Paul Lefebvre
Mayor,
Greater Sudbury
Nadia Mykytczuk
CEO,
MIRARCO
Sudbury’s environmental recovery has made people’s lives immeasurably better and created a wellspring of economic growth based on innovation and determination.
Ground zero is where the mines were established, so rich with metals and minerals that they transformed Canada into a natural resources powerhouse. It became the place where decades of exposure to toxins rendered the landscape so barren that the bare and fractured rock seemed lunar, beyond salvation. Ten million trees later, ground zero is an environmental champion and economic trailblazer where “green and growing” possess extraordinary scale and meaning.
Greater Sudbury, Ont., is a brilliant case study in creating a double win. Sudbury’s investment of willpower, capital, and know-how not only conquered a monumental environmental problem, it precipitated a culture of practical innovation and staunch determination that’s become a wellspring of economic growth, resilience, and hope. Yet another payoff: the city’s collective know-how makes global economic challenges — like tariffs — more manageable. At a time when reinvention and innovation are at a sudden premium, how this northern Ontario city remade itself from a polluted mining town into a green, economically diversified municipality offers universal lessons.
“We are ground zero to showcase to the world that we can reduce pollution and keep the industry,” says Paul Lefebvre, Mayor of Greater Sudbury. “The air has been cleaned up by 99 per cent. This was a collaborative effort involving the community, government, and industry. We’ve proven that the environment and the economy can coexist and thrive together. Here in Sudbury, we’ve become a global example of how we can learn from our past and grow from it.”
We are ground zero to showcase to the world that we can reduce pollution and keep the industry. The air has been cleaned up by 99 per cent. This was a collaborative effort involving the community, government, and industry. We’ve proven that the environment and the economy can coexist and thrive together. Here in Sudbury, we’ve become a global example of how we can learn from our past and grow from it.
Symbols of hope
The area around Kelly Lake is a testament to the tremendous scale and dimension of Sudbury’s transformation. By design, the city has left exposed, blackened rock — a stark, physical reminder that an eviscerated landscape drains a place of its vitality and steals its future. Today, with the surrounding greenery inexorably reclaiming the fractured rock, the symbolism is unmistakable: with great effort come great things.
That great effort now spans 50 years, with its formative industry, academia, government, and community roots changing the way previously disconnected stakeholders interacted. Working together bred trust and cross-sector knowledge-sharing. Today, an evidence-based, maker mentality permeates the way Sudbury’s leaders act.
“When you look at Sudbury today and you look at our innovation ecosystem,” says Nadia Mykytczuk, CEO of MIRARCO (Mining Innovation, Rehabilitation and Applied Research Corporation), “you see we have cross-industry expertise engaging around challenges and issues. We come together often — it’s incredible.”
Practical progress
“Coming together” is among the first steps municipalities must take to weather challenges and to learn to thrive despite them.
Steve Gravel, Manager of the Centre for Smart Mining at Cambrian College, recalls Inco and Falconbridge (today, Vale and Glencore) selling off non-core mining assets in the 1980s, which might have triggered an exodus of talent. Instead, locals put their specialized know-how to good use, founding mining service companies like HARD-LINE/Hexagon, which transformed the sector into an integrated mining complex.
Don Duval, CEO of NORCAT, says the resulting cluster of specialized mining firms is “one of the leading global tech hubs for all that is mining technology in the world.” This includes NORCAT’s Underground Centre, which Duval describes as the “only innovation centre in the world that owns and operates an underground mine for tech companies to test and refine their technologies.”
More positively still, beyond a certain threshold, innovation processes take on a life of their own. Natural regrowth accelerates and outpaces replanting, and the practice of knowledge-sharing and practical cross-sector collaboration triggers waves of self-starting innovation emerging from unexpected quarters. As Mykytczuk puts it, “The way that we approach challenges has almost become ingrained in the community. I’ve heard mayors say it’s in our DNA.”
The path forward
Sudbury’s environmental turnaround is so profound and comprehensive that its core industry — mining — has become a global technology leader. Major projects are revitalizing the downtown: the Cultural Hub at Tom Davies Square, for example, will host the Central Library, the Art Gallery of Sudbury, and the Sudbury Multicultural and Folk Arts Association. The arena and events centre positions Sudbury as the premier regional hub for entertainment and culture.
Sudbury is both ground zero and road map — example and how-to. Theirs is a model of what can happen when different groups — each with its own specialized know-how — apply their combined expertise to tackle complex challenges. The odds of conquering the challenge increase while the resulting skills, infrastructure, processes, and interconnections make it highly likely that waves of new, unforeseen opportunities will emerge.
The potential payoff is immense: in Sudbury’s case, from broken landscape to global hub — proof positive that formidable problems have local solutions.
To learn more about Greater Sudbury, visit investsudbury.ca.
