood pellets. On a socio- political scale, kathryn Harrison is looking at some potential reasons behind governments’ seemingly lethargic response to emissions reduction and greg Dipple is unearthing ways to use mine tailings to offset a mine’s carbon emissions.

there has never been a more exciting time to pursue sustainable solutions to climate change. Ubc is quickly proving its innovation and practicality in this endeavour; precisely the approach needed to work towards accomplishing the goals outlined by the ipcc. after all, the planet doesn’t have another 50 years to wait.

John Robinson Professor, Institute for Resources, Environment and SustainabilityDirector, Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability

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WOOD pelletS are OFFeriNg OppOrtUNitieS FOr a cleaNer-bUrNiNg biOFUel bUt majOr cONcerNS are OverSHaDOWiNg tHeir pOteNtial. tONy bi aND Ubc’S cleaN eNergy reSearcH ceNtre are eNgiNeeriNg SOlUtiONS

Spring / Summer 2009 5

Each year, more than one million tonnes of wood pellets – made of waste wood from B.C. forests – are shipped to Europe to meet a growing demand for a clean-burning biofuel. Composed entirely of compressed sawdust or forest residues, wood pellets generate far fewer emissions than conventional firewood and are the subject of a unique research effort within UBC’s Clean Energy Research Centre.

“The forest industry in B.C. has supported the sale of wood pellets to Europe for some time,” says Dr. Xiaotao (Tony) Bi, a member of the Biomass and Bioenergy Research Group (BBRG) and a professor in UBC Vancouver’s Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering. “They are widely used for home and district heating and power generation and they are an important future feedstock for biorefineries. But they also incur some major storage and transportation problems.”

A health-and-safety issue concerning off-gassing during storage is the most pressing problem to be tackled by Bi and his BBRG colleagues, Drs. C. Jim Lim and Shahab Sokhansanj in the Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering (the latter also of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory) and Dr. Taraneh Sowlati in the Department of Wood Science.

“When wood decomposes in storage, it depletes oxygen while off-gassing carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and methane,” Bi explains. “In European ports, workers have been severely injured or killed by exposure to these toxic gases when unloading the pellets from ships. Equally concerning is the tendency of the pressure-formed pellets to break apart during loading and unloading, generating a combustible dust that has caused several fires at major ports.”

To address these and other issues, Bi and colleagues are creating what they call an “engineered high-quality wood pellet” composed of modified wood fibres that improve the pellet’s durability, shelf life and energy density. In collaboration with industry, the UBC team is developing procedures to suppress fires during handling and reduce their incidence in the long term. They are also quantifying the off-gassing of stored pellets in order to build a Material Safety Data

canadians consume less than 20 per cent of the 1.2 million tonnes of wood pellets produced in canada each year.

Sheet for industry and to determine optimal storage and transportation conditions, including proper ventilation.

Enhancing emissions According to Bi, the net greenhouse gas emissions from combustion of wood pellets exported from Canada to Europe over the whole life cycle (24 kg CO2/GJ) are much lower than natural gas (57 kg CO2/GJ) and coal (90 kg CO2/GJ). They also generate lower particulate emissions than coal, heating oil, firewood and unprocessed wood residues. Bi reasons this should encourage domestic demand for wood pellets, but Canadians consume less than 20 per cent of the 1.2 million tonnes of wood pellets produced in Canada each year.

Bi believes the hesitation to embrace wood pellets in Canada is fuelled in part by a public perception that they generate smoke and particulates like raw firewood. However, strict manufacturing standards require wood pellets to have a low moisture and ash content for a smokeless, uniform burn. Bi and colleagues are conducting several life cycle analysis case studies to examine the economic, environmental and human health implications of converting to wood pellet fuel in Canadian homes, district heating systems and emerging biorefineries.

“There is a lot of international interest in this technology,” Bi notes. “Sawmills and lumber mills in B.C. generate roughly six million tonnes of wood residues each year. We only use slightly more than a million tonnes, so there is plenty of available supply for wood pellets. Furthermore, there is an abundant supply of trees killed by mountain pine beetle that wither on the stand because they cannot be used for timber or pulp, but they could be converted to wood pellets.”

The research of Tony Bi and colleagues in the BBRG is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Natural Resources Canada, Agriculture and Agri-food Canada, Biocap Canada Foundation, B.C. Ministry of Forests and Range and Wood Pellet Association of Canada.

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Bodies of water drying up in the African Sahara. Glaciers melting in the Arctic. Violent hurricanes wreaking havoc off the Atlantic coast. While these catastrophic international events have captured the public’s attention on climate change, UBC’s Collaborative for Advanced Landscape Planning (CALP) is using the Local Climate Change Visioning Project to accelerate the social-learning and policy-change process by demonstrating what climate change action looks like in our own backyards.

“When we started this research in the Lower Mainland, people said Vancouver is a benign place in terms of climate change because we don’t get extreme temperatures,” says Stephen Sheppard, Project Leader and UBC Vancouver Professor in Forestry and Applied Science. “But we wanted to demonstrate how climate change affects all of us.”

