Niagara Sustainability Initiative (NSI) is a not-for-profit organization with a mandate that connects government, industry, community and academia to advance the environmental and economic performance in the Niagara Region. The organization consists of senior level professionals from the energy, environment, government and academic sectors, as well as recent post-graduate alumni, graduate students, undergraduate students and other community volunteers.

NSI is focused on bringing economic strength back to the Niagara Region through greening of local businesses. NSI provides an opportunity for local organizations to capitalize on a changing consumer landscape – a consumer landscape that demands environmental responsibility. It is NSI’s goal to help the public and private sectors of the Niagara Region achieve this transformation to contribute to an environmentally and economically sustainable community.

Major Achievements

• Achieved Ontario Trillium Foundation project funding of $47,100 at the end of 2010. A great achievement for a start up organization without history or financial backing
• Achieved the goal of providing professional training in the carbon management field for young professionals and students in Niagara.
• Spring 2011 - Committed first corporate financial supporter: Horizon Utilities
• Summer 2011 - Committed the first 5 participating organizations

Polaris Realty is a 40 year old commercial property management company with a portfolio of 13 properties located in Quebec, British Columbia, and Ontario. All of their buildings have been recognized as BOMA BESt and LEED EB, a voluntary environmental certification standard for buildings, and their AXA Place in Vancouver won the BOMA Earth Award in 2010.

In 2010, Polaris began working with e3 Solutions for the purpose of measuring and benchmarking the environmental performance of their properties.  e3 performed carbon audits on their facilities by collecting and analyzing data from 2007 until 2010.  Polaris is now able to manage its own carbon emissions by using e3’s Carbon Accounting Tool, e3CAT.

e3’s report on Polaris identified the following key achievements of the company’s reduction strategy.

• 100% of employees submitted commuting information, an extremely high response
• By 2009, emissions had dropped by 76 tonnes, compared to 2007

• All properties participated in the carbon footprint exercise, including those in Ontario, British Columbia, and Quebec

• Polaris plans on establishing a building efficiency program for all its tenants

Veolia Water, in managing all of the water cycles on behalf of its municipal and industrial clients, concentrates its efforts on ensuring that water resources are preserved and optimized. In 2009 e3 implemented a compliance module for Veolia.

e3's Compliance Module allows Veolia Water to track permit/regulatory requirements and associated task assignments with confidence. The e3 EMIS compliance module provides automated tickers and email notification capabilities, logs when tasks have been completed, and sends alerts when tasks are pending or overdue. Compliance status management reports are generated within the application and rolled up to user defined levels within the organization.

System features include:

• Management of hundreds of locations/projects

• Compliance Management & (Audit) Issues Tracking

• Task management / notification

• Calendaring

• Compliance status reporting

• Issues Tracking

• Contract (Legal Document) Management

• Stores and organizes all legal documentation, revisions and correspondence related to client contracts

• Advanced Security Module

• Content is locked-down based on role, location and authorship

• A user can edit content that they have created, and view content that is applicable to their location or user group

Key benefits to Veolia include:

• Saves time with an easy-to-use browser-accessible interface, customizable user preferences, and a personalized My Desktop starting view that helps users find what they need fast

• Eliminates duplicate/inaccurate data entry and inefficient use of human resources

• Provides timely warnings prior to exceeding a permit limit or the occurrence of a non-compliance event

• Provides auto-notification of pending and overdue task assignments and compliance deadlines

A leading Fortune 500 company, FedEx is widely regarded as the pre-eminent small package transportation company in the world, with offices and service in 220 countries. Since 2004 FedEx has utilized the e3 Solutions Environmental Management (EMIS) system to track emissions, waste shipments, compliance management, site remediation, facility inspections and audit information for thousands of North American and international locations. In order to accomplish these goals, e3 Solutions has worked extensively with FedEx staff to review and identify existing data sources, map workflow requirements, and recommend solutions to streamline the process of collecting and disseminating environmental information throughout their expansive organization.

FedEx Express went on to be the first of the FedEx operating companies to implement e3’s Enterprise Carbon Management (ECM) system for use to track and quantify their greenhouse gas (GHG) emission’s inventory globally for all of their physical assets. This supports FedEx Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) report that is released annually to examine and manage FedEx’s success in managing its people, planets and profits in a socially responsible way.

