Opinion

Inventing New Incentives

  • Oct 31, 2008

With the upcoming federal election, leaders from all political parties are revealing their environmental platforms and promising more green energy. I would like to know how they plan to help Canadian innovators and inventors who have been trying for years to get their energy saving technologies to market.

I am a private inventor who has developed a technology that was confirmed by the National Research Council (NCR) to be 2.35 times more efficient in producing and storing hydrogen energy than any technology known to exist. If this technology were to be fully developed and commercialized, it could make Canada entirely energy self-sufficient within a decade, as well as be exported to other countries. Without funding, however, I am unable to bring this technology to market and myriad benefits to Canadians, including employment and investment opportunities, are lost. My frustration is shared by many other Canadian energy innovators and technology developers – chronic lack of funding and support from our own governments, despite the generous lip service paid at election time to green energy and innovation.

Regardless of which party gets elected, I fear it will be business as usual: Canada’s sizable innovation talent will continue to stagnate, while our politicians waste billions of dollars in the wrong direction – either sending troops to unstable areas of the world to secure the oil supply or investing in nuclear energy, which will take at least another decade to get up and running. If our politicians are truly keen on green, they need to start walking the talk and support a "Made in Canada" solution. At the moment, Canada ranks 14th on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s (OECD) listing on R&D intensity. For a country that boasts one of the highest living standards in the world, plus a wealth of innovation talent, I find this very disturbing. We should be scoring near the top and could if our governments supported us. So why aren’t they?

Andy Janson
5855 Cook Road
London, Ontario N6P 1P3

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