In order to make climate change choices more explicit to both the public and decision-makers, the Local Climate Change Visioning Project is employing Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and 3D visualization to illustrate alternative carbon emissions scenarios and the measures that a particular community can take to mitigate and adapt to global climate change. One of the B.C. case studies that the research team has focused on is the North Shore, a community with a high per capita carbon footprint due to factors like the natural gas required to heat large homes and the high dependency on cars for basic transportation. Sheppard explains:

“North Shore residents’ high-carbon footprint is not all their fault because the community was planned to be largely dependent

on fossil fuels that cause climate change. The issue is what needs to be done to transform such neighbourhoods without significantly reducing their quality of life. Our visualizations suggest how a variety of solutions that don’t dramatically alter those places – like putting in local commercial services so people can shop locally and creating more transit and bike lanes to reduce car dependency – can transform the community’s carbon footprint. As a result, it goes from a high -carbon neighbourhood that is increasingly vulnerable to forest fire and stream erosion to a more resilient and climate-friendly community.”

The future is climate-friendlyThrough a participatory visioning process exploring alternative future scenarios, Sheppard believes decision-makers and communities will be better equipped for planning on long-term climate change.

“Most people are concerned about climate change, that’s not the issue. We haven’t run into many skeptics,” says Sheppard. “But most people don’t know what might happen locally and aren’t sure what they can do collectively. With visualization, you’ve moved them on in their thinking and you’re showing them that they have choices.”

The Local Climate Change Visioning Project is funded by the GEOIDE Research Network (National Centre of Excellence), the B.C. Government and Metro Vancouver, with support from the Districts of North Vancouver and West Vancouver, The Corporation of Delta and many other partners.

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tHe lOcal climate cHaNge viSiONiNg prOject iS USiNg 3D viSUalizatiON tO briNg climate cHaNge actiON tO liFe FOr lOcal cOmmUNitieS

ACONVENIENT TRUTH

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OF PROGRESSPhoto > Tyson Williams

In 2002, the Canadian government ratified the Kyoto Protocol, an international environmental treaty that required Canada to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to six per cent below 1990 levels by the 2008 to 2012 commitment period. But while the Canadian public lauded the action, Canadian federal and provincial governments have yet to adopt the concrete measures needed to reduce Canada’s emissions.

So why are some countries on track to meet their Kyoto targets while others have failed to build any significant momentum?

UBC Vancouver political science professor Kathryn Harrison is looking to find answers to that very question. Specifically, she is collaborating on a research project entitled “Global Commons, National Interests,” funded by the Weyerhaeuser Foundation, that is uncovering how the circumstances in different countries can help us understand why certain governments have made progress on climate change while others have not.

“It is a pretense that the Kyoto Protocol imposed comparable burdens on industrial nations. It looked like Japan, Canada, the United States (U.S.) and the European Union (E.U.) had taken on comparable reductions because they were all in the -6 range but in practice, the magnitude of change required to meet a similar nominal target was much greater for Canada, the U.S. and Australia,” she says.

Turning the tide Harrison points to the E.U. as an example of a party whose target was not as demanding

relative to a business-as-usual trajectory. She attributes the E.U.’s greater progress to a lower rate of population growth, the shift away from highly polluting industries by two of its biggest players (Germany and the U.K.), a stronger public appetite for climate change action and a proportional representation electoral system that amplifies the influence of smaller parties, such as the Green Party.

Conversely, Harrison notes that Canada’s inability to meet Kyoto targets has also been influenced by the U.S.’s decision to reject ratification. However, she believes that U.S. President Barack Obama’s election will create opportunities for change in Canada.

“We’ve dragged our heels for a decade but one of the reasons is that it was difficult to act alone. When the U.S. moves, it will be a lot easier for us to do so,” says Harrison. “On the other hand, one of the lessons from this cross-national comparison has been that if voters make environmental policy a priority, their elected officials will respond. Canadian voters have to really want it.”

caNaDa’S emiSSiONS are Nearly 30 per ceNt abOve itS kyOtO target. katHryN HarriSON iS lOOkiNg tO UNDerStaND WHy SOme cOUNtrieS are leaDiNg tHe Way aND WHy OtHerS are FalliNg SHOrt


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ONce a SOUrce OF eNvirONmeNtal cONcerN, miNe tailiNgS cOUlD NOW cONtribUte tO tHe FigHt agaiNSt climate cHaNge. greg Dipple aND team are DiScOveriNg HOW miNeS caN pOteNtially OFFSet tHeir OWN emiSSiONS


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The unsightly mounds of rock waste surrounding most metal ore mines have long been a source of environmental concern. However, a team of UBC researchers is investigating the potential of these “mine tailings” to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, enabling individual mines to contribute to the fight against climate change.

In a natural process called carbon mineralization, rainwater and process waters carrying carbon dioxide (CO2) react with abundant silicate minerals in the tailings to form highly stable carbonate minerals, effectively trapping the CO2. This process is of particular interest to Greg Dipple, a professor in UBC Vancouver’s Department of Earth & Ocean Sciences and member of the Mineral Deposit Research Unit (MDRU).

“More than 90 per cent of the Earth’s carbon is bound in carbonate minerals,” says Dipple. “It’s where carbon wants to be, thermodynamically, but carbon mineralization occurs over geological time and is difficult to reproduce kinetically. If we can devise a way to accelerate this process, mines could use it to offset their own emissions.”

Fingerprinting carbon Carbon mineralization occurs most often in tailings that are rich in magnesium silicate, found at nickel, diamond, chrysotill and some gold and platinum mines. To this end, Dipple’s team is studying two active mine sites, the Diavik Diamond Mine in the Northwest Territories and Mount Keith Nickel Mine in Western Australia.

