Executive Education Retreat

Water and Energy as Drivers for Competitive Business Advantages offers executives a unique business retreat in a stimulating and inspiring environment of the Canadian Rockies, where in a small group they can explore ideas on how to turn sustainability-based approaches to water and energy into competitive advantages and new business. The program is designed to cover a range of issues that are central to those who are leaders in business, government, public agencies, and not-for-profit organizations.

Key takeaways:

• Frameworks to understand how profit and nonprofit organizations and institutions can handle their water and energy more sustainably to gain credibility with stakeholders
• Strategies to gain competitive advantage through sustainable and environmentally beneficial practices, including product and process innovation that increase profits and create new markets
• Deeper awareness of best practices of how to use water as an emotional driver to trigger internal changes and to raise the organizations’ profile as a societally responsible entity

Who Should Attend?

This unique program is designed for senior executives and officers across a wide array of organizations in the private, public, and nonprofit sectors. Due to the exclusive nature of the program, registration is limited to 25 participants.

Curriculum and Schedule

HIGHLIGHTED SESSIONS
Water and Energy as Key Elements for Strategy Developments
More than ever, water and energy are key elements in political decision-making and the stability for future societies. Early recognizers of geographically distinct characteristics will set the trends and win the competition. This session will show how to attain the capabilities to help foresee these trends more accurately and develop your own strategy to succeed.
Water and Energy as Business Opportunities
Water and energy and the necessary infrastructures are regarded as cost drivers. In this session participants will look at these challenges using case studies that demonstrate how these cost drivers can be turned into opportunities and open new markets.
High-Profile Activism: Media and Boycotts
An important aspect of business strategy involves managing the “non-market” environment of activists, interest groups, and the media. This is particularly demanding when dealing with emotional issues such as water. In this session, participants examine how and why high-profile activism shapes firms, and how firms can profit from the easily transportable message concerning water and energy to further shape their positive image.

Sample Daily Schedule
Breakfast	Full breakfast
Morning Session I	Discussion of the outcome of the case studies session
Morning Session II	Water (energy) and capital markets: powerful assets
Morning Session III	Politics and economics of government regulation
Lunch	Buffet lunch
Optional Group Activity	Recreational activities
Late Afternoon Session	Introduction to specific case studies
Dinner	Cocktail reception followed by a served dinner
Evening	Study Group discussions (on case studies) and networking among participants

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FACULTY DIRECTOR:

Dr. Alexander J.B. Zehnder
Scientific Director of the Alberta
Water Research Institute

Alexander Zehnder, Scientific Director of the Alberta Water Research Institute (AWRI), is recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on water and water management. He is the founder and director of triple Z consulting, and is Professor emeritus of ETH Zurich. He is also the former president of the ETH Board -- the governing board of the ETH-system comprising two universities (ETH-Zurich and ETH-Lausanne), and four national laboratories (PSI, EMPA, WSL, EAWAG). Zehnder is the co-founder and a member of the board of directors of SPG (Sustainable Performance Group), Europe’s largest investment company focusing on sustainable production and manufacturing, member of the industrial advisory board of Zouk Ventures in London, and of the Council STS (Science and Technology in Society) forum Kyoto. Zehnder has been on the faculty of Stanford University, Wageningen Agricultural University, the Netherlands, and for 12 years, served as director of the Swiss Water Research Institute, EAWAG. He holds an honorary doctoral degree of the University in Nancy, France, is a Member of the Dutch Royal Academy of Sciences, the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences, and a Foreign Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. He is also one of the “founding fathers” of the concept of the “2000 Watt Society”.

2009 FACULTY MEMBERS:

Dr. Wiktor L. (Vic) Adamowicz
Associate Dean Research,
University of Alberta

Wiktor (Vic) Adamowicz is Associate Dean (Research) in the Faculty of Agricultural, Life & Environmental Sciences, and Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Rural Economy, University of Alberta. He obtained his BSc and MSc from the University of Alberta and his PhD from the University of Minnesota. Adamowicz conducts research in and teaches environmental and natural resource economics. His research interests include developing methods that integrate environmental goods and services into economic analysis and designing policies and institutions that help capture the importance of environmental services in economic decision-making. Adamowicz was the Scientific Director of the Sustainable Forest Management Network of Centres of Excellence, one of Canada’s Networks of Centres of Excellence, from 1998 to 2004. Adamowicz was elected to be a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Academy II – Social Sciences, in 2007. In 2001-2002 Adamowicz was a Gilbert White Visiting Fellow at Resources for the Future in Washington DC.

