Current Research
ESRG engages in transdisciplinary research aimed at improving human-environment interactions. Focused on the human dimensions of environmental resource issues, our research projects link factors influencing the sustainability of land and natural resource use in complex settings, for example, human perceptions of ecosystems, environmental change, social organization and power relations, and local-global economic forces.
New opportunities for involvement are emerging all the time and we welcome expressions of interest from individuals and groups interested in working with the ESRG. Please visit this page often or contact us for updates.
DIVERSE: Adapting Forests to Global Change
Maximizing Pathways to Forest Sector Adaptation (2024-2026)
CANSTOREnergy Project (2023-Ongoing)
Adapting Rural Climate Cultures (2024-2025)
DIVERSE Project
Christian Messier (Principal Investigator), Kevin Solarik (Project Co-Lead), Charles A. Nock (Project Co-Lead)… Ryan Bullock (Research Collaborator)
Funded by: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research of Council of Canada (NSERC), MITACS
Humanity has been relying on forests for thousands of years, but forests are now under pressure worldwide. The climate is warming up, while our demand for wood and for land is ever growing. Many studies have created concern this will lead many forests of the world to degrade, or even disappear, even in places like Canada where forests are numerous. To counter this, the DIVERSE project is exploring how we can help Canadian forests adapt to these challenges.
This project has six themes: i) forest resilience and vulnerability; ii) identification and selection of suitable tree species to grow; iii) functional complex networks; iv) evaluation of various forest management approaches under global stressors; v) socio-economic conditions and governance; and vi) implementation of alternative silvicultural treatments and multi-species plantations.
The full research team and more information on the project can be found here: https://diverseproject.uqo.ca/
Maximizing Pathways to Forest Sector Adaptation by Reducing Barriers for Small Enterprise
Ryan Bullock (Principal Investigator), Steven Young (Project Partner), Bryanne Lamoureux (Project Manager)
Funded by: Natural Resources Canada
Forest ecosystems are increasingly experiencing the impacts of climate change. To date, climate adaptations in forestry have most often been in reaction to disruptive events, such as wildfires. To minimize the risks and impacts of a changing climate, the forest sector must adopt an anticipatory and planned approach to climate adaptation.
Small-to-medium sized enterprises (SMEs), which account for >99% of Canada’s forestry enterprises, are the “front line” for implementing adaptive actions. Our research will share lessons from existing adaptation research and actions and develop case studies with SMEs to develop a strategic framework. This framework will help identify and inform how SMEs can adapt while continuing to operate, remain viable, and support the forestry sector and communities.
In partnership with the Central Canada SFI Implementation Committee, this project aims to:
- Work with forest sector stakeholders and rightsholders to share current knowledge of existing challenges to adaptation implementation and lessons learned;
- Use existing knowledge to inform new in-depth case studies on the challenges to and successes with implementing adaptive actions in the forest sector; and
- Develop tools to help forest sector SMEs to take viable actions towards climate adaptation.
This project will develop an understanding of challenges to and opportunities for implementing adaptation actions with SMEs in the forest sector, and share this knowledge with industry, policy-makers, and other relevant groups.
CANSTOREnergy Project
David Sinton (Principal Investigator), Kate Neville (Co-PI), Drew Higgins (Co-PI), Heather MacLean (Co-PI). Gisele Azimi, Laurel Besco, Ryan Bullock, Tracey Galloway, Maya Papineau, David Silas, Yimin Wu, Melanie Zurba, Aimy Bazylak, Joule Bergerson, Cheryl Teelucksingh, Chandra Veer Singh, Dwight Seferos, Christina Hoicka, Michael Ross, Edward Sargent, April Franco, Curtis Berlinguette, and Viola Birss (Co-Applicants)
Funded by: New Frontiers in Research Fund
In order to mitigate climate change and to address social inequality in Canada, our energy systems must be re-envisioned. Although Canada has vast renewable energy capacity, the country remains deeply reliant on fossil fuels. The key barrier to expanding renewable energy sources is a lack of seasonal energy storage, as demand for fuel increases during fall and winter. At present, storing excess energy generated during spring and summer for later use is a considerable challenge. The CANSTOREnergy Project aims at advancing the science and technology of conversion of renewable energy into carbon-based fuels, designing a new way to store energy to be used when it is needed.
The key objectives and outcomes include:
- Transforming the way that energy is stored by integrating policy, community engagement, and ownership models to influence technological development; and
- Creating technology to provide communities with the capacity to store renewable electricity for later use. This will consider the differing seasonal challenges that Northern and Southern communities encounter in Canada.
This project will design a new way of storing energy by building a process for designing technology which values both local input and control. This project is led by colleagues at the UofT. Bullock and members of the Environment and Society Research Group are part of the DIRECT team, which works to engage communities throughout the energy project.
Adapting Rural Climate Cultures
Ryan Bullock (Principal Investigator), Wayne Kelly (Co-Investigator)
Funded by: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC)
Over 27% of Canada’s population lives in rural areas, which are defined as municipalities, small towns, villages, islands, and northern and remote communities consisting of Indigenous peoples, settlers, and recent immigrants. Culture, which guides how people receive, organize, rationalize, and understand their experiences, is diverse across rural Canada landscapes. Rural culture is influenced by disturbances occurring both from within the community and from outside events. Currently, rural communities are experiencing unprecedented pressures to adapt to climate change, causing rural cultures and climates to co-adapt and evolve. There is a need for synthesis of current understandings of how climate change and climate adaptation interact with rural communities, and how climate adaptation is shifting rural cultures and narratives. This knowledge synthesis initiative will advance understanding of the evolving narratives of rural Canada pertaining to climate adaptation and cultures, the challenges and opportunities these narratives hold, and inform how rural communities can be supported amidst an uncertain future.
Funded by SSHRC’s Knowledge Synthesis Grant, the key objectives of this project are to:
- Systematically compile a database of existing knowledge on how climate change and adaptation interact with culture, and conduct a meta-study to identify evolving research methodologies and knowledge gaps;
- Conduct an exploratory literature review and narrative synthesis to understand what is known about climate adaptation and rural culture in Canada;
- Identify climate adaptation actions and opportunities for evolving rural climate cultures;
- Gather existing resources to support rural communities in climate adaptation and compare them to findings related to rural cultures; and
- Develop practical recommendations for how to effectively consider rural cultures to support climate adaptation in rural Canada.
Understanding how culture interacts with climate change and adaptation will inform adaptation policy decisions that impact rural communities.
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