Sasha Wilson, a doctoral student in Dipple’s lab, has collected over 1,000 tailings samples from both mine sites. Working alongside postdoctoral fellow Stuart Mills, who determines the crystal

structures of the minerals in each sample, Wilson quantifies the mineral content and calculates the rate of carbon uptake. Postdoc Shaun Barker then extracts and purifies the CO2 captured in each sample, and identifies its source using tracer isotopes.

“The main reservoir for modern carbon at the mine sites is the atmosphere,” Dipple explains. “Large quantities of trapped carbon in our samples are radiogenically modern, which means they didn’t come from ancient bedrock and have therefore been absorbed as a greenhouse gas from the local atmosphere.” Under a carbon-counting scheme, Dipple says officials could use this fingerprinting protocol to verify the source of CO2 absorbed by a mine’s tailings, proving that it is offsetting a portion of its own emissions.

To date, Dipple’s team has shown that tailings from some mines naturally absorb up to 50,000 tonnes of CO2 a year, which is about 15 per cent of annual mine greenhouse gas emissions. The next step is to explore ways to accelerate mineral carbonation.

“We have a handful of potential acceleration strategies,” Dipple says. “Some involve scrubbing from emissions stacks and other point sources of carbon; others involve relatively straightforward aqueous geochemistry, such as changing pH or adding catalysts; and some use microbes to bind CO2. The next stage is to identify the most prospective ones and move from bench-top to field.”

Greg Dipple’s research is conducted in partnership with the Geomicrobiology Unit at the University of Western Ontario and the Research School of Earth Sciences at the Australian National University. It is funded by Diavik Diamond Mines Inc., BHP Billiton and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC).

Left > Ian Power, University of Western Ontario Right > Sasha Wilson, UBC

Some mine tailings naturally absorb about 15 per cent of annual mine greenhouse gas emissions.

www.climate-decisions.org an online resource to guide decision-making and research on climate change adaptation.


In the high-altitude ridges of Costa Rica, the Golden Toad existed peacefully for centuries. Although only two inches long, its brilliant, bright yellow exterior made it an arresting presence in the cloud-covered tropical forests about 30 km above the city of Monteverde. Its exceptional skin was so striking that a renowned herpetologist claimed the toad appeared to have been dipped in enamel paint. But within 30 years of its discovery, not a single specimen of this formerly abundant species, known to be an important indicator of environmental change in its sensitive ecosystem, has been seen. In 2007, the Golden Toad was officially categorized as extinct. More notably, it is considered to be Costa Rica’s first extinction due to global warming.

“Global warming is an example of change wrought by humans that requires other species to adapt or face extinction,” says Sally Otto, Director of UBC’s Biodiversity Research Centre. “The problem with diversity loss due to causes like climate change is that we don’t always know if a species’ extinction is going to cause a massive shift in the stability of that ecosystem. When some species are removed, it can cause a reduction in the productivity of that environment or the ability of that environment to resist invasion by introduced species.”

Otto isn’t waiting around to find out these consequences. Under her leadership, the Biodiversity Research Centre’s 50 researchers and 200 staff are contributing to a global effort to understand how species interact and evolve, and how the loss of biodiversity (the variety and relationships of all living things) is affecting the planet.

In early 2010, these researchers will occupy a common home in the new Beaty Biodiversity Centre, which will act as both a world-class research facility and a public museum. The research wing will provide laboratories and facilities for biodiversity researchers from such diverse fields as zoology, botany, earth and ocean sciences, microbiology and forest sciences. This interdisciplinary perspective serves as the ideal approach to pursue in-depth investigations into

the effects of climate change, pollution, habitat destruction, introduced species and many other threats to biodiversity.

The other part of the new centre, the Beaty Biodiversity Museum, aims to make biodiversity research at UBC more accessible to the public. The museum’s massive collection includes specimens of over two million plants, fishes, fossils, birds, reptiles, fungi, shells, mammals and insects that will be displayed, for the first time, to the public. Also on public display will be an 85-foot-long blue skeleton, the first on display in Canada.

“Our aim with the Beaty Biodiversity Museum is to get the public interested in biodiversity. By seeing and appreciating the diversity of life, we hope to engender a stronger desire to protect it,” says Otto. “As a culture, we need to spread the message that we’re the stewards of our environment and if we don’t take better care then we’re going to lose more and more species.”

Species at risk The Beaty Biodiversity Centre will become another key centre dedicated to biodiversity research at UBC. At UBC Okanagan, the Centre for Species at Risk and Habitat Studies (SARAHS) is already working steadfastly to address questions relevant to the structure and function of habitats and populations of species at risk. Core research areas include targeting the dynamics of habitats and species across multiple temporal and spatial scales.

“What is so unique about the Okanagan setting is that we are in one of the most bio-diverse regions in the entire province,” says Karen Hodges, Canada Research Centre chair in Conservation Biology at UBC Okanagan. “The south Okanagan has a multitude of species, many of which are at risk in Canada, so our field opportunities are quite different than being on the peninsula in Vancouver.”

