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Opportunities in the Classroom: SFU offers 563 courses across nine faculties that address sustainability and the SDGs.

Opportunities in the Community: The SFU Sustainability and Climate office continued to partner with university collaborators to highlight sustainability, climate action and planetary health events at the university. Through the Countdown to 2030: creating a sustainable future campaign, SFU underscored the critical importance of the years leading up to 2030. The SFU community was invited to participate in a diverse range of sustainability and climate activities across our three campuses, including high profile events such as the President’s Dream Colloquium on Indigenous Peoples and Local Community Perspectives on Sustainability and Resilience and the THE University Impact Forum on Sustainable Cities, both held in 2022.

Faculty for the Future, the Centre for Education Excellence and SFU Sustainability and Climate Office collaborated to design a community-wide survey. 

While the survey was not deployed through online communication channels, survey questions were discussed in small focus groups. 

A summary report was created that includes recommendations around our future role in advancing climate literacy at SFU.

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Climate Innovation team has been established, including a new Executive Director, Director, and Grant Writer.

More than 100 SFU researchers and 100 external partners engaged through climate innovation workshops and funding opportunities. Climate Innovation has hosted four Researcher-Partner Events and awarded $125,000 in Seed Funds to high potential research-with-impact projects. 

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Founded in 2022, SFU’s Civic Innovation Lab (CIL) works to advance education through the provision of collaborative learning and research opportunities and contribute to the economic, social, and environmental well-being of Burnaby residents through the study of civic innovation challenges. In 2025, CIL supported 14 ongoing projects and over $31M in research value.

Launched in 2022, the B.C. Centre for Agritech Innovation (BCCAI) supports farmers, producers, food-processors and small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in meeting their innovation needs. The centre, led by SFU, collaborates closely with universities across B.C., including the University of the Fraser Valley, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, University of Victoria, The University of British Columbia, and Thomson River University, providing expertise and excellence at local and regional levels.

In 2023, SFU partnered with Aga Khan University (AKU) on the Arusha Climate and Environmental Research Centre (AKU-ACER), a highlight of the growing relationships between SFU, AKU and the broader Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN). A new research centre unveiled by SFU and AKU supported opportunities for research partnerships on community-centred climate innovation, student exchanges and other collaborations between the two institutions.

The SFU Clean Hydrogen Hub was launched in 2024 as a new core research facility that brings together industry, community, academia and government partners to advance the clean energy transition.

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Since 2022, SFU has sent both in-person and virtual delegations of faculty, staff and students to the United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP). This annual engagement presents an important opportunity to highlight SFU’s leadership in climate research and spark international collaborations.

VentureLabs accelerates deeptech, cleantech, science, and innovation-based companies that have winning propositions and strong potential to scale up. The lab connects entrepreneurs with experienced mentors and a network of resources focused on tackling the unique challenges and complexities faced by innovators. In December 2023, VentureLabs hosted an event series focused on addressing real-world climate issues. This initiative brought together individuals seeking solutions from different industries with researchers and innovators from academia, fostering collaborations across sectors to tackle the climate challenge head-on.

4D LABS is an open-access applications- and science-driven Core Facility at SFU’s Burnaby campus. It offers fully customized research and development programs for researchers, start-ups and industry. In August 2025, 4D LABS welcomed Dr. Robin Isyas to deliver a seminar on hydrogen storage and the development of next-generation gas sorption platforms that are poised to advance green energy technologies worldwide.

In 2023, SFU’s Research Intelligence Office (RIO) developed an internal SDG Data Collection Portal. To date, the portal has streamlined data collection across the institution and created efficiencies in reporting. The development of public dashboards was paused and will be revisited in the future. 

RIO also enhanced SFU’s Research Expertise Engine with new features and functionality. 

Efforts were reallocated to reporting on multiple ranking and rating systems, resulting in SFU being ranked  

• #3 in Canada – Sustainable Cities and Communities, 

• #3 in Canada – Climate Action

• #4 in Canada – Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, 

• #2 in Canada – Affordable and Clean Energy (Times Higher Education 2025 Impact Rankings).

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In 2023, SFU International—with support from the Sustainability and Climate Office —developed the SDG Framework for Global Engagement at SFU through an extensive process. They gathered quantitative and qualitative data about SFU’s four core functional areas and conducted institution-wide consultation with key stakeholders and SDG experts.

The result was a framework to help guide SFU’s global initiatives and engagement in alignment with the 17 SDGs. 

