Clean tech and sustainability innovators are among the fastest-growing Canadian businesses and entrepreneurs this year. Let's have a look at the top 10 and their fields of work
Next Hydrogen
GROWTH RATE*: 8,800%
At the COP26 climate conference in November, the United Nations identified hydrogen as the “backbone” of our clean energy future. But separating hydrogen from water, through a process called electrolysis, takes substantial energy. During the transition, “grey” hydrogen produced with natural gas may be acceptable, but net-zero will require “green” hydrogen produced with emission-free renewable energy. Yet most electrolysis systems today work only with the steady electricity provided by major power grids.
Enter Next Hydrogen, of Mississauga, Ontario, a maker of electrolyzers specially designed to produce large quantities of hydrogen using intermittent renewable electricity sources, such as wind and solar.
Founded in 2008 by veterans of Stuart Energy, a Toronto-based pioneer of hydrogen power, Next Hydrogen is now scaling up to deliver commercial solutions to the transportation and industrial sectors. The company is partnering with industry leaders such as Hyundai, Kia and global engineering firm Black & Veatch.
Modern Plant-Based Foods
GROWTH RATE*: 2,660%
Founded by accountant Tara Haddad, Vancouver-based Modern Plant-Based Foods aims to benefit “people, animals and the environment” by popularizing healthier, more natural plant ingredients. Its offerings range from plant-based, no-additive burgers, meatballs, roasts and sausages to a line of vegan potato crisps.
“We wanted ingredients people can understand,” Haddad says.
The company has had its challenges – just last year it changed its name from Modern Meat. Two years ago, the company had just signed lucrative food-service contracts when COVID shut down the restaurants it had targeted. It struggled for months to navigate complex packaging rules to pivot to retail sales. Fortunately, the company’s two Vancouver retail stores, called Modern Wellness Bar, sell vitamins, supplements and healthy foods that give the company a heads-up on changing consumer tastes.
On December 31, food-industry veteran (and third-generation farmer) Avtar Dhaliwal took over as CEO, promising “a heavy focus on cutting-edge products, marketing techniques, and acquisitions.”
Li-Cycle
GROWTH RATE*: 831%
With lithium, the active component of EV rechargeable batteries, quadrupling in price over the past year, it’s a great time to own this mineral. And the good times extend to Mississauga, Ontario–based Li-Cycle, which recycles metals from electronic waste – including nickel, copper and cobalt, but especially the lithium ion in consumer and EV batteries.
Founded in 2016 by mining consultants Tim Johnston and Ajay Kochhar, Li-Cycle has raised more than US$700 million to perfect its technology and build a hub-and-spoke network of recycling centres in Canada, the United States and Europe. (A deal announced in early May with mining giant Glencoe could up that total another $200 million.)
Based on existing supply deals with industrial clients such as GM and LG, Li-Cycle estimates it could supply 15% of North America’s battery manufacturing capacity by 2025. Better still, the company says its services will reduce the need for new mines, lower the burden on landfills and shrink battery costs.
Burcon NutraScience
GROWTH RATE: 735%
“Plant-based protein bars: so soft you’ll say, ‘No whey.’”
How do you sell new, healthier, more sustainable foods to a skeptical public? Winnipeg-based Burcon NutraScience is redefining dinner with creativity, rigorous agricultural science, nearly 600 patents issued and pending, and a soupçon of sass.
It all starts with protein: Burcon has figured out how to make smoother, tastier and more blendable pea proteins, called Peazazz – suitable for use as meat and dairy alternatives, ready-to-drink beverages or baked goods – and the first purified, human-grade canola proteins (marketed as Supertein®, Puratein® and Nutratein®). Producing these delicacies and marketing them to food companies around the world is the task of Merit Functional Foods, a partnership between Burcon and three food-industry veterans that just opened a $130-million production facility in Winnipeg.
Burcon recently told investors that consumer products using Merit’s protein ingredients are now available on retail shelves in the United States and Europe.
Meta Material
GROWTH RATE: 264%
Halifax-based META Materials was founded to solve an unusual problem: protecting pilots from blinding laser light. With help from Europe’s Airbus, META developed a windscreen film that reflects hazardous beams. Today META is a global leader in “smart,” functional surface films derived through nanotechnology. One of its films – an invisible metal mesh that adheres to walls and windows – enhances the reach of 5G radio signals, saving businesses from spending millions on signal boosters.
CEO George Palikaras says META’s surface films replace outmoded industrial processes that require six times as much energy. Its “metamaterials” also reduce the need for rare-earth minerals that are hard to find and dirty to mine. With 150 employees, the company focuses on five key markets: medical, automotive, aerospace, energy and consumer electronics. Coming soon, a new generation of 3D glasses for the metaverse – which could spark a collaboration with another firm called Meta – the former Facebook.
