Data Centres: Catalyst or Challenge for Canada’s Energy Sector?

Jane McDonald is the Vice President of Climate and Nature Solutions. Previously, she led two of Canada’s major sustainable economy think tanks, Smart Prosperity and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD). She is a member of Canada’s Generation Energy Council, which produced the first energy vision for Canada consistent with the country’s climate goals, and the Farmers for Climate Solutions Task Force. She is a Director of The Transition Accelerator, and a delegate to the Net-Zero Data Public Utility, the world’s first global repository for private sector climate transition-related data freely accessible to all.

Jane began her career in the private sector, launching new environmental markets at New York investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald where she brokered some of the first-ever carbon credit deals between large energy companies and international projects. She then directed a successful advocacy effort to have renewable electricity from major Canadian utilities included in President Obama’s Clean Power Plan.

From 2015-2106 she served as Policy Director in the office of Canada’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change, through the signing of the Paris Agreement, the adoption of a national climate strategy and the implementation of a national price on carbon pollution.

In 2020, she joined an independent group of Canadian finance, policy and sustainability leaders who formed the Task Force for a Resilient Recovery, publishing a roadmap for a long-term COVID recovery strategy to keep Canada competitive in the fast-growing global clean economy.

Outside of her work, Jane has taught as an Adjunct Professor of Environmental Finance at the University of Toronto, served on the board of many non-profits, is a 2007-2008 Action Canada Fellow and a 2024 winner of the Clean50 Award.