BACKGROUNDER
Canada’s ecological footprint
“Ecological Footprints of Canadian Municipalities and Regions,” a report for the Federation of
Canadian Municipalities by Anielski Management Inc., finds that Canada has the world’s thirdlargest “ecological footprint,” and if everyone in the world consumed at the Canadian rate, it
would take four more Earths to support them.
An ecological footprint measures the impact each person or group makes on the environment.
The footprint is the biologically productive area required to produce all the products a person or
group consumes and to absorb all their waste. A footprint that exceeds the Earth’s carrying
capacity indicates an unsustainable rate of consumption.
The report finds it takes 7.25 hectares of land and sea throughout the world to support each
Canadian. However, Earth has only 1.9 hectares of productive land and sea available to meet the
needs of each person. By this measure, Canadians consume almost four times Earth’s capacity. In
comparison, the United States has the world’s second largest ecological footprint at 9.7 hectares
per person. France, with a population twice the size of Canada’s, has the 14th largest footprint at
5.26.
Ecological footprints vary according to average household income and the amount and kind of
energy consumed. In general, the greater the household income, the bigger the footprint. High
energy consumption and use of carbon-intensive fuels are also associated with larger footprints.
Energy demand accounts for 55 per cent of the Canadian footprint, with the largest portion
consumed by industry (38 per cent), followed by transportation (35 per cent), residential (15 per
cent) and commercial/business (12 per cent). Other components include the consumption of crop
land (19 per cent), forest land (16 per cent), built area (5 per cent), pasture land (3 per cent), and
sea space (2 per cent).
Among the 20 Canadian municipalities and urban regions studied, York Region, Calgary and
Edmonton have the largest municipal footprints, while Montreal, Quebec City and Greater
Sudbury have the smallest. The difference is due primarily to consumption expenditure levels and
the kind of energy consumed. In general, municipalities with higher household incomes have
larger footprints.
The report finds that household and municipal footprints can be reduced through lifestyle choices,
such as driving less and walking, cycling, carpooling or traveling by public transit; eating locally
grown food; retrofitting homes or businesses to conserve energy or adopting renewable-energy
alternatives; or driving a more fuel-efficient vehicle.
Municipal governments can use the environmental footprint analysis to shape their priorities,
planning and budgeting for transportation, housing, development, food, energy, infrastructure,
taxation, and environmental regulations. Benchmarking municipal, household and business
footprints will help to identify best practices or models of efficient energy use, transportation,
waste disposal, water and local food policies that yield smaller footprints.
The report was commissioned by FCM to develop the first Canadian estimates of the ecological
footprint of each of the major Canadian municipalities/regions that contribute to the FCM Quality
of Life Reporting System.
1
Ecological footprint analysis
Ecological footprint analysis is a tool for assessing the sustainability of the community of
households, businesses and other organizations. It converts the consumption of food, energy, and
other materials (using personal consumption expenditure data as a proxy for physical material
consumption) to the equivalent area of biologically productive land that would be required to
produce the food, energy and other materials to meet human consumption demands. A household,
business or community living within the natural bio-capacity of the land, sea and water that it
uses would have a healthy ecological footprint.
The municipal ecological footprint
The ecological footprint of a municipality (or any given population) is the biologically productive
area required to provide the space, materials and energy the community consumes and to absorb
its wastes. Municipalities can use the ecological footprint to measure and report on progress
towards community sustainability, to shape government priorities, and to plan and budget for
transportation, housing, development, food, energy, infrastructure, taxation, and environmental
regulations.
Benchmarking municipal household and business footprints should point to examples of best
practices or models of efficient energy, transportation, waste disposal, water and local food
policies that yield smaller footprints. In addition, municipalities can use the ecological footprint
to help community members reduce their individual ecological footprints.
Possible uses for the footprint include:

Measuring progress towards a municipal/urban sustainability vision.

Tracking returns on investment from sustainable transportation, green infrastructure and
other sustainability capital investments.

In strategic business planning and budgeting to consider the impact of municipal
spending on achieving a “balanced ecological budget”.

Encouraging community or neighbourhood sustainability lifestyle action plans.

Encouraging citizens and businesses to calculate their own footprint by tracking energy
consumption and thinking about buying locally and supporting local enterprise.

Offering incentives for “green” buildings.

Encouraging renewable energy infrastructure investments by households and businesses
through building codes, issuing renewable energy bonds or other ecological tax
incentives.
Calculating municipal ecological footprints
Environmental footprint analysis measures sustainability by calculating the total amount of
available productive land and how much of that productive land is needed to support municipal
consumption.
The municipal footprint estimates used in “Ecological Footprints of Canadian Municipalities and
Regions” begin with Canada’s national footprint estimates, which are based on detailed national
consumption statistics (not available at the municipal or provincial scale). The Canadian
ecological footprint uses more than 250 categories of production, import and export commodities
(such as oil, coal, corn, timber, fish meal, cotton, etc.). The calculation of municipal footprints
starts with Canadian national average per capita footprint data and estimates, then uses a number
of variables to arrive at local municipal footprints.
2
These variables include:

Household personal consumption expenditures;

Per capita income;

Average household size;

Population and population density;

Energy consumption; and

Commuting distances.
These variables reflect local variations in lifestyles and consumption levels and indicate local
variations in ecological footprints. Not all of the above data is available for all FCM
municipalities/regions. For example, only some municipalities that report Census Metropolitan
Area (CMA) data have household expenditure data available from Statistics Canada.
The primary factors used to estimate municipal footprints is from Statistics Canada’s CMAreported household consumption expenditure data (2001 Census). This is then translated into the
equivalent physical material and energy demands or flows. The national ecological footprint
estimates are apportioned for each municipality based on differences in per capita consumption
expenditures (where CMA household expenditure data is collected by Statistics Canada). For
non-CMA municipalities lacking Statistics Canada household expenditure data, other variables
are used, including per capita income as the next best proxy for consumption.
3