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Key VPPEI staff offered ongoing support and facilitated discussions for the central Sustainability and Climate Office on equity issues

The Equity Office provided strategic guidance to the Sustainability and Climate Office in integrating equity considerations into the implementation and delivery of the SFU Sustainability and Climate Action Plan (2022-2025)

The Sustainability and Climate Office hosted Decolonizing Practices Training facilitated by Ta7talíya Nahanee, and co-sponsored by Equity Office

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SFU is on track to meet our UN Race to Zero goals.

Success on reductions of SFU’s direct emissions (Scopes 1 and 2) was bolstered with the development of the Corix Biomass Plant. The high-efficiency heating plant converts biomass into energy and uses recycled urban and construction wood waste as its primary fuel.  The GHG emissions saved are equivalent to the emissions from 900 homes every year.

Efforts in direct emissions reductions and SFU’s transition to renewable energy have been expertly led by SFU’s Energy Team. More information about additional decarbonization efforts utilized to reduce SFU’s energy use and direct emissions can be found in SFU’s Strategic Energy Management Plan.

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Renewable energy sources on SFU’s Burnaby campus have increased to approximately 95% as of July 2024 due to ongoing system optimization and the partnership with Corix—far exceeding the original 50% goal.

Energy at the Vancouver and Surrey campuses is primarily sourced by district energy systems and there is continued advocacy for renewable energy sources.

While indirect emissions can be incredibly difficult to tackle, SFU has made meaningful progress through several initiatives and climate action programs.

One significant area of progress has been in reducing commuting emissions through new sustainable transportation projects and programs including enhanced on campus cycling infrastructure, the launch of the Evolve Bike Share, and the installation of new EV charging hubs and stations. Notably, SFU’s hybrid work program , introduced in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, has also helped significantly reduce faculty and staff commuting emissions.

In 2021, the university implemented a landmark Plastic Bottle Ban, a key milestone in eliminating single-use plastics. This initiative led to the installation of water bottle filling stations on all campuses, the introduction of reusable water bottles in vending machines, and partnerships with beverage vendors to transition away from plastics to alternatives. 

During this period SFU Ancillary Services partnered with the SFU Sustainability and Climate Office to launch the Reuse for Good Program beginning with the Lower Mainland's first stand-alone Express & Go recycling station on campus. The station has collected more than 450,000 containers since 2019 and is serving as a model for waste reduction efforts in the region. Reuse for Good Program expanded to include initiatives such as the MugShare Program, ChopValue partnership, and Recyclopedia platform which offered the additional benefits of emissions reductions.

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In 2021, in recognition of the escalating climate emergency, SFU committed to fully divesting its public equity portfolios from fossil fuels by 2025—a target that has now been successfully achieved. The university divested from its global equity portfolio in 2021, its fixed income portfolio in 2024, and completed divestment from its Canadian equity portfolio in 2025.

In line with the university’s Responsible Investment Policy, SFU has also committed to reduce the carbon intensity of portfolio emissions by 45% below a 2016 baseline. As of 2024, the carbon intensity of SFU’s investment portfolio has been reduced by 74%.

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SFU's Strategic Sustainability and Climate Plans take a comprehensive approach by integrating both climate mitigation and adaptation. SFU’s journey in measuring and mitigating its climate risks began in 2020. SFU developed a cross portfolio steering committee, engaged experienced consultants, and led a 2-year community-wide engagement to develop SFU’s first Climate Risk Assessment Report. The report identifies projected climate impacts, SFU’s vulnerabilities to these impacts (70 unique risks), assigned risk ratings, and poses 80 potential actions.

Key initiatives included the construction of a new Fire Hall on Burnaby Campus in collaboration with City of Burnaby, specialized with equipment to deal with unique wildfire challenges specific to Burnaby Mountain. Other projects include the SFU Safe Community Safety App, the establishment of an Extreme Weather Strategy and Heat Wave Response Committee, and the delivery of targeted information and supportive infrastructure during extreme heat events – a collaboration between Safety and Risk Services and Facilities Services. Additional efforts from SFU administrative departments have included eco-grief and anxiety counselling services and resources, and integration of climate risk considerations into revised investment policies through SFU Finance.

SFU’s Ancillary Services has also advanced food systems resilience by increasing local food procurement to 40%, launching the Rooted Indigenous Food Program—which centers Indigenous traditional food knowledge and resiliency, and expanding campus-wide food security initiatives. SFU’s Action Labs have contributed further by implementing scalable, evidence-based, and locally adapted resilience solutions in local food systems.

SFU’s approach to managing climate risks also became embedded with its Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) framework, which comprises 12 cross-cutting themes, now including a dedicated Climate Resilience category.

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