Dr. Ernst A. Brugger
President and Managing Partner of BHP – Brugger and Partners Ltd.

Ernst A. Brugger is chairman of the board of Sustainable Performance Group, Zurich, of SV Group, Zurich, and BlueOrchard Finance s.a. (Microfinance), Geneva, and a member of numerous organizations in Switzerland and abroad. As co-founder and CEO of The Sustainability Forum Zurich and in his project work he advocates the implementation of long-term strategy, corporate responsibility, sustainability and good governance in business and politics. Brugger is a founding partner and the President of BHP – Brugger and Partners Ltd., a consulting firm specialized in sustainability strategies for private and public organizations. His special focus is on sustainability in and through capital markets. He began his professional career as head of the National Research Program “Regional Policy in Switzerland” on behalf of the Swiss National Science Foundation. From 1981 on he also taught at the University of Zurich, where he is a part-time professor today. Over the last 25 years he has carried out responsibilities in both business and public administration. He was active as an entrepreneur and advisor in Latin America for ten years and built up the FUNDES foundation for SME-development there. He has been a consultant to businesses and institutions in Europe, the US, Latin America, Africa and Asia for many years.

David R. Percy. Q.C.
Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Alberta

David Percy became Dean of the Faculty of Law in 2002. His teaching and research interests are in Natural Resources Law, Contracts and Construction Law. He is the author of The Framework of Water Rights Legislation in Canada, as well as books on wetlands and groundwater law. Dean Percy is a former President of the Canadian Association of Law Teachers. He acted as Counsel to the Federal Inquiry on Water Policy in 1987 and was a consultant to the Government of Alberta in developing the Alberta Water Act (1997). He has advised the Government of Canada and the governments of six provinces and territories on issues of natural resources law and policy. In 2000 and 2001, Dean Percy worked with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on water law and aquaculture issues in five African countries. In 2002, he worked as a consultant to FAO in developing an aquaculture law in Namibia.

FEATURED GUEST SPEAKERS

Albert F. Appleton

Albert F. Appleton (Al) is an international infrastructure and environmental consultant with interlocking expertise in water resource and water utility management, infrastructure economics and public finance, land use and landscape preservation, the economics of sustainable development and the use of financial strategies such as Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) to achieve mutually supporting economic development and environmental protection goals. His most recent work includes using payment for ecosystem service strategies to develop a self funding plan for restoring nine million acres of California national forest and ending the current catastrophic forest fire cycles in California. He has also advised a network of Mid-Atlantic environmental and civic groups locked in conflict with the natural gas industry proposal over its plans to use highly polluting fracking techniques to extract natural gas from shale formations on how to transmute what is currently a traditional economy versus environment debate into a future oriented partnership for a green economy by seeking consensus around new strategies of sustainable shale gas extraction. Appleton is also a member of the Alberta Water Research Institute expert panel designing a blueprint for the future sustainable management of Alberta’s water resource and water utility systems. Since the mid-1990s, Appleton has done sustainable development and infrastructure work in numerous foreign countries including Brazil, Canada, China, Columbia, the Dominican Republic, and Hungary, as well as the United States, and has been involved in expert consultations and public presentations in many others. Appleton is a member of the Katoomba Group, a worldwide network of experts on the use of market tools to address the problems of sustainable development. He teaches seminars on sustainability and its economics in the City University Hunter College graduate program in Urban Affairs and Planning, and in the Engineering and Architecture programs of the Cooper Union. During the early 1990s, Appleton served as Commissioner of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and Director of the New York City Water and Sewer system, where he developed and implemented groundbreaking innovations that saved New York City billions of dollars, most notably through the New York City Catskill watershed protection urban-rural partnership. This partnership successfully preserved the pristine quality of New York City drinking water and became a worldwide model for watershed protection, and water conservation, as it permanently reduced New York City’s water use by nearly 400 million gallons of water a day, or 30 per cent of total consumption.

