Greening Greater Toronto

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Green Procurement

Greening the purchasing choices of business, governments and non-profit organizations can dramatically reduce waste, energy consumption and carbon emissions, and help to make the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) the greenest city region in North America.

Currently, energy inefficiencies in the commercial and public sectors contribute almost half of the GTA’s carbon emissions, while the commercial and public sectors generate 64 per cent of the GTA’s waste and over 70 per cent of total waste bound for landfill.

Our mission

To work with members of the Green Procurement Leadership Council to develop a program to accelerate corporate procurement of greener products and services and help drive the success of Ontario’s green business and technology sectors.

Our initiatives

Document Hub

• An online portal of green procurement-related documents on best practices, policies, contract clauses, and vendor evaluation criteria to help organizations green their buying practices.

Green Exchanges

• A series of boardroom discussions hosted by Council members on specific procurement topics such as remote meeting technologies or lighting systems and controls.

Paper Group and Other Action Groups

• The Green Paper Group is exploring opportunities in procurement to reduce the environmental impact of paper use and clarify the options available to purchasers.
• We are also exploring other buying areas that might form the basis of additional action groups.

Commitment to Buy Green

• Council members are working together to develop a framework for sharing targets for energy and resource consumption, emission generation and general environmental practices to form the basis for a commitment to buy green.

Expected results

• Additional procurement of green products and services within the GTA;
• Improved environmental performance for the GTA on a variety of measures; and
• Additional jobs and local economic activity due to increased green procurement.

Progress to date

Document Hub (April 2010):

• The Green Procurement Document Hub was launched in April 2010 that contains best practices and peer-produced “how-to” materials for greening their own procurement practices. More than 150 documents have been downloaded , and we continue to receive and add more documents to the collection.

Green Exchange (ongoing):

• We have held two Green Exchange events:
  1. The Reverse Marketplace (April 2010), hosted by the Bank of Montreal, gave green vendors the chance to hear from a panel of procurement executives at national corporations about how to successfully sell green products and services to large corporations. Read the press release.
  2. At the IT Purchasing discussion (May 2010), hosted by the Ontario Institute of the Purchasing Management Association of Canada, over a dozen IT procurement and operations specialists discussed the opportunities and challenges in greening IT practices. The discussion covered data centres, product selection, power management and certification labels. Read highlights here, and click here to listen to a Metro Morning interview on energy efficient cooling centres.
• The next Green Exchange on lighting and control systems, hosted by RBC, is planned for September.

Paper Buying Group (Ongoing):

• Corporate buyers participating in the Paper Buying Group have taken part in discussions to identify concrete options available for integrating paper practices with environmental strategies and are preparing a paper to share these conclusions more widely.

Green Supplier Cluster Analysis (September 2009):

• We conducted a preliminary assessment of green supplier clusters across Ontario, including green products, services, and technologies.
• The objective was to highlight regions within the province where higher concentrations of business activity around various green technologies exist, which will help inform formal cluster building and investment strategies to support the development of green industries in the Province of Ontario.
• Further analysis of this research may be pursued in conjunction with GGT partners.

Greening Greater Toronto Marketplace: (May 12, 2009):

• Together with the Toronto Research Alliance (TRRA) and the Ontario Centres of Excellence (OCE), we presented the inaugural Greening Greater Toronto Marketplace. This event brought together 100+ senior procurement executives with 25+ green suppliers ranging from local small-scale innovators to major well-established companies. Features of the event included concise supplier presentations, supplier booths, green talk stations, and private deal rooms, all within a marketplace setting.
• As outlined in the recent GGT Outcome Report, Buyers and Sellers Don’t See Eye to Eye, a follow-up survey of the Marketplace participants revealed a misalignment between the actual concerns of potential buyers and what suppliers believe them to be.