Organto
GROWTH RATE: 208%
Sales of organic foods in the United States grew 12.8% in 2020. But in the European Union, they grew 15%, their fastest jump in a decade. Seeing this trend coming was Vancouver-based Organto Foods, which focuses on supplying sustainable, traceable and organic fruits, vegetables and herbs to key European markets.
In recent years the company has evolved from an owner of agricultural and packaging operations in Guatemala into an “asset-light” importer that builds relationships with high-quality producers throughout Europe, the Americas and Africa. With these trusted partners, the company boldly offers consumers QR codes that trace the origins of every product.
Organto is also building its own brands: “I AM Organic” and “Fresh Organic Choice,” for its wide range of products, including fresh avocados, spices, packaged mushrooms and fruit-salads-in-a-cup. To keep things global, Organto has two co-CEOs: one in Vancouver and one in the Netherlands.
The very good food company
GROWTH RATE: 164%
Founded in 2016 by two brash B.C. foodies, The Very Good Food Company has a mission to produce tasty, nutritious plant-based meat and cheese alternatives that “put the fun back in functional.” (Brand names include Smokin’ Burger, Stuffed Beast, Ribz and The Very British Banger.) A $600,000 crowdfunding campaign and then a $4-million IPO in 2020 gave the company the capital and confidence to expand its retail presence, boost production and distribution, and open a plant in California.
But growth costs. In 2021, sales nearly tripled, to $12.3 million, but Very posted a $55-million loss. Soon after releasing those results, the company announced cost cuts, fired CEO Mitchell Scott, and accepted the resignation of co-founder James Davison, chief R&D officer. Former Nestlé executive Matthew Hall took over in May as interim CEO, reassuring investors that “With its excellent products and brand, Very is poised to be a leader in the growing plant-based market.”
Loop Energy
GROWTH RATE: 161%
Thanks to the pioneering work of innovators like Ballard Power, Vancouver is fast becoming a world capital of fuel cell design. Fuel cells mix hydrogen and oxygen to create electricity, but the transportation and industry sectors are demanding more powerful cells before they welcome clean, renewable hydrogen power.
Vancouver’s Loop Power is trying to cross that chasm with its patented eFlow fuel cell, which produces 16% higher fuel efficiency than competing designs, the company says, and generates nearly twice the power. Loop claims its technology can reduce hydrogen costs by $23,000 a bus every year.
The company targets myriad markets, from transit, heavy trucking and urban delivery to the construction, mining and marine sectors. In April, Loop announced that Hylife Innovations, a Dutch developer of sustainable power solutions, will integrate Loop’s hardware into its “InnovaHub,” which uses hydrogen to power residential buildings.
Lion Electric
GROWTH RATE: 146%
Marc Bédard was a partner with PricewaterhouseCoopers when he joined the board of Quebec school-bus maker Entreprises Michel Corbeil – and fell in love with that business. After that firm went bankrupt, Bédard teamed with a former Corbeil executive to bring yellow-bus manufacturing back to Quebec – with a green tinge. Their start-up, Lion Electric, would produce low-emission vehicles at first, and eventually electric ones.
By 2016, the company was producing all-electric school buses, followed two years later by electric trucks. In May, Lion celebrated a milestone: its 600 electric buses and trucks have clocked a total of 10 million miles. With the International Energy Agency insisting that electric vehicles need to represent 79% of global bus fleets and 59% of heavy truck fleets by 2050, Bédard says, “The need to take immediate action to decarbonize transportation is clear.”
Just to make sure, Lion is now building a $185-million battery factory.
Greenlane Renewables
GROWTH RATE: 146%
It’s been said that Vancouver-based Greenlane Renewables has the wind at its back. Commentators weren’t mixing metaphors. They were referring to the shift toward renewable natural gas (RNG) as more gas utilities and waste producers begin to transform decomposing organics into a natural gas replacement – and as governments legislate tighter renewable quotas for utilities’ natural gas supplies.
Greenlane’s biogas-upgrading systems produce low-carbon RNG, which can be inserted directly into the natural gas grid, with waste from landfills, dairy farms and water-treatment plants. Over 30 years, it has sold 135 systems, including the first of their kind in a dozen countries. Greenlane says its systems have collectively removed more than six million tonnes of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere – equivalent to removing 1.3 million cars from roads every year.
But that’s history. Over the next 28 years, Greenlane expects that demand for biogas upgrading equipment will total $90 billion.
Comments