Although not directly affiliated, SARAHS and the Beaty Biodiversity Centre will work collaboratively to advance knowledge of biodiversity and its contribution to more productive ecosystems.

climate cHaNge iS pUttiNg tHe eartH’S biODiverSity iN SeriOUS jeOparDy. Ubc’S biODiverSity reSearcH ceNtre iS aimiNg tO UNDerStaND tHe impact OF tHiS SHiFt

“ When some species are removed, it can cause a reduction in the productivity of that environment.”

aS pOlitical Debate Over tHe OverexplOitatiON OF FiSH StOckS rageS ON, Ubc’S FiSHerieS ceNtre iS targetiNg tHe reSpONSible maNagemeNt OF aqUatic ecOSyStemS FrOm mUltiple perSpectiveS

SEA CHANGE


The spectacular collapse of Canada’s Atlantic cod fishery in 1992 shone a public spotlight on a long-simmering academic debate: were political decisions about fisheries management policies encouraging the overexploitation of fish stocks? More than a simple conservation issue, the demise of Canada’s most lucrative fishery also generated significant public fallout. Thousands of jobs were lost, local economies were decimated – and more than 15 years later, cod populations show no sign of recovery.

Today, the plight of the world’s fish stocks is well known but remains poorly understood. The dearth of scientific information – and the grave environmental, economic and social consequences of overfishing – has prompted a worldwide effort to seek solutions. At the heart of UBC’s contribution is the Fisheries Centre, an interdisciplinary research hub promoting the study and responsible management of aquatic ecosystems.

“From ecological studies to investigating how the fish arrives on the table, no single discipline can solve the problem of fisheries,” says Rashid Sumaila, newly appointed Director of the Fisheries Centre and its Fisheries Economics Research Unit. “Although there is a mix of basic and applied research within the Fisheries Centre, much of our work involves working with fishing communities, informing the public and advising policy makers, such as the Federal government or the UN.”

Sumaila’s own research integrates economics with other disciplines to help manage and sustain fisheries. He is known for his thoughtful analysis of government subsidies to fisheries, which he characterizes as “good, bad or ugly” depending on their effectiveness in reducing pressure on overfished stocks. His research also examines how the “profit now, pay later” approach to many fisheries may affect future generations, helping to inform elaborate ecosystem models that consider biological and economic parameters over time.

These models of complex interactions of species and ecosystems provide researchers with invaluable insights into current problems – and future solutions. Associate Professor Villy Christensen has been using modeling since 1990 to demonstrate how human exploitation impacts marine ecosystems, and is passionate about its efficacy. “You can see how things were, how they are, and how they might be, all informed by a scientific model.”

Sumaila concurs. “Modeling is a nice way of bringing together most of our work. You can now do policy analysis using these models. If you want to maximize the dollars from an ecosystem, what will that system look like in the future? If you want to maintain a certain number of jobs in the fishery, what will the system look like? If you sacrifice the ecosystem for jobs for a few years, you may then see a downhill trend.”


The Sea Around Us databases also provide a powerful engine for Ecopath, a modeling software developed by Christensen and Carl Walters that has become the de facto standard for ecosystem approaches to fisheries management, with more than 6,000 users in 150 countries. Christensen and an interdisciplinary team of UBC researchers and Masters of Digital Media program students have now integrated this powerful model with a high-resolution gaming engine to create a scientifically accurate virtual seascape where the virtual fish populations respond to changes in real time. Working in partnership with the B.C. Ministry of the Environment, a newly proposed Environmental Decision Support Facility will enable provincial resource managers to immediately visualize the potential impacts of decisions that affect both aquatic and terrestrial environments.

As Christensen explains, “We want politicians, resource managers, and for that matter, the public to be able to explore alternate scenarios. What if we increased fishing effort? What if we closed

this area to fishing? What does the best available science say will happen?”

Plentiful fish, productive waters While visualization offers a powerful management tool, it is no substitute for directly engaging the communities that depend on fisheries. This on-the-ground philosophy informs the work of Project Seahorse, another key Fisheries Centre research cluster headed by Amanda Vincent, who holds the Canada Research Chair in Marine Conservation. Using the emotional power of seahorses as a focal point, Project Seahorse (PS) engages all level of stakeholders – from fishing communities to international regulatory bodies – to build sustainable biological, economic and social capital. This approach has been particularly successful in the Philippines, where PS has partnered with some of the world’s poorest communities to enable the designation of 33 Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).

“MPAs are a tool for building social capital,” Vincent explains. “They require a local management council, planning and

Underwater world The Sea Around Us Project, a key Fisheries Centre research cluster led by renowned researcher Daniel Pauly, is investigating the impact of fisheries on the world’s marine ecosystems – and this work is becoming increasingly critical given the rapid depletion of global fish stocks. Project member Villy Christensen and the team members use geographic information systems (GIS) data to create and analyze complex maps of fisheries catches, aquatic habitats, fish biomasses, commercial species distributions, fishing vessel prices, Marine Protected Areas, and even fishing access agreements between nations. The result is a powerful overview of human interactions with aquatic ecosystems on a local, national and global scale.

“This [visual] information enabled us to show that the over-reporting of fish catches has masked a global decline in landings,” says Christensen, “[and] this has fueled false optimism about future catch increases and the ability to meet UN and other food security targets.”


interactions with local authorities. In a community with few resources and little organization or power or hope, establishing an MPA empowers them to also deal with other problems of resource use, education, and law and order. Moreover, MPAs have led to measurably more fish in their waters.”

Vincent’s team leads an array of projects all over the world. In Hong Kong, PS has translated its trade research into a broad collaborative effort for sustainable use of marine species in traditional Chinese medicine, involving industry and government as well as academia. At the international level, PS has been instrumental in engaging CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, in establishing export controls on marine fishes of commercial value, using seahorses to set precedent.

