The Pollution Probe Approach to 
Environmental Renewal

Pollution Probe is a Canadian charitable organization that:

• defines environmental problems through research
  

• promotes understanding through education; and
  

• presses for practical solutions through advocacy.

Pollution Probe is dedicated to achieving positive and tangible environmental change.

We are a partnