Green Community Entrepreneurship

Travis Gliedt

Paul Parker

University of Waterloo

Presented at the Social Economy Conference University of Toronto

April 2007, Toronto, ON

Overview• Social Economy Definition• How does the process of entrepreneurship in the

social economy differ from the for-profit sector?• Green Community Entrepreneurship

– Social Economy– Ecological Economics– Social Entrepreneurship– Environmental Entrepreneurship

• GCE in Green Communities Canada• Conceptual Framework of GCE• Policy Implications

Social Economy• Quarter (1992): ‘vision of social transformation’ • McMurtry (2004): reincorporate transformative approach • Westlund (2003): social and commercial economies

should be viewed as ‘parts of a continuous spectrum’

Revenue Generation

Traditional

•donations

Entrepreneurial

•commerce, fees, etc.Tension

Third sector non-profit organizations providing socially-beneficial products or services designed to fill a gap left by the government and the competitive for-profit market.

How does entrepreneurship in the social economy differ from the for-profit sector?

• Individual• Financial Capital• Idea Patenting• Profit Objective

• Collective• Social Capital• Idea Sharing• Social Objective

For-Profit Social Economy

• The collective ability to mobilize resources, including social capital, to provide products or services that achieve environmental rather than profit maximising

goals.

Green Community Entrepreneurship …

Case Study: Green Communities Canada (GCC) and EnerGuide for Houses (EGH)• Green Communities Canada

– Successful EGH service provider since 1998– Largest program and revenue source for

many green community organizations

• 2005 expansion of program, November • 2006 new federal government, January

– Cancellation of Program, May• new evaluations – 1 day notice• Follow-up evaluations – 12 months

• How will green communities respond?

GCE in Green Communities Canada

• 45 service innovations• 29 proposals • 24 ideas / opportunities

• 76%• 70%• 63%

N=12 GCOs; May 2006 - January 2007

Creative Response % Energy Related

GCO managers …“I must say that creativity and organizational structure/funding are quite inter-related…some sort of foundation or stability helps make creativity possible”.

“We survived due to guts, determination, and entrepreneurship!”

GCE helped GCOs Survive and Thrive

New Service Innovations by Type – Energy vs Non-Energy Related

n = 12 GCOs

64

17

4

3

3

8

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

Energy Related Non-Energy Related

#

Revised Residential EnergyEfficiency ServiceExpanded Market for ExistingServiceAccelerated Development andImplementation of Existing IdeaNew Idea and Implementation

New Idea and Implementation

Expanded Scale of Existing Service

Accelerated Development of

Existing Idea

Creative Responses

Social Entrepreneurship

Individual Collective

Human Capital

Social Capital

Network

Green Community

Entrepreneurship

Strategic Partnerships

Team FunctionalFacilitating

FactorsDrivers

Funding Shock

Market Collapse

Environmental Sustainability

Objective

Implications of GCE

• GCE as a tool for LED and SD

• GCE can aid CEM objectives– Climate change mitigation and adaptation

• Joint project implementation between social entrepreneurs and environmental entrepreneurs

• GCE long term organizational stability

Questions?