Future of fish Other Fisheries Centre research groups are actively involved in sustaining vital North American fisheries and their ecosystems. The Marine Mammal Research Unit, headed

“ We need to value the fish we eat today as our fish, and the fish our children and grandchildren will eat in the future as their fish.”

by Andrew Trites, is examining the interactions between fisheries, humans, and marine mammals, with field research conducted at the Port Moody open water facility and the Pacific Ocean showing that marine mammals are indicators of ecosystem change.

The Aboriginal Fisheries Research Unit, led by David Close, combines traditional ecological knowledge with modern science to address questions benefiting Aboriginal resource management and protecting Aboriginal fisheries and foods in perpetuity.

The Fisheries Ecosystems Restoration Research group, led by Tony Pitcher, focuses on modeling and evaluation in support of policy goals that reconcile the preservation of biodiversity and services with sustainable and responsible fisheries, including “Rapfish,” an interdisciplinary rapid appraisal method for evaluating the status of fisheries.

The Quantitative Modeling Group, involving Carl Walters, Steve Martell, Murdoch McAllister and Villy Christensen, develops mathematical models to help

fisheries biologists and resource managers adapt in the face of the extreme uncertainty that characterizes many marine ecosystems.

This kind of interdisciplinary research promotes fisheries management that bases policy decisions on sound science, and requires participation from stakeholders at all levels. Will this prevent the Atlantic cod catastrophe from being repeated? Rashid Sumaila believes it is a fundamental question of value.

“We need to value the fish we eat today as our fish, and the fish our children and grandchildren will eat in the future as their fish,” he says. “At the moment, we value those future generations’ fish as if they were ours, and that can be problematic.”

The Fisheries Centre attracts national and international funding from major donors, research councils and granting agencies, and is one of 16 research units in UBC’s College for Interdisciplinary Studies (CFIS), supporting collaborative, interdisciplinary research and learning in sustainability, social policy and human health. See www.cfis.ubc.ca.

Above > Rashid Sumaila, UBC Below > Kaldor

What makes a community sustainable? is it the effective management of local environmental resources? Or meeting the social, economic and health needs of its population? For the five Ubc researchers in the following pages, the answer is unequivocally both. From tackling water scarcity to environmental health and planning, these researchers are individually working to ensure local communities are equipped with the necessary knowledge to remain sustainable for generations to come.

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More than one hundred years after being hunted to near-extinction, sea otters are returning to the waters off the West Coast of Vancouver Island. While the return of these marine creatures marks the successful re-introduction of a native species, not everyone is welcoming the sea otter back with open arms.

“The sea otter’s return is causing all kinds of ecosystem changes,” says Kai Chan, an assistant professor at UBC’s Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability (IRES). “The changes of most concern to people are that sea otters eat the organisms that their fisheries depend on. The Nuu-chah-nulth (First Nation, of the West Coast of Vancouver Island) has declared its authority and intent to cull sea otters.”

Determining what side-effects sea otter culling might have for Vancouver Island’s aquatic ecosystems is but one aspect of Chan’s research with the B.C. Coastal Ecosystems Service Project. The project focuses on ecosystem services – the provision of benefits by ecosystems to people, directly and indirectly – and aims to help community leaders make the best decisions for the long-term health of their communities.

According to locals, the sea otter causes a negative impact upon the shellfish industry because it feeds on shellfish, reducing harvest. However, Chan and his colleagues are promoting research that demonstrates the sea otter’s positive contributions to the ecosystem. For example, sea otters are known to prey on sea urchins, an organism whose primary function is to graze marine vegetation like kelp. But when sea urchins become abundant in the absence of sea otters, some kelp forests are wiped out. Chan explains:

“Kelp is to the marine world like a forest is to the terrestrial world. If you don’t have kelp, you have a desert. But when you have kelp, you have really productive ecosystems that create habitat for all kinds of organisms. The B.C. Coastal Ecosystem Service Project is concerned about shedding light on these positive interactions that have received little attention.”

A consensus on the sea otter’s fate in Clayoquot Sound has yet to be determined. But by equipping local decision-makers with the information they might need to make sustainable choices, Chan sees his research as a direct path to maintaining biodiversity and improving human well-being in communities.

The B.C. Coastal Ecosystems Project is funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Nature Conservancy, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Hampton Fund and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

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ecosystem services are the provision of benefits by ecosystems to people, directly and indirectly.

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Sustaining the swell

In the heart of Canada’s west coast lies Vancouver, a city world-renowned for its striking natural beauty and high standard of livability. To many, it’s no wonder that the region’s population is expanding – at a significant rate. By 2050, Greater Vancouver’s current population of two million is expected to nearly double to almost four million. For city planners today, the question of how the region will accommodate that growth while ensuring continued livability in the region has never been more critical.

The Sustainability by Design Project by UBC’s Design Centre for Sustainability is directly addressing those issues through a collaborative effort that aims to produce a compelling visual representation of what the Greater Vancouver region might look like in 2050 at neighbourhood-, district- and region-wide scales.

“A visual representation of what Vancouver would look like in the future allows us to determine how we can restore the green systems,” says Patrick Condon, Principal Investigator. “These pictures allow citizens and researchers to participate in a hands-on way and apply what they know about sustainable communities collaboratively in an effort to provide a new vision for the region.”

According to Condon, maintaining livability while accommodating population and demographic change does have its challenges. For example, he notes that Vancouver’s dependency on the single-passenger automobile, which accounts for 80 per cent of all car trips, is antithetical to a sustainable future. While completely eliminating automobiles isn’t a viable option, he does see opportunities for change.

