1 INTRODUCTION

Energy has been a vital commodity for sustaining the life and economic activities and assuring the quality of life and techological advancements. The global picture is not as rossy as expected. One needs to note that at present, a total of 13% of the global population still does not have access to basic electricity. Furthermore, 3 billion people still supply their energy need for cooking and heating from coal, wood, or animal waste, ending up in millions of deaths every year due to indoor air pollution.¹ Therefore, it is crucial to provide access to clean, affordable, and sustainable energy for all. In this regard, the United Nations Assembly in 2015 presented Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG 7) that defines five objectives to be achieved by 2030.² All proposed pathways for the energy transition to provide electricity, heating, cooling and power for transportation for people and their comfort are expected to consider sustainable energy sources and technologies as solutions to problems rising from hydrocarbon‐based fuel consumption. Energy applications, including production, storage, conversion, and utilization, becomes the primary contributor to the currently in‐action climate change by covering more than 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions.³ Therefore, sustainable energy technologies are essential to achieve a nature‐friendly energy transition for a cleaner and more peaceful environment.

Sustainable energy is energy generated and consumed in a manner that supplies the present demand without preventing future generations from meeting the energy demand of their time.⁴ In general, it is thought that sustainable energy and renewable energy have the same meaning, and they are used instead of each other. However, it should be noted that some particular “renewable energy” projects might not be totally sustainable. For instance, the use of agriproducts or clearing off forests for biofuel production might damage the environment more than conventional methods. Therefore, instead of end products, energy systems should be analyzed from the extraction of the resources to disposal to decide either sustainable or not. This approach is also known as the life cycle assessment (LCA) method. Furthermore, energy systems should also be analyzed in terms of environmental impacts through an LCA methodology since the operational emissions might not reflect the system's real impact on the environment. For instance, in the operation phase, electricity consumption does not emit any harmful fumes; therefore, electricity is a carbon‐free substance. However, this term might change 180° with the production method of electricity. If electricity is supplied from a coal‐based power plant, such electricity consumption will make a significant indirect contribution to climate change.

The importance of sustainable energy for humankind can be expressed 3‐fold; energy security, environment, and economy. Sustainable energy provides diversification in power supply, which increases energy security, lower the need for imported energy sources, and prevents the depletion of nations' natural energy resources. Compared to conventional fuels, sustainable energy emits lower, in some cases, net‐zero, greenhouse gases that make a significant contribution to battling climate change. Furthermore, sustainable energy sources do not entail fuel costs or require long‐distance transportation, providing better price stability than conventional fuels. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), sustainable/renewable energy demand will increase by 1% by the end of 2020 compared to the 2019 level.⁵ Moreover, despite delays in the supply chain and construction chain due to Covid‐19, sustainable/renewable electricity generation will grow by 5% by which it will consist of 30% of global electricity generation. In sustainable/renewable‐based electricity generation breakdown, hydropower accounts for 60%. Since it does not produce direct greenhouse gases, one might consider nuclear, which produces 10% of global electricity, as sustainable as well, so that the share of sustainable/renewable in global power generation reaches up to around 40%.⁶

Canada currently has substantial renewable energy resources to produce 17% of its primary energy.⁷ Furthermore, Canada has a unique and well‐structured nuclear industry that produces around 15% of its electricity.⁸ Canada's sustainability picture looks promising in electricity generation, but the image is not the same for transportation, heating, and cooling. Despite having all these abundant nature‐friendly energy sources and getting almost 60% of its electricity from sustainable/renewable sources, Canada is among the top 10 greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter countries.⁹ However, Canada is capable of achieving better than these. There are reasons to be hopeful in this regard. First, Canada is well aware of its responsibilities regarding GHG emissions reduction and already announcing new policies and new funds to support nature‐friendly projects. Second, Canadian institutes already have enough experience regarding green energy projects. Figure 1 illustrates a potential sustainable energy pathway for Canada through the 3S + 2S = S approach where 3S represents source‐system‐service, 2S stands for storage, and lastly, S is for sustainability. Owing to its policymakers' awareness about climate change and the importance of sustainable solutions, and its well‐structured institutes, Canada is committed to implementing such a green energy transition.

In this study, Canadian sustainable energy studies from 1970 to 2020 are evaluated through a comprehensive literature search in the Elsevier's Scopus sources. The relevant data and information are collected and assessed on sustainable energy‐related studies. Moreover, the most productive Canadian institutes that make the highest contribution to Canada's sustainable energy research activities are discussed, and their studies are presented with figures. The methodology used for this study and online search criteria implemented for data collection is described in the following section.

