Future Proof - The Road to Zero

Listen to our conversation with Felix Böck founder of Chop Value of Vancouver BC.

As a carpenter, Felix was always fascinated by bamboo as a material. After continuing his interest in bamboo as a PhD student at UBC, he started his journey on building a sustainable community-based business.

Building a team, conducting some research, developing a micro factory concept and sourcing bamboo from the local sushi restaurants of Vancouver; so was Chop Value born.

Focusing on high end wood products selling to major retailers, Felix and his team are now looking to grow the business with their micro-factory franchise approach.

Listen to our conversation with Professor Gideon Grader of Technion and Co-Founder of H2Pro.  Borne out of Technion’s decade old energy research program, H2Pro is the commercial upstart bringing this technology to market.  

Using a newly developed two stage process that doesen’t require a membrane for separation of oxygen and hydrogen, H2Pro has developed a lower cost and highly efficient (up to 95% efficient) electrolyser system. With strong funding backing from a diverse group of Japanese and American industry partners, H2Pro is moving ahead with building a development factory to build a commercial prototype by 2022 leading to the rollout of several pilot projects planned for 2023.  

The product should be commercially available by 2024 and will be aimed for large scale power applications.

Listen to our conversation with Christina Seidel, the owner of Sonnevera International Corp and Executive Director of the Recycling Council of Alberta as we explore what is the circular economy and what are some of the ways to get there.

Going beyond simply recycling our plastic waste, which has thus far not solved our waste issue, we look at what are some of the disruptive ways we can begin to redesign our economy by designing out the waste or moving to a model of maintaining the value of our resources instead of recycling waste.

Join us for a conversation with Flavio Ortigao Owner and Chief Technical Officer at Recupera, as we explore his solution for turning plastic waste into hydrogen and new plastics.

Listen to our conversation with professor David Layzell, an Energy Systems Architect at the Transition Accelerator as well as Director of the Canadian Energy Systems Analysis Reach (CEASAR) initiative, University of Calgary.

Starting his career as a professor of biology, David has followed his interest in energy systems from the botanical world to that of human systems and has become a leader in the planning of transition pathways  to Net Zero energy systems.

Working with the Transition Accelerator to develop hydrogen hubs across Canada, David is accelerating the production and use of low carbon hydrogen as a fuel for both domestic demand and for new international markets that are quickly emerging.

Listen to our interview with Shannon Halliday of HTEC Hydrogen Technology and Energy Corporation (HTEC) of Vancouver BC.  As Vice President of Sales and Marketing at HTEC and having worked many years in the sustainable energy field and has experience in European and Quebec markets, Shannon has a rich background to share.

HTEC currently serves BC, Quebec and California with retail hydrogen fueling stations, with near future prospects to grow their infrastructure to a wider market including  Alberta.  Committed to low carbon fuels, HTEC strives to create partnerships for green and blue hydrogen supplies as well as developing their own low carbon hydrogen infrastructure.

Listen to our conversation with Matt Fairlie, Vice Chair at Next Hydrogen Corp.

A pioneer of Canadian innovation in Hydrogen, from his days as a graduate student involved in building hydrogen cars to working as a senior official in several hydrogen technology start-ups in Ontario.

Next Hydrogen specializes in building modular drop-in electrolyser units that are capable of processing large intermittent sources of electricity and converting it into Hydrogen efficiently.

Current clients include Canadian Tire distribution facilities and Next Hydrogen is looking to expand beyond the province of Ontario.

Join us for our conversation with Kathleen O'Neil, a founder and CEO of two innovative clean tech companies.  One company focuses on Carbon Capture and the second one, incorporated in Canada, is developing a new and innovative Methane heating and cracking (pyrolysis) technology to separate the Hydrogen and Carbon components from Natural Gas in a way where no CO2 is produced.  This low energy technology turns methane into Hydrogen and Carbon Black (a solid form of Carbon that can be used in other industrial processes).

She has been at work developing this technology since 2016, and with over $9M in industry and government funding New Wave Hydrogen is conducting field pilots and looking to move toward commercial pilot scales by 2025.   This technology will open the door for distributed and centralized Hydrogen production with low energy requirements and with zero carbon dioxide, offering the potential for significant reductions in GHG emissions in Western Canada and globally.

Join us for our conversation with Badr Abduljawad, Co-Founder and Director of Operations with Hydra Energy.  As someone who has completely embraced the west coast life, Badr was drawn to Vancouver to play a part in the Hydrogen economy.

Along with co-founder Simon Pickup, they have pioneered Hydrogen as a Service (HAAS) and created the easy button for the transportation industry.  Converting truck fleets to be able to run hydrogen in a co-combustion process with diesel fuel, providing the fueling infrastructure and hydrogen source with no upfront cost, it's never been easier for companies to move onto the road to zero emissions.

Operating in British Columbia and working on expanding the number of fleet vehicles served, Hydra has come up with an effective model to resolve the supply and demand balance of an emerging hydrogen economy.

Maggie Hanna is our local explorer and energy futurist.  Principal of Common Ground Energy Corporation and a fellow with the Energy Future Labs, she is based out of Calgary Alberta.

Starting her career as a geologist for the mineral industry, switched into oil and gas exploration for several decades and then worked a technology scout for the oil and gas industry in Alberta, she now is an advocate of a sustainable energy transition and has worked tirelessly to advance new technological innovation in Western Canada.

In our conversation we look at what is possible out of a Hydrogen economy for Western Canada from the perspective of someone who knows the Alberta oil and gas industry very intimately.

As well as an overview of where the world is headed and how Canada stacks up in developing and taking advantage of the opportunities available from developing our Hydrogen resources.