“The models for success are places like Downtown Vancouver. In the last 10 years, it has doubled its population but at the same time, trips by car to the area have significantly reduced,” he says. “It used

aS vaNcOUver’S pOpUlatiON cONtiNUeS tO expaND, tHe SUStaiNability by DeSigN prOject iS emplOyiNg viSUal repreSeNtatiONS tO eNSUre cONtiNUeD livability iN tHe regiON

to be all jobs and no people and now it is both jobs and people, which has reduced the number of people traveling downtown because many of them live there.”

Condon believes that strategically locating the new population through densification and proper distribution of services and jobs to create neighbourhoods is only one of a myriad of sustainable solutions, but certainly the most effective in the short term. He adds: “Vancouver is advantaged by its growth. For places that aren’t growing at all, it’s much tougher to get those kinds of changes because you have to basically rebuild all the buildings at great additional cost.”

Through consultation with numerous stakeholders, the project will result in a 10m x 15m wall-size map that will provide proven tools and strategies that are appropriate to deploy at the regional scale. The map is expected to be ready in 2011.

The Sustainability by Design Project is funded by numerous organizations including the City of North Vancouver, Real Estate Foundation of B.C., the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD), the Landscape Architecture Canada Foundation, the Vancouver Foundation, UBC, Transport Canada and Western Economic Diversification Canada.

“ a visual representation of what vancouver would look like in the future allows us to determine how we can restore the green systems.”

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livable cOmmUNitieS

SUStaiNiNg tHe SWell


It all started with a fluke lightning strike in Okanagan Mountain Provincial Park during one of the driest summers on record. A spark ignited, and the flame spread quickly, forcing the evacuation of 45,000 residents and consuming 239 homes within days. For residents, the Okanagan wildfires of 2003 became well known as one of the worst disasters to ever affect the region.

John Wagner, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at UBC Okanagan’s Irving K. Barber School of Arts & Sciences, remembers the wildfires well: “I had never thought of the Okanagan as a place facing major water scarcities until the fires. I recall thinking that some real changes were needed to the way people manage water here.”

That desire to change the Okanagan’s water governance strategies prompted Wagner to focus his research on the history of water management practices in the Okanagan. His project, “From Abundance to Scarcity: the Political Ecology of Water Use in the Okanagan Valley,” aims to ultimately inform policy-makers on the best solutions for effective water governance in the Okanagan.

The Okanagan will experience significant water shortages by 2050 due to climate change, says Wagner. Although less precipitation may not be a major contributor, water will be needed throughout a longer irrigation season since snow will melt earlier and many reservoirs will be exhausted by September. As scarcity becomes more of an issue each year, Wagner sees the need to address significant questions around the fair distribution of this increasingly limited resource.

Water licensing in the Okanagan, which is based on provincial legislation and policy, has created important historical inequalities in the area in regard to water distribution. Under existing legislation, the first people to apply for and obtain a license have priority rights. Wagner explains: “Farmers and settlers took out all the early water licenses – the system was created for their benefit – but Indigenous communities were not able to apply for licenses and their pre-existing Indigenous rights were not recognized. This is an outstanding grievance that is going to have to be addressed at some point.”

Examining effective water governance strategies on an international scale is one way that Wagner is tackling fair and sustainable water allocation. He sees a multi-level distributed system that allows a network of institutions to cooperatively govern water use as a viable approach to Okanagan’s water scarcity issues in the short term and an opportunity for significant improvements to water sustainability in the long term.

“From Abundance to Scarcity: the Political Ecology of Water Use in the Okanagan Valley” is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).

For wantof waterjOHN WagNer iS UNeartHiNg a myriaD OF SOlUtiONS FOr eFFective Water gOverNaNce iN tHe OkaNagaN

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www.footprintstandards.org Originated by Ubc School of community and regional planning professor William rees, the ecological Footprint concept measures human demand on the earth’s ecosystems with earth’s ecological capacity to regenerate.

FOr WaNt OF Water

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In 1994, Metro Vancouver was the first regional district in Canada to develop and adopt the Air Quality Management Plan (AQMP). The plan detailed aggressive measures to reduce tail-pipe emissions, a primary cause of air pollution in the area. As a result, residents of Vancouver enjoy air quality that is better than it was 20 years ago even as population numbers skyrocket and economic activity booms. However, despite substantial improvements to the city of Vancouver’s air quality, establishing the most effective solutions that benefit the maximum number of people still has a long way to go.

“The air quality is better in Metro Vancouver than in the Fraser Valley because of the AQMP but these measures have shifted the pollutants downwind,” says Douw Steyn, Professor, Department of Earth & Ocean Sciences at UBC Vancouver. “Whereas two decades ago, the most polluted places in the Fraser Valley used to be Port Moody to Maple Ridge, it’s now Chilliwack to Hope.”

The evolution of pollution in the Greater Vancouver Regional District is the subject of Steyn’s research project “Modelling in Support of Management: Photochemical Air Pollution in the Lower Fraser Valley, B.C.” Specifically, he is using computer modeling to understand the chemical composition of emission patterns and what their changes as a result of the AQMP can tell us about tackling pollution in the future.

Steyn explains that Vancouver’s air pollution problems are the result of meteorological and chemical factors. For example, the region’s location between the coastline and mountains produces a land-sea breeze that traps air and allows pollution to build up from day to day until it is pushed further downwind. In addition, while technological advances like catalytic converters have removed volatile organics in tailpipe emissions, they have not been able to remove another category of pollutants called oxides of nitrogen, resulting in a changed chemical mixture whose chemical reactions are much slower. By understanding these complicated factors, Steyn believes more effective solutions to air pollution can be developed.

