PortsToronto Presents Sixth-Annual Sustainability Report

We are proud to present our sixth-annual Sustainability Report, which offers a comprehensive look at our efforts in the past year with respect to our longstanding mission to protect Toronto’s waters, support our community and innovate for a sustainable future. 

In this report, for the first time, we have aligned our environmental initiatives with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs). The UN-SDGs are 17 specific goals intended as a universal call to action to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. The framework has been adopted by government bodies around the world including the Canadian federal government in its Federal Sustainable Development Strategy for Canada.

In this report, we have put our organization through its paces in identifying projects and initiatives that we are proud of as well as areas in which we need to improve in order to reach our future targets. We also acknowledge that the year 2020 looked much different than we had originally planned. However, thanks in no small part to the perseverance and grit of our team, we took the challenges resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic in stride and did what we could to continue working toward our goals.

In 2020, PortsToronto continued to implement sustainable practices, support our community and the wellbeing of our employees, and invest in programs and infrastructure that protect the environment and grow Toronto’s economy.

Some of these initiatives include:

• Converting Billy Bishop Airport’s Marilyn Bell I passenger/vehicle ferry to electric-power, which will significantly reduce noise associated with ferry operations and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 530 tonnes. This project is expected to be completed in 2021;
• Completing the Billy Bishop Airport Cityside Modernization Project, an important component of the City of Toronto-led Bathurst Quay Neighbourhood Plan which included the complete reconstruction of the Eireann Quay roadway and sidewalks, as well as climate resiliency measures including permeable paving to reduce storm water runoff and urban heat island effect;
• Completing the build of a new space at the Port of Toronto tailored to the needs of the Works and Environmental Services team – an essential team that ensured the safe continuation of many of PortsToronto’s signature projects throughout 2020, including dredging, flood protection and wetland creation;
• Continued to support leading research on plastic and microplastic pollution in our waterways, and incorporate the use of innovative trash-trapping technology in our harbour cleaning efforts as part of the PortsToronto Seabin Program; and,
• Continuing to choose 100% green electricity from Bullfrog Power—the only port authority and airport in Canada to do so.

Curious to know more? To read PortsToronto’s 2020 Sustainability Report, click here.