Some of the innovative initiatives employed by e3 Solutions to improve FedEx emission management and environmental stewardship programs include:

• PDA (handheld) data collection and import routines

• Extensive use of electronic forms for offline data-collection and subsequent automatic upload without the need to re-key information

• flexible, user configurable data validation rules

• Automated e-mail reporting and user-defined notifications

• Automation of the GHG Emissions inventory and reporting at over 2000 locations in over 200 countries in 9 primary languages and 600 airplanes and a fleet of 40,000 vehicles

Since January 2007, e3 has supported Direct Energy with their carbon strategies. This has included the completion of their 2007 and 2008 GHG inventory for North America along with a comprehensive carbon reduction program.

Direct Energy and their parent company Centrica have established a leadership position on climate change. They have invested in low and zero carbon power generation and offer our customers a suite of green products and services. Direct Energy supports urgent action to set a meaningful price for carbon, including the implementation of robust cap and trade mechanisms to deliver absolute carbon reductions.

Some of the innovative initiatives employed by e3 Solutions to improve Direct Energy’s carbon management and environmental stewardship programs include:

• Centralized dashboards and report portals
• “Live” drill down KPI’s to asset level views
• Full audit trail and data verification
• Identification of  underperforming assets
• Supporting the Development of the business case for executive approval

A wholly owned subsidiary of Koch Industries - one of the largest privately owned companies in the world - Flint Hills Resources (FHR) operates 3 oil refineries in the United States, a petrochemical processing facility in Illinois, and petroleum marketing and distribution interests in Canada. FHR first implemented the e3 Compliance Management system as an enterprise solution in 2001. In 2003 the FHR management system was extended to include air emissions tracking, Title V reporting, and emission inventory management. Toxic release inventory (TRI) calculation and reporting were likewise implemented in 2007. Prior to implementing the e3 Solutions system, FHR relied on spreadsheets and manual methods to collect, calculate and report environmental data. e3 Solutions software and services have enabled FHR to automate much of their calculation and reporting requirements.

Some of the innovative initiatives employed by e3 Solutions to improve FHR emission management and regulatory reporting include:

• Automatic history tracking of all data inputs, including changes and deletions

• Line level emission calculation equation storage to facilitate detailed auditing requirements

• Automated data rollup of emissions totals by time period, equipment or facility

• Automated generation of complex Title V, TRI and Emission Inventory reports

In April 2009, Toronto Maple Leafs and Air Canada Centre officially launched their Team Up Green initiative as part of Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment's (MLSE) ongoing commitment to the environment and sustainability.

In early 2007, e3 was retained to support the development of  a green strategy for the Air Canada Centre. The ACC hosts over 260 events each year, including Maple Leafs and Raptors games, as well as live events. With over 20,000 fans at each event, the organization realized that they could have a large impact within their community and with their fan base. They calculated their 2007 carbon footprint and developed a green strategy to reduce their footprint and engage fans. This coordinated program is a true integration of reduction programs and community outreach.

The Air Canada Centre is in its third year of a five-year plan where Canada's premier sports and entertainment venue will invest $5 million to reduce its overall carbon footprint. The venue's environmental initiatives include: reducing its energy consumption and its greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent, re-engineering Air Canada Centre's mechanical and electrical operations, and implementing a waste diversion program.

Shell Canada is a leading Canadian energy company that is majority owned by Royal Dutch Shell PLC. With headquarters in Calgary, AB, Shell operates three refineries in Canada in addition to fuel storage and distribution channels. Since 2000 Shell Canada has used e3 Solutions enterprise software and services to calculate monthly and annual air emissions inventories as well as to facilitate uniform reporting under the National Pollutant Release Inventory (NPRI) program. As part of the services provided to Shell Canada, e3 Solutions has assisted in the identification and mapping of emission generation sources including storage tanks, heaters/boilers, flares, fugitive sources, wastewater treatment, waste disposal and other on-site operations.

Using the e3 Solutions EMIS application and services, Shell Canada has been able to standardize emission calculations and procedures across facilities, perform multi-year trending and comparisons, and automate environmental reporting.