As Steyn tackles air pollution’s composition, Michael Brauer, Professor, School of Environmental Health at UBC Vancouver, is also busy helping inform Metro Vancouver’s AQMP by looking at

the relationship between pollution hotspots and health. His research is actively drawing links between health complications, including low birth weight, pre-term babies, asthma and adult cardiovascular disease, in areas that are affected by residential wood burning or large amounts of vehicle traffic.

“There’s a bit of a paradigm shift from the more traditional approaches to managing air quality, like reducing the sources. All that is great but if you have 50,000 vehicles passing by your home everyday, you’re still going to have a problem,” says Brauer.

Brauer points to Knight Street in Vancouver as an example of an area that is a major truck route but is also heavily populated with schools and homes. However, he suggests this example is one of many that exist in most metropolitan cities, which is why the need for best practice guidelines is so important.

“Our research has resulted in urban planning guidelines that have been adopted by the Ministry of Environment and are integrated into Metro Vancouver’s AQMP. These guidelines specify that locating schools and long-term care facilities along major traffic hotspots should be avoided and gives guidance on how close is too close and how busy is too busy,” says Brauer.

Both Steyn and Brauer’s research are expected to play key roles in shaping the future of Metro Vancouver’s AQMP as well as to the continued improvement of air quality in the GVRD.

Douw Steyn’s research is funded by the BC Clean Air Research Fund (through the Fraser Basin Council), the Fraser Valley Regional District, Metro Vancouver and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). Michael Brauer’s research is supported by Health Canada, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) and others.

Spare the airDOUW SteyN aND mike braUer are lOOkiNg tO iNFOrm tHe Next pHaSe OF metrO vaNcOUver’S air qUality maNagemeNt plaN iN aN eFFOrt tO reDUce tHe Negative eFFectS OF regiONal air pOllUtiON

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“ Whereas two decades ago, the most polluted places in the Fraser valley used to be port moody to maple ridge, it’s now chilliwack to Hope.”

livable cOmmUNitieS

Spare tHe air

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Communities around the world are confronting unique challenges to sustain their local environment, culture and identity in the face of climate change. From B.C.’s coastal communities to Arctic gateway cities in the north, UBC Vancouver sociology professor Ralph Matthews is leading teams of researchers in the study of the sociological and cultural implications of climate change through two distinct projects: The Co-Management of Climate Change in Coastal British Columbia (C5) Project and The City of Whitehorse – Climate Change and Institutional Adaptive Capacity Project.

Frontier: What was the objective behind The C5 Project?Ralph matthews: The C5 Project aimed to examine how people living in the same space and place understand that shared environment within their own cultural, social and economic circumstances. Specifically, we were interested in the way First Nations and non-First Nations people understand and perceive climate change and global warming by gathering individual-level data on cultural models, or culturally standardized perspectives that people use to interpret their environment.

f: What are the challenges that Aboriginal people face in Coastal B.C. in regards to climate change? Rm: All communities in these areas are resource communities, making them vulnerable to climate change because they tend to be highly dependent on a single industry like fishing, farming, agriculture or forestry. For Aboriginal peoples, these

changes affect the interdependency of people, culture and nature that is fundamental to their way of life.

f: How do Aboriginal people understand climate change in these communities?Rm: Aboriginal people understand climate change in the context of their culture, experience and history. These are people who have a history of having their culture threatened one way or the other so they liken climate change to other overall long-term challenges to their culture to which they have to adapt.

f: How do non-Aboriginal people understand climate change in these communities? Rm: Non-Aboriginal people seem to be split on climate change. Firstly, unlike Aboriginal people, they do not relate it to their history or culture but may, for example, talk about it in terms of the current economy. Secondly, there is a sizable proportion that are still in denial that the problem is real or different from past climate change events and have very little understanding about how global warming expresses itself.

f: How did the findings of The C5 Project drive your current research with The City of Whitehorse – Climate Change and Institutional Adaptive Capacity Project?Rm: From The C5 Project, I learned much about how individuals think about and interpret climate change, but didn’t come away with a good sense of these communities’ capacity to respond to climate change. The City of Whitehorse – Climate

Change and Institutional Adaptive Capacity Project focuses entirely on what is going to happen to Arctic gateway cities like Whitehorse as a result of environmental changes, what processes they are using to deal with them and what is their capacity to respond.

f: How is climate change impacting these cities?Rm: A major issue for the Arctic at a social and governance level is that two thirds of the population lives inside the cities. They are affected by what the climate is doing to their natural resources. For example, it is melting the ground and their roads are flooding. However, climate change is also producing an economic boom in the north through exploration and tourism. We’re capturing all of the dilemmas of management, politics and governance in regards to these issues and investigating the institutional capacities that they have to deal with them.

f: Why is it so important to understand sociological responses to climate change?Rm: Climate change is brought about by social behaviour. Our responses, either mitigation of it, or adapting to it, require changes in our behaviour and our social structures.

The C5 Project was funded by Natural Resources Canada. The City of Whitehorse – Climate Change and Institutional Adaptive Capacity Project is funded through a Canada International Polar Year (IPY) grant to the Climate Adaptation and Vulnerability in Arctic Regions (CAVIAR) research network.