中文翻译：

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加拿大可持续能源研究工作的观点

1引言

能源一直是维持生命和经济活动以及确保生活质量和技术进步的重要商品。全球情况并不像预期的那样乐观。需要注意的是，目前，全球仍有13％的人口无法获得基本电力。此外，仍有30亿人通过煤炭，木材或动物粪便满足烹饪和取暖的能源需求，每年由于室内空气污染导致数百万人死亡。¹因此，至关重要的是为所有人提供清洁，负担得起的可持续能源。在这方面，联合国大会在2015年提出了可持续发展目标7（SDG 7），该目标定义了到2030年要实现的五个目标^。2旨在为人们的运输提供电力，供暖，制冷和电力及其舒适度的能源过渡的所有拟议途径，都应考虑将可持续能源和技术视为解决基于碳氢化合物的燃料消耗问题的解决方案。能源应用（包括生产，存储，转换和利用）通过覆盖全球70％以上的温室气体排放，成为当前无所作为的气候变化的主要贡献者。³因此，可持续能源技术对于实现自然友好的能源过渡，创造更清洁，更和平的环境至关重要。

可持续能源是指以满足当前需求而又不妨碍子孙后代满足其时代能源需求的方式产生和消耗的能源。⁴通常，人们认为可持续能源和可再生能源具有相同的含义，并且彼此替代使用。但是，应该指出的是，某些特定的“可再生能源”项目可能并不完全可持续。例如，使用农产品或砍伐森林来生产生物燃料可能比传统方法对环境的破坏更大。因此，从最终资源的提取到处置，应分析能源系统而不是最终产品，以决定是否可持续。这种方法也称为生命周期评估（LCA）方法。此外，还应该通过LCA方法对能源系统的环境影响进行分析，因为运行排放可能无法反映系统对环境的实际影响。例如，在运营阶段，用电量不会产生任何有害烟雾；因此，电是无碳物质。但是，该术语可能会随电力生产方法而变化180°。如果从燃煤发电厂提供电力，那么这种电力消耗将对气候变化产生重大的间接影响。

可持续能源对人类的重要性可以表达为三倍。能源安全，环境和经济。可持续能源可提供多种电力供应，从而提高能源安全性，降低对进口能源的需求，并防止国家自然能源的消耗。与传统燃料相比，可持续能源的排放量较低，在某些情况下为零净温室气体，为应对气候变化做出了重要贡献。此外，可持续能源不会带来燃料成本或需要长途运输，从而提供了比传统燃料更好的价格稳定性。根据国际能源署（IEA）的数据，到2020年底，可持续能源/可再生能源需求将比2019年增长1％。⁵此外，尽管由于Covid‐19导致供应链和建设链出现延误，但可持续/可再生发电量仍将增长5％，占全球总发电量的30％。在可持续/可再生能源发电细分中，水电占60％。由于它不产生直接的温室气体，因此可以考虑将产生全球电力的10％的核能也视为可持续的，因此可持续/可再生能源在全球发电中所占的比例高达40％。⁶

加拿大目前拥有大量可再生能源，可生产其一次能源的17％。⁷此外，加拿大拥有独特且结构良好的核工业，其发电量约占其总发电量的15％。⁸加拿大的可持续发展图景在发电方面看起来很有希望，但在运输，供暖和制冷方面却不尽相同。尽管拥有所有这些丰富的自然友好型能源，并且其近60％的电力来自可持续/可再生能源，但加拿大还是十大温室气体（GHG）排放国之一。⁹但是，加拿大有能力取得比这些更好的成就。在这方面有理由充满希望。首先，加拿大深知其在减少温室气体排放方面的责任，并已经宣布了支持自然友好项目的新政策和新资金。其次，加拿大的机构已经在绿色能源项目方面有足够的经验。图1说明了加拿大通过3S + 2S = S方法的潜在可持续能源途径，其中3S代表源系统服务，2S代表存储，最后，S代表可持续性。由于决策者对气候变化的认识和可持续解决方案的重要性，以及其结构合理的研究所，加拿大致力于实施这种绿色能源转型。

在这项研究中，通过在Elsevier的Scopus资料来源中进行全面的文献检索，评估了1970年至2020年的加拿大可持续能源研究。在可持续能源相关研究中收集和评估相关数据和信息。此外，还讨论了对加拿大可持续能源研究活动做出最大贡献的生产力最高的加拿大研究所，并用数字介绍了他们的研究。下一节将介绍用于这项研究的方法和为数据收集而实施的在线搜索标准。