The Canadian boreal forest is as important as the Amazon tropical rain forest and needs as much recognition and protection, say conservation groups.

Boreal Songbird Initiative and Ducks Unlimited released a report highlighting 10 areas in the forest rich in biodiversity.

The report says the forest contains 25 per cent of the globe’s never-before-harvested forests and seven of the 10 largest areas of contiguous forest in the world. Read it all at the Windsor Star.

A new report from a U.S. environmental chemist says bitumen would sink 26 hours after an oil spill in fresh or brackish water.

Testimony at the Northern Gateway hearing by experts speaking on behalf of Enbridge Inc, the pipeline builder, said based on laboratory tests bitumen doesn’t sink.

Jeff Short says if the test by consulting firm SLRoss Environmental Research had been done at lower temperatures, with higher wind speeds, the study would have reached different conclusions. Read it all at the Tyee.

Meanwhile, a long-time energy expert and geologist says the world of difficult oil, such as the oilsands, is costing too much and bringing too much volatility. Read it all at the Tyee.

Parks Canada approved an increase of winter and summer activity at the Mount Norquay ski area in Banff National Park, bringing immediate criticism from environmental groups.

Parks approved for summer use the installation of cables and ladders to connect climbers to the mountain top, and the opening of the tea house and observation area.

For the winter, Parks approved an increased number of ski runs, skiing in tree-thinned areas, and widening and modifying a terrain park.

Environmental groups said the approved plan will impact grizzly bear habitat, and the increased road traffic will intersect a grizzly bear migration corridor.

Parks says a number of mitigation efforts will limit the impact of the increased development and activity. Read it all at the Calgary Herald.

The Cree Regional Authority of Quebec says Resolute Forest Products clear cut an area of the forest, breaking a 2002 provincial agreement, and wants their Forest Stewardship Council certification revoked.

The Cree say Resolute is required and did not cut trees in a mosaic pattern, cutting no more than 150 hectares before leaving an equivalent area uncut, until the re-growth reaches three metres. Read it all at CBC News.

The NunatuKavut Community Council is ending their participation in the environmental review of the Labrador-Island Link connecting power from the Muskrat Falls dam in Labrador to Newfoundland.

The group says they have lost faith in the review of the transmission line that crosses their traditional territory. Read it all at the Telegram.

The Harper government is helping reform the environmental review process in Peru to speed up approval of mining projects by Canadian companies.

Canada has pledged $53 million in foreign aid projects to Peru with many focused on natural resources management.

Peru announced last year it was streamlining the environmental review process since $7.5 billion in mining projects were in limbo. The new process would take power away from industry, but it is still a work and process. Read it all at the Edmonton Journal.

Canadian researchers discovered a record-breaking strain of bacteria that lives and reproduces at temperatures below freezing. The strain, OR1 or Planococcus halocryophilus, is able to withstand temperatures of –15 C and possibly survive temperatures as low as –25 C.

A report from the Wind Energy Association of Canada says government incentives are needed to boost Alberta’s green image and sustainable energy projects.

The province announced goals to increase sustainable energy over the next decade, but still relies heavily on coal-fired plants for electricity. 

Robert Hornung, president of CanWEA, says financing new projects is too difficult and the government needs to make changes to the marketplace. CanWEA recommends implementing a clean electricity standard to promote alternative energy projects. Read it all at The Edmonton Journal.

A recent study of south Baffind Island revealed a caribou population in serious decline.

The herd of between 60,000 to 180,000 from the 1990s has now sunk by more than 95 per cent to between 1,000 and 2,000 animals.

Nunavut Environment Minister James Arreak said the government will draw on traditional knowledge, science and best practices to conserve the caribou. Read it all at the CBC.

An agreement between the forest industry and environmental groups to protect the boreal forest has broken down.

The 2010 agreement between 19 forest companies and seven environmental groups aimed to protect the woodland caribou and make room for logging.

Greenpeace and Canopy pulled out of the agreement in the last year because of a lack of progress. Read it all at the Toronto Star.

The Kootenay Co-op in Nelson, B.C., is criticizing the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s recent change to its definition of local food. CFIA recently changed the definition from 50 kilometres to anything produced inside the province.

The co-op says it undermines the definition of local and is a sellout to large grocery chains looking to cash in on the buy local phenomenon. Read it all at the CBC.

Mandated to purchase carbon offsets for their greenhouse gas emissions, a B.C. board of education is forgoing purchasing offsets from the Pacific Carbon Trust and instead is going to offset their emissions locally.

The PCT, a provincial Crown corporation, takes money from departments, schools, hospitals and universities and buys carbon offsets inside the province. The provincial auditor general recently criticized the PCT for not purchasing credible offsets, a claim the trust and the province rejects.

The Southeast Kootenay school district is taking its $80,000 it is suppose to pay the trust and is creating a reserve fund to help cut emissions locally – a move they says does not contravene legislation.

Why pay the trust money, when it could be used to improve inefficient heating and cooling systems – projects that would directly cut greenhouse gas emissions, says Cranbrook trustee Chris Johns. Read it all at the Vancouver Sun.

Charles Ramcharan, an associate professor of biology at Laurentian University, supports the City of Greater Sudbury’s plan to study the watershed through the lens of climate change and development.

The Sudbury area is rich in metal resources. The city’s surrounding wetlands help lock in the metals to keep them out of the greater watershed. Climate change threatens to dry out the wetlands and limit their ability to hold back the metals. Read it all at the Sudbury Star.

The Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory in Eureka, Nunavut whose funding was previously cut by the Harper government had some of its funding restored for five years.

PEARL will get a $5-million grant over five years through the new Climate Change and Atmospheric Research initiative, which is funded through the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

NSERC is handing out a total of $32 million to research projects.

The new money won’t be enough to keep the station going year round, but Jim Drummond, PEARL’s principal investigator, says they are working on automating some instruments. Drummond also said climate change research needs long-term funding and wants confirmation funding won’t end in five years. Read it all at the Toronto Star.

About 50 protesters gathered in Sarnia, Ont. to protest a conference on the oilsands. The conference aims to find ways to create value-added products from the bitumen. Read it all at CTV News.

Meanwhile, Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver replied to a letter from Canada’s top climate change academics opposed to the expansion of the oilsands. In the letter, Oliver said the fight against climate change doesn’t hinge on shutting down the oilsands, which accounts for 0.1 per cent of emissions globally. Read it all at the Globe and Mail.

Meanwhile, a Canadian Pacific Rail freight train derailed spilling 91,000 litres of oil in Saskatchewan. CP has been increasing shipments of oil by rail. This spill marks the third CP train oil spill in the last few months. Read it all at Global News.

The industry association, the Air Transport Action Group, hopes progress is made to find a market-based approach to reducing the air industry’s greenhouse gas emissions at a UN agency meeting in Montreal.

The United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization is holding meetings this week and the industry association wants to see a global deal approved by 2016 and implemented by 2020.

Options being considered are buying credits when airlines surpass baseline emissions, with some money flowing to research or an even more comprehensive emissions scheme.

The European Union has paused their plans to tax the emissions of international airlines, while the ICAO attempts to craft a global solution. Read it all at the Winnipeg Free Press.

Canada’s Arctic glaciers are the largest contributor to a world-wide melt of glaciers, says a new international study.

The global glacier melt is contributing almost as much to sea-level rise as the melting of Greenland and Antarctica’s ice sheets combined, says the study.

Canada's glaciers are shrinking at twice the rate of 50 years ago, said the study published in the journal Science. Read it all at the Edmonton Journal.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said the Keystone XL pipeline must go ahead because the oil will flow regardless by train.

Harper attended a question and answer session at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. Read it all at the Times Colonist.

Harper also said climate change will not be solved by capping economic growth; rather by major investments in technology and a global emissions regime.

Environmentalists back in Canada said Harper was being disingenuous because his government canceled support for green energy development and gives subsidies to oil companies. Read it all at the Edmonton Journal.

A new bylaw requiring the use of clear plastic garbage bags had residents of Dufferin County screaming at their councillors.

The law coming into effect June 1 would harmonize the policy across the county’s eight municipalities where a few already require clear bags.

Requiring clear bags has shown to divert the amount of recylables ending up in the landfill by exposing the contents of garbage. The county’s bylaw allows for the bags to be stored in garbage cans and for one privacy bag. Read it all at the Toronto Star.

A new study from the Royal Bank of Canada says rising food prices are negatively impacting the Canadian economy.

Food prices rose 2.4 per cent in 2012 and could rise another 4 per cent this year due to the severe drought conditions across the U.S. last year.

Consumer confidence in the economy is falling and only 26 per cent of Canadians are optimistic about the economy. Nearly 30 per cent of Canadians believe the economy is deteriorating. Read it all at the London Free Press.

The United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture contacted Ottawa over plans to conduct natural gas exploitation using hydraulic fracturing techniques next to a UNESCO world heritage site.

Black Spruce Exploration wants to frack a few kilometres from the boundary of Gros Morne National Park off Newfoundland’s west coast.

