The Wolastoq, also known as the Saint John River, is a nearly 700-kilometre waterway that winds from Quebec and Maine to the Bay of Fundy in New Brunswick. It’s home to several species at risk: wood turtles nest by its shores, pygmy snaketail dragonflies buzz on the water’s surface, and wild Atlantic salmon swim upstream. It’s easy to see why its name means “beautiful and bountiful river” in the language of the Wolastoqiyik, or the “people of the beautiful river.” The river is central to their identity and culture.

But in the Wolastoq watershed and the cities and towns it sustains, the impacts of increased industrialization and the changing climate are felt deeply. Today, the river is crisscrossed by roads and rail lines, disrupted by large hydroelectric dams, and bordered by farms and shoreline real estate that often run right up to the water’s edge. As a result, the Wolastoq has lost much of its ability to absorb surges in water levels during winter snow melts and heavy spring rains. Surrounding communities are forced to battle intense flooding when the river jumps its banks, causing costly damages. In 2019, record-level flooding carried $93.2 million in damages, and thousands of residents were forced to evacuate. Severe flooding occurred again in 2023, and the province is bracing itself for more to come in 2026.

Restoring ecosystems along the Wolastoq – such as by planting trees, working with farmers to restore degraded agricultural sites by riverbanks, and increasing waterside vegetation to rehabilitate floodplains – could be key to a multi-layered solution. To make those opportunities a reality, WWF-Canada and Wawanesa Insurance, a national mutual insurance company headquartered in Winnipeg, have teamed up in supporting local partners to help the river better absorb and slow water currents during extreme events, enhancing flood protection and other forms of natural resilience.

Investing for impact

For Wawanesa, which has a strong membership base in New Brunswick, the Wolastoq is a logical place to focus part of its annual $2 million investments in climate resilience throughout Canada. Wawanesa partnered with WWF-Canada because of its proven track record, strong technical expertise and deep relationships with local experts and community members, says Mitch McEwen, the insurer’s director of sustainability, climate resilience and community impact. “Our contribution is bringing the focus on reducing climate related losses,” he adds.

In New Brunswick, through their partnership with Wawanesa and others, including government and private foundations, WWF-Canada supports on-the-ground experts to identify local restoration projects with the highest impact both for people and nature.

In the town of Edmundston, which experiences flooding year after year, this funding enabled project design and site assessments for floodplain restoration work with broad community support.

“We’re using nature-based solutions like planting native trees and shrubs to mitigate flood risk and deliver several environmental and social benefits,” says Stéphanie Paradis-Léger, a researcher in applied ecology with INNOV, a local organization supported by WWF-Canada and Wawanesa. Paradis-Léger says the positive outcomes from their work became quickly apparent. “During a freeze thaw in December, ice jams formed, but the restored floodplain held the overflow, likely preventing flooding,” she reports.

Long-term advantages

Nature-based solutions are not only highly effective in the short term, but they also help companies identify where their philanthropic investments can have the greatest impact on climate resilience. Investments in restoring nature don’t require as much maintenance compared to other types of infrastructure, and they tend to improve progressively as ecosystems develop and recover. “Naturebased solutions get better over time, generally speaking, as they become more mature,” McEwen says.

Another core benefit of nature-based solutions is reflected in WWF-Canada’s overarching priority for comprehensive ecosystem regeneration. In the Wolastoq watershed, investments in things like restoring wetlands and planting native species along riverbanks can offer significant benefits to the more than 500,000 people who live in the region, as well as the wildlife – which includes nearly 50 species at risk of extinction – and the land and river ecosystems.

“We really strive to create ecosystems where both wildlife thrives and also the humans that live in those communities,” says Alex Portman, head of corporate partnerships at WWF-Canada. For example, by doing restoration in the upper reaches of the river near Edmundston, WWF-Canada is creating cascading benefits for the entire watershed, notes Lauren Stead, senior manager of ecosystem restoration at WWF-Canada.

Restoration takes root

Restoration projects in the Wolastoq are part of a broader 10-year strategic plan WWF-Canada is deploying through to 2030 called Regenerate Canada, which has three pillars: 1) catalyze the restoration of one million hectares of degraded ecosystems across the country, 2) steward and protect 100 million hectares of ecosystems, and 3) reduce carbon emissions in the atmosphere by 30 million tons using nature-based solutions. “All of the work we do ladders up into these three main goals,” Portman says. “For corporate partners, that means their investment is directed toward science-based, high-impact projects that deliver measurable results on the ground.”

As restoration projects take root in the Wolastoq watershed, WWFCanada is working to activate more impactful partnerships in the region and beyond. For its part, Wawanesa is on board for more of this type of collaboration, where “partners with the local technical expertise drive a coordinated approach to identifying the appropriate solutions that actually get them off the ground,” McEwen says. “We hope to be able to scale that over time.”

