Opening Remarks
⏱9:00 am to 9:15 am 15 minutes:

 Indigenous Assessment Processes
⏱9:15 am to 10:45 am 90 minutes: 

This session will give an overview as to how the Territorial Planning Unit (TPU) of Grand Council Treaty #3 (T3) upholds Anishinaabe Inakonigaawin (law) throughout all environmental decisions. The presenters will look at both Manito Aki Inakonigaawin (Great Earth Law) and the Nibi (water) Declaration and how they are the foundation to a Treaty #3 Environmental Assessment. Through Anishinaabe Inakonigaawin, the TPU has developed a comprehensive Lands Managers toolkit that explores how Anishinaabe in Treaty #3 communities can work with Environmental Assessments, while ensuring all generations are included in environmental decision making.

1. Explanation of the Grand Council Treaty #3’s mandate
2. Manito Aki Inakonigaawin significance and how it is applied
   to environmental assessments
3.  Nibi (water) Declaration Significance and becoming
   Anishinaabe Inakonigaawin
4. Treaty #3 Lands Manager Toolkit (T3 EA and IA’s)
5. Why youth are important to include in Environmental
   Assessment processes.

Perspectives on the Future
⏱11:00 am to 12:30 pm 90 minutes

This panel sheds a spotlight on a mix of tools that have always been part of assessment processes, but need a revamp to add value and purpose.

1. A sustainability assessment framework to guide decision-making about rare earth element mining
Limiting global temperature increase to 2ºC above preindustrial levels will require a swift transition to energy generation using renewable technologies. Unfortunately, these technologies require greater quantities of materials, such as rare earth elements (REE), that historically have involved socially and ecologically damaging extraction processes. This paper explores how Canada can use sustainability-based assessment to transform REE mining and help identify concerns, manage trade-offs, and deliver positive contributions to sustainability. An illustrative application of the specified framework is then presented through a review of the Nechalacho project in the Northwest Territories, Canada’s first operational REE mine.

2. Climate Vulnerability and Risk Assessment: Current Practice and Implications for Environmental Assessment, Sustainability and Cumulative Effects Assessments 
This presentation will highlight lessons learned and implications for environmental assessment from undertaking climate vulnerability and risk assessments on a variety of existing and new infrastructure projects as well as to natural assets in Ontario and in other parts of Canada. Examples will demonstrate application of the recently released PIEVC High Level Screening Guide (HLSG) with insights on how project sustainability has been enhanced and for how the PIEVC HLSG method may contribute to cumulative effects assessments going forward.

3. Environmental Assessment as a Tool for Managing Impacts on Wetlands
Many jurisdictions in Canada use a hierarchical approach to mitigate wetland loss whereby loss is avoided, unavoidable loss is minimized, and any remaining loss is offset through compensation. Wetland offsets are a way of compensating for wetland losses, but are poorly understood or not always implemented.

4. Highway 401 Expansion: Erosion and Sediment Control Lessons Learned and Adaptive Management
The project is within the Sixteen Mile Creek and Credit River Watersheds and includes more than 25 drainage/watercourse crossings, some with sensitive fisheries covered under provincial and federal legislation. Erosion and sediment control (ESC) design, implementation, and monitoring is a key component of the Project, involving extensive coordination between drainage designers, environmental planners, fisheries biologists, environmental inspectors, and the construction team. The presentation will highlight adaptive management as a means to manage uncertainty while involving Regulatory Agencies and key stakeholders during construction.

Impact Assessments: An Update from the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada
⏱2:00 pm to 3:00 pm 60 minutes

Overview from the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada on various initiatives that add value to participants.

1. Impact Assessment Agency of Canada Practices in implementation of the UNDRIP
This presentation will explore approaches in implementing the United National Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in the field of impact assessment. The Agency will overview work striving towards and securing consent, participation of Indigenous peoples in assessment and decision-making, and various collaborative arrangement with Indigenous communities.

2. Impact Assessment Agency of Canada’s Approach for Involving Indigenous Groups and Others during the Post-Decision Phase
The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada has developed an approach for engaging and funding involvement of Indigenous groups and stakeholders in all post-decision activities, such as follow-up monitoring and reporting on the effectiveness of mitigation measures, including monitoring committees, as well as, compliance verification and enforcement activities.

3. Advice and Guidance: The Impact Assessment Agency of Canada’s Work with Proponents
Through case studies, the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada will highlight advice and guidance that it provides proponents. Highlights will include work done during the pre-planning phase to inform the preparation of the Initial Project Description, work done in the planning phase to focus the Tailored Impact Statement Guidelines, and work done in the impact statement phase to guide the development of the Impact Statement.

Meaningful assessments involve resolving conflicting views
⏱3:15 pm to 4:45 pm 90 minutes:

Closing Remarks
⏱4:45 pm to 05:00 pm 15 minutes: 

This session explores how assessments have or could meaningfully incorporate different voices.

1. Indigenous Community Integration into the Marathon Palladium Project
This presentation will explore the results of meaningful partnerships and opportunities for Indigenous community
participation, ultimately leading to commitments for continued interactions throughout the life of the Marathon Palladium Project. Generation PGM Inc., the proponent, has developed meaningful partnerships with potentially impacted Indigenous groups to progress this Project through the Joint Review Panel process under CEAA, 2012 and Ontario’s Environmental Assessment Act.

2. Mediation and Impact Assessment: Revisiting Prospects for Sustainability Goals
The integration of mediation into IA has been cited as a potential element of next generation assessment, due to
its focus on equitable decision-making. However with limited past experience, there is a lack of understanding.
This presentation examines the potential of mediation in current IA context. The presentation will be anchored by
some past case studies.

3. A Review of Misinformation Communicated by the General Public in Environmental Assessments
This presentation explores outreach processes with the general public, including a sample of concerns identified
by the general public, their relationships with the concerns identified, and their ability to make an informed
decision. It also explores examples of misinformation that has been communicated between the general public as
well as methods used to manage such misinformation.