The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society wants a buffer zone created around the park to protect it from oil and gas development. Read it all at the CBC.

Meanwhile, Saskatchewan designated 11,000 hectares of northern boreal forest as a provincial park, the first new park in the province in almost 20 years. Read it all at the Tyee.

In partnership with Natural Resources Canada, Ottawa developer Minto will build five net-zero energy homes, while studying the feasibility of developing the green technology on a wider scale.

As part of the federal ecoEnergy Innovation Initiative, five builders including Minto will share ideas and technologies to build homes that produce the same amount of energy from renewable sources as they use annually. Read it all at the Ottawa Citizen.

The wild weather swings in Thunder Bay from climate change is hurting tourism. Normally, this weekend would herald the start of the fishing season, but many northern lakes still have ice.

The weather swings are impacting the start and end of the tourism season, said Alan Cheeseman, president of Wilderness North. Read it all at the CBC.

Fish have been migrating north for four decades to find cooler water, says a new study.

By examining fisheries records, University of British Columbia scientist William Cheung correlated the types of fish caught with the type of temperature they prefer.

The mean temperature is increasing close to two degrees per decade for the last fourty years, Cheung said. Read it all at the Ottawa Citizen.

By 2080, as a result of sea level rise, New York could face weather like Superstorm Sandy every two years, says Klaus Jacob, a research scientist at Columbia University. The New York City Panel on Climate Change will report to the mayor at the end of the month on actions the city can take to mitigate the impact of climate change. Read it all at the Montreal Gazette.

Don’t blame BC NDP’s anti-pipeline stance on their collapse at the polls, said the head of the Dogwood Initiative.

The Dogwood’s internal polling found the NDP gained politically in their opposition to Kinder Morgan’s proposed pipeline expansion through the Vancouver area. Read it all at The Tyee.

Meanwhile, climate change expert Andrew Weaver became the first provincially elected Green Party member in the British Columbia legislature. Read it all at the Vancouver Sun.

The Quebec government tabled a bill to impose a five-year moratorium on shale gas exploration in the St. Lawrence River valley.

The province had previously announced plans to study and hold hearings on fracking. Energy companies use hydraulic fracturing techniques in the Gaspé and on Anticosti Island, but the decision to restrict in the St Lawrence lowland arose from public opposition. Read it all at the Vancouver Sun. 

The head of the International Joint Commission says a major investment in research is needed in order to preserve the Great Lakes.

The IJC’s recent biennial report found the number of chemicals down in the lakes, and no new non-native fish have been found since 2006.

The report also said, however, ice coverage is way down, the number of diporeia – a key food source for fish – is also down and the toxic blue green algae are back.

The IJC depends on the research capabilities of both the United States and Canada and both countries have cut funding recently, said Lana Pollack, U.S. co-chair of the commission.

Funding needs to be consistent and policies to limit greenhouse gases introduced, she said. Read it all at the Toronto Star.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency temporarily changed the definition of local food from 50 kilometres to food that is provincially grown or from 50 kilometres beyond the border. CFIA says it will be two years until a new definition is finalized, but finding a definition may not be easy.

The Farmers’ Markets Ontario says locally made products contains 51 per cent local ingredients or the defining ingredients are local.

Savour Ottawa will certify a restaurant as local when it serves 15 per cent local food with a financial limit of $25,000.

Made in Canada products can have less than two per cent sourced from outside the country. Read it all at the Toronto Star. 

Researchers found water that is over a billion years old locked in underground caves 2.5 kilometres below the Canadian Shield.

In an article published in the journal Nature, scientists say the water could be as old as 2.64 billion years and could support life. The scientists extracted the water without disturbing the cavern and found levels of noble gases that indicated the water had not been exposed to the atmosphere in at least a billion years.

Researchers will now be examining the water to find traces of life. Read it all at the Toronto Star.

Residents near Charlottetown, P.E.I., are calling on the provincial government to enforce stricter water conservation efforts for the local watershed.

Residents say the municipality is drawing too much water from the Winter River and its tributaries. Environment Canada forecasts a dry summer and residents fear branches of the Winter River will run dry for a second consecutive season.

New regulations are set to reduce Charlottetown's water consumption by 30 per cent, but they do not come into effect until 2015. Read it all at CBC News.

According to a new study, living close to major roadways can be harmful to kidney and cardiovascular health.

The study, published in the British Medical Journal, shows noise and air pollution increases the risk of heart attack by 12 per cent. The link between heart and kidney health indicate kidney function also suffers from proximity to street traffic. Read it all at The London Free Press.