Learn more about partnering with WWF-Canada: wwf.ca/partnerships

Illustrations by Chanelle Nibbelink

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Markham, Ontario, in the 1990s was a city in need of a pivot: away from an era of increasing sprawl and toward denser neighbourhoods with better urban planning. The long-term pressures of climate change and the energy transition were already visible, and in 1999 Markham’s city councillors took the step of investing in a district energy system to heat and cool its downtown core. Instead of relying on individual boilers and cooling equipment in every building, the city backed a shared energy network designed to scale alongside new development.

Now, roughly 25 years later, insulated pipes buried beneath parts of Markham carry hot and chilled water between central energy plants and connected buildings across more than 14 million square feet of development. Markham’s investment paid off. The system has delivered a faster transition to cleaner energy while helping build amore resilient city by improving long-term energy reliability and flexibility as community needs evolve.

“The thing we’re able to do with[centralized plants] is adopt new technologies long before a building would,” says Peter Ronson, COO of Markham District Energy. “And so the buildings on a district energy system benefit from the transition to higher efficiency and lower carbon footprint.”

The opportunity for Canada

When it comes to shared community energy, Canada currently lags behind other regions such as Europe, the Middle East and Asia, where city-based systems are more common. The cities that are leading the charge in Canada are benefitting significantly, like Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories, which could save up to $160,000 annually with its district energy system.

A widespread shift to centralized thermal energy networks stands to improve the resilience of Canada’s economy while accelerating progress on emissions reductions. These projects are readily bankable and scale efficiently with private sector investment. Networked systems help municipalities become more resilient to power outages and energy shocks. Around the world, they have proven effective in different kinds of disasters, from ice storms to hurricanes. That’s partly because district energy systems can draw from multiple energy sources and are maintained using higher-grade equipment, says Gerard MacDonald, principal at Reshape Infrastructure Strategies in Vancouver.

Upfront investment, lasting benefits

Despite the economic and environmental advantages, district energy still faces enormous challenges getting projects officially off the ground, Ronson says. Energy systems like these require significant upfront financing. But on the other side of the ledger, they scale well as demand grows. Systems can be launched for just a few buildings and expand over time. Early support from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ Green Municipal Fund, which provides grants and loans to municipalities for clean energy and resilience projects, has helped get many of these first-phase systems off the ground.

“District energy is one of the smartest ways to decarbonize buildings,” MacDonald says, because it cuts emissions “with a lot less electricity than you would if you went at it building by building.” That’s why, he says, it is drawing attention not just from the district energy and electricity sectors, but also from politicians and others who care about costs for users.

Investors are noticing too. “District energy is increasingly compelling be-cause, compared to more traditional utility models, it can offer communities local control and greater resilience to fuel price shocks, outages and supply disruptions,” says Marieke Cloutier, senior director of programs at the Green Municipal Fund. “It offers large-scale, net-zero investment opportunities with strong returns and efficient transaction costs.” A crucial early supporter, the Green Municipal Fund continued investing in Markham Centre district energy for 20 years – providing more than $17 million in grants and loans. This system became Canada’s fastest-growing energy utility, attracting more than $270 million in additional capital across multiple stages of expansion, including from the Canadian Infrastructure Bank and Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce.

Such early funding from the Green Municipal Fund plays a “de-risking” role for district energy projects, laying the groundwork for investors who want to fund green infrastructure but may find municipal deals too small or complex to navigate. District energy is capital intensive, so being able to borrow at low interest rates and offer reasonable security can be a strong accelerant. The Green Municipal Fund finances early work such as business cases and feasibility studies, so that by the time a project is ready for large-scale capital to come in, it is equipped with reliable data, clearer risk allocation and strong return potential.

Investors like the certainty of long-term infrastructure and utility-scale returns on investment, Ronson says. “Once you connect buildings to district energy systems, they’re typically connected forever.”

Networked for growth

As well as stable power and emissions reductions, cities with networked energy draw further advantages from these systems’ shared infrastructure, Cloutier says. They’re cheaper to run over time while providing municipalities with “more stable long-term revenue streams when compared to other conventional utility models.”

Markham now operates two district energy systems with four energy plants, and it’s commissioning another. The new addition will collect warmth from a large sanitary sewer running alongside one of its plant facilities, using a heat exchanger and industrial heat pumps. Ronson says the system will improve efficiency and provide a return on investment, all while reducing the carbon footprint of Markham’s heating network beginning this winter.

Twenty-seven years after pivoting to efficient thermal energy networks, Markham now leads a wider shift as other cities rethink how they heat and cool their downtowns. As cities and investors weigh their options, MacDonald argues that the real test is what works for the people who pay the bills. “It’s in the public interest to go the route of district energy because it’s lower cost, it can be low-carbon, and it’s not going to break the grid.”

FCM’s Green Municipal Fund (GMF) is a globally unique organization providing funding and education to municipalities to help them reach net-zero and build resilient communities. GMF manages approximately $2.4 billion in programs funded by the Government of Canada.

Learn more about how the GreenMunicipal Fund is helping derisk climate investment: greenmunicipalfund.ca/invest

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