Jim Hoggan
President, Hoggan & Associates; Chair, the David Suzuki Foundation

Jim Hoggan is the owner and founder of Hoggan & Associates, a leading Canadian public relations firm that specializes in environmental communications and in managing difficult issues for government, industry and not-for-profit organizations in North America, Europe and Asia. As principal of a longstanding research project on the subject, Hoggan is also a leading expert in Canadian attitudes toward sustainability. A law school graduate with a long-standing interest in social justice, Hoggan is Chair of Canada’s most influential environmental organization, the David Suzuki Foundation. He is also a trustee of the Dalai Lama Centre for Peace and Education, chair of the Canadian chapter of Al Gore’s organization, The Climate Project, and cofounder of the influential climate change website DeSmogBlog. com, and of the sustainable energy website, EnergyBoom. com. He has written and released two books in the last year, including, Do the Right Thing: PR Tips for a Skeptical Public, a compilation of public relations tips and theory, and Climate Cover-up: The Crusade to Deny Global Warming, an expose of the questionable PR campaign and tactics used to sow international confusion about the causes and implications of climate change.

Mark M. Little
Senior Vice-President and Director, GE Global Research

Mark Little was named senior vice president and director of GE Global Research in October 2005, becoming only the ninth director in the organization’s 105 year history. In that role Little is responsible for leading one of the world’s largest and most diversified industrial research and technology organizations. At Global Research, approximately 2,600 people from virtually every major scientific and engineering discipline focus on the company’s long-range technology needs. The organization has research facilities in the United States, India, China and Germany, working in collaboration with GE businesses around the world. Prior to his current role, Little was vice president of GE Energy’s power-generation segment headquartered in Schenectady, New York. GE Energy is a world-leading supplier of power generation equipment including gas, steam, wind and hydro-turbine generators, turnkey power plant services, gasification technologies and integrated gasification combined cycle. Little joined GE in 1978, starting out in the company’s Turbine business. After holding several management positions in engineering, he was named product general manager for generators in 1989. In 1991 he became general manager of business development for GE Energy, responsible for strategic planning and joint venture development. In 1992 he was appointed product general manager for gas turbines and in 1994 he was named vice president of Power Generation Engineering. He assumed responsibility for the large turbine generator segments of power generation in 1997, and in 2004 he was appointed to lead the combined thermal, wind and hydro power generation group. Little holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering from Tufts and Northeastern universities respectively, and he earned a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

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CONFERENCE LOCATION

Banff National Park (www.banfflakelouise.ca), a UNESCO World Heritage Site set in the heart of the Canadian Rockies, is a vast untamed territory that begs to be explored. Wild animals roam the valleys, eagles soar over the Canadian Rocky Mountains, and pure water streams into rivers from 1,000 glaciers. Located about 90 minutes west of Calgary, Alberta, more than four million visitors travel to Banff each year to inhale the fresh, clean alpine air, and to enjoy both the scenery and the many activities the area has to offer. The largest community within Banff National Park is the Town of Banff (www.banff.ca) a unique destination that takes pride in accommodating visitors and providing tourism services, without losing the charm of a small mountain community. The town offers world class shopping and dining experiences, and is home to internationally renowned and historic Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel.

THE BANFF CENTRE

Nestled on the side of Tunnel Mountain overlooking the Town of Banff, The Banff Centre (www.banffcentre.ca) features a variety of accommodation and meeting rooms encircled by stands of pines, fir and spruce trees. With 75 years of experience as a centre for creative excellence in the arts, leadership and mountain culture, The Banff Centre offers world-class service, and first class facilities that meet your every need, from sophisticated high-tech to the simplicity of its natural surroundings.

ACCOMMODATIONS

The conference will be based at the Banff Centre Professional Development Centre (www.banffcentre.ca/conferences), which features stone fireplaces, pine timbers, unique handcrafted furniture, and expansive windows that reflect the full beauty of The Banff Centre’s natural setting.

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The total cost of this three-day program is $3,000 CAD.
Cost includes:

• Conference fees and access to all sessions
• Three nights executive accommodations at The Banff Centre
• Breakfast, lunch and dinner for the duration of the program
• Wireless Internet access in bedrooms
• Parking
• Access to the Salley Borden Recreation Facility
• Transportation from Calgary International Airport to Banff, Alberta (if required)

A spousal and family program is available at a minimal extra cost and upon request. Please contact Dianne White at + 1 780 701 5406 for more information.
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To register on-line, please go to: www.banffcentre.ca/conference_registration/2009/AWR0908/
or
Contact The Banff Centre at 1-800-884-7574 or + 1 403 762 6308.
If registering via telephone, please reference:
Conference Group Name:
Alberta Water Research Institute
Booking ID: AWR0908
Please Note: Due to the exclusive nature of the event, registration is limited to 25 participants. Participants will be admitted based on professional credentials and contributions.

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