Planting Trees Today to Breathe Easier Tomorrow 

Growing Our Culture of Stewardship

At MyHEAT, we live by a pretty simple philosophy: make local changes today that will have a global impact tomorrow.

This year at MyHEAT, we have made a conscious effort to ingrain a sense of environmental stewardship into our corporate culture to remind ourselves of our philosophy. Today – Energy Efficiency Day – is no different. Since we focus our efforts daily on promoting energy efficiency, we wanted to honour the day a little differently.

We’re passionate about cutting greenhouse gas emissions, and our focus is partnering with utilities to deliver engaging digital experiences to energy consumers in pursuit of efficient home upgrades. But there are other effective ways to reduce CO₂ emissions, like planting trees – lots of trees.

You ‘wood’ not believe the fun that we had!

Spending an afternoon in the woods, getting our hands dirty, and doing good for our planet – what could be better than that? On September 18^th, 2019 that’s exactly what the MyHEAT team did.

In partnership with the City of Calgary, a group of MyHEAT employees ventured out to a marshy, partially-wooded grassland area in a suburb in the northwest part of the city. Our task: plant 70 native trees and shrubs as part of the city’s habitat restoration plan. 

After a safety talk and a short walk to our first planting location, we got a quick tutorial on the proper way to dig a hole, remove the plants from their pots, ‘tickle the roots’, and get them into the ground. Then, we were let loose to plant five different species of shrubs: Wolf Willow, Snowberry, Saskatoon, Wild Rose, and Shrubby Cinquefoil.

We know that planting 70 shrubs isn’t going to save the world, but imagine what could happen if every organization joined our efforts.

As trees grow, they absorb and store carbon dioxide. Worldwide, more than two billion hectares of land have been identified as offering opportunities for reforestation – that’s an area larger than South America. A global effort called Bonn Challenge works to restore these areas of deforested and degraded land with the aim of reforesting 350 million hectares by 2030. This would sequester 1.7 gigatons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year! According to their website, almost 50 government agencies and private organizations have made commitments to the Bonn Challenge and anyone can get involved by identifying areas for reforestation and pledging to the challenge. 

While energy efficiency has been identified as an important resource to reduce greenhouse gases, save money for customers, increase home comfort, and generate jobs, planting trees and reforestation projects are proving to be an integral part of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide that already exists in our atmosphere.

Whether participating in local programs with your family or scaling up to plant larger areas as part of corporate initiatives, tree planting is a great climate change solution. We encourage everyone to get out and make a difference in their community!

A special thank you to Kyle Edworthy and Filip Kurbatfinski from the City of Calgary for facilitating the MyHEAT planting event.

Written by:
Chelsea Froklage, Marketing & Design Lead