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UBc to get greenerThe federal and provincial governments are investing nearly $68 million to boost research infrastructure and sustainability at UBC. The Biological Sciences West and South buildings at UBC’s Vancouver campus will receive $65 million to renovate research facilities and classrooms originally built more than 50 years ago, while incorporating the latest sustainable features. The Geoexchange System at UBC Okanagan, which uses groundwater from under the campus to heat and cool buildings, will receive $2.9 million to make the campus emissions-free by 2010. The BioSciences Renew Project is expected to be completed by spring 2011.

marine management A team of researchers from UBC’s Sea Around Us Project and Princeton University is using computer models to simulate changes in ocean temperature and current patterns caused by various climate change scenarios. The research aims to discover how

temperature changes affect 1,066 commercially important fish and shellfish species from around the world, including cod, herring, sharks, groupers and prawns. “We found that on average, the animals may shift their distribution towards the poles by 40 km per decade,” says William Cheung, who led the project as a post-doctoral fellow at UBC’s Fisheries Centre. “Fishers in the tropics may take the brunt of these changes, since many are from developing countries and are ill-equipped to deal with the loss in catch. Nordic countries like Norway, on the other hand, may see a gain in potential catch.”

Offsetting B.c.’s carbon footprint A UBC spinoff company has been selected to be the first provider of carbon offsets to the Pacific Carbon Trust (PCT), an organization that will provide offsets to the Government of B.C. and its crown corporations. Offsetters Clean Technology Inc., a company founded out of the Centre for Sustainability and Social Innovation at UBC, will provide PCT with high-quality emissions

New spiders new possibilities A UBC researcher’s discovery of dozens of new species of jumping spiders is offering exciting new opportunities to inform fields as diverse as medicine and robotics. Wayne Maddison, a professor of zoology and botany, collected more than 500 individual spiders in the Kaijende Uplands, one of Papua New Guinea’s largest undeveloped areas. Preliminary studies show as many as 130 species, including 30 to 50 novel species, may have been found on the trip. “Spider venom has evolved for millions of years to affect the neurological systems of the spider’s insect prey, and each species of spider gives us another opportunity to find medically useful chemicals,” says Maddison. “Jumping spiders, with their remarkably miniaturized yet acute eyes, could help us understand how to push the limits of vision, among other things.”

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Fellow, Royal Society of londonGeorge Sawatzky, Department of Physics & Astronomy

Officers, Order of canadaVictor Ling, Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine

Timothy Oke, Department of Geography

David Sweet, Faculty of Dentistry

members, Order of canadaMax Cynader, Faculty of Medicine, Brain Research Centre and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute (VCHRI)

Ross Petty, Department of Pediatrics (Pediatric Rheumatology) and VCHRI

Harold Adams Innis PrizeTina Loo, Department of History

Professor Loo received the Harold Adams Innis Prize for her outstanding book States of Nature: Protecting Canadian Wildlife in the Twentieth Century. The prize is awarded by the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences to the best English-language book in the social sciences.

Killam Prize, HumanitiesSherrill Grace, Department of English

Professor Grace has worked tirelessly to transcend the intellectual boundaries of research and scholarship in culture and the arts through cross-disciplinary collaboration. The Canada Council for the Arts Killam Prizes are intended to honour distinguished Canadian scholars actively engaged in research in Canada.

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offsets, or a form of trade funding projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, in an effort to address climate change in B.C. The Government of B.C. and its crown corporations have all pledged to be carbon-neutral by 2010. “This is the first of many purchases to fund innovation and stimulate the development of a viable emissions offset industry in B.C.” said Minister Hansen. “In its first agreement, the PCT has purchased the ability to offset 330,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions over five years – equivalent to taking 85,800 cars off the road for one year.”

Partners in sustainability After decades of guiding sustainability programs at the national and international level, former B.C. premier Mike Harcourt is partnering with UBC to help people make a difference in their communities and businesses. As associate director of the new UBC Continuing Studies Centre for Sustainability, Harcourt will contribute to educational programs for practitioners in the public and private sectors that stress practical knowledge in tackling climate change and sustainability issues.

let there be light A UBC invention that brings natural sunlight into multi-floor office buildings will receive up to $2.1 million in funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC). The patented Solar Canopy Illumination System collects sunlight on the exterior façade of conventional buildings through a specially designed array of mirrors. Customizable “light guides” then bring the sunlight

into the building, supplemented by dimmable light fixtures. “This is the first such system to be practical for widespread adoption in standard office buildings,” says Lorne Whitehead, UBC physics professor and inventor of the technology. “The system will not only bring natural light into workplaces but could reduce greenhouse gas emissions from lighting in commercial buildings by 10 to 25 per cent.”

From sea to land A team of researchers including scientists at UBC has discovered a chemical substance in marine algae that may alter plant evolution timelines. Lignin, a glue-like substance that helps fortify cell walls and is vital to structural support in land plants, was previously thought to be unique to terrestrial plants who sprout upward, supported by their own woody tissues. Until the discovery, lignin was long considered land plants’ distinguishing characteristic from aquatic plants that rely on water for support. “All land plants evolved from aquatic green algae, and scientists have long believed that lignin evolved after plants took to land as a mechanical adaptation for stabilizing upright growth and transporting water from the root,” says lead author Patrick Martone, an assistant professor in the UBC Department of Botany. “Because red and green algae likely diverged more than a billion years ago, the discovery of lignin in red algae suggests that the basic machinery for producing lignin may have existed long before algae moved to land.”

Photo > Lorne Whitehead, UBC

Photo > Kathy Ann Miller, UBC

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Frontier issue 6