Projects and Initiatives - Tools and Resources

CIP's climate change projects are designed to help build and disseminate the growing body of knowledge available to planners on how climate change is affecting their communities and how to deal with it.

The following activities have yielded outputs and resources that are being assembled and shared with CIP members and others to identify and address climate change impacts, especially at the community level.

Tools/Best Practices

Work on this component involves an assessment of existing planning tools and their adaptability to climate change planning. Through the combined use of surveys and focus groups across the country, research is under way to determine what climate change tools planners use and what tools they need that don't already exist. Surveys will also be used to benchmark and provide a baseline against which to monitor planners' knowledge of and responsiveness to climate change. A report card tool is being developed to monitor and report change from year to year.

Work is also under way to development of a model Standard of Practice that will serve as a guideline for professional planners dealing with climate change issues. It will deal with planners' substantive, legal and ethical obligations in complying with CIP's policy on climate change. Application of the standard would occur at the Affiliate level and in compliance with any applicable provincial legislation governing the profession.

In addition, a number of Canadian case studies are being prepared that will highlight best practices and/or innovative approaches to climate change planning. These case studies focus on adaptation issues and also deal with mitigation strategies.

When completed, all of these resources will be added to the Climate Change Resource Library.

Research/Studio Awards

Administered in close collaboration with ACUPP, this component involved awarding ten $5,000 research fellowships and five $2,500 studio project awards. Application criteria and promotional information were developed and distributed to all planning programs in Canada that are recognized by CIP. A panel reviewed the submissions received and selected the recipients. Final reports were submitted by fellowship recipients, and both the fellowship and studio recipients prepared posters on their work. All of the documentation is available for viewing in the Climate Change Resource Library.

Community Climate Change Adaptation Plans

Under its partnership with NRCan, and through a joint collaboration between CIP, INAC, NRCan and the Government of Nunavut, CIP has sent teams of planners to work with seven communities in the far North and, more recently, four Atlantic communities to help develop community-based climate change adaptation plans.

The teams, comprised of two planners each, work with local government and stakeholders, to help them prepare for changes that have already started or might happen as a result of climate change. In the case of the northern communities, this work also involves NRCan scientists, engineers from Nunavut, and INAC staff, as well as elders and other community members. The teams conduct a number of visits, each lasting several days, and then contribute to the preparation of a climate change adaptation plan for the community.

The climate change adaptation plans prepared under CIP's project are available through the Climate Change Resource Library.