The 2026 edition of the Clean50 has been revealed.
The Clean50 is an annual list celebrating individuals and projects demonstrating recent innovation in Canada’s clean technology space.
The list evaluates the impact of 50 individual leaders, 20 emerging leaders, five lifetime contributors and 25 sustainability projects for work completed between from 2023 through 2025.
The Clean50 Individual awards are selected from 16 categories that transcend industries, academia, government, and more, with the leader in each of the 16 categories declared to be part of the Clean16.
The annual list, now in its 15th year, was unveiled this month at the Clean50 Summit, which was held at Evergreen Brickworks in Toronto.
Honourees were selected from more than 1,100 nominees.
The 2026 Clean16 list includes Julie Angus, the chief executive officer of Open Ocean Robotics, a Victoria-based developer of solar-powered vehicles designed for environmentally friendly oceanic exploration. Open’s fleet of zero-emission vehicles have logged more than 5,000 hours of field data collection, monitoring 5.2 million hectares of marine protected areas.
The Clean16 also features Vancouver-based impact investor Spring, recognizing the leadership of Co-CEOs Caroline von Hirschberg and Keith Ippel as well as Managing Partners Olivia Hornby and Graham Day.
“We’re seeing more investors recognize that climate solutions often require patient, blended, and mission-aligned capital to scale,” says von Hirschberg.
“When we broaden who gets access to capital, we don’t just make the system fairer—we unlock new ideas, markets, and technologies that might otherwise be overlooked,” she stated.
Spring’s venture capital fund, Spring Impact Capital, recently closed with $14M in funding, and has already invested in eight companies—including Open Ocean Robotics.
Another honouree for 2026 is Elisabeth Baudinaud, the mastermind behind Carbon Wise, which aims to accelerate “low-carbon construction” by delivering practical, science-based solutions that reduce both operational and embodied carbon using tools like energy modelling and Whole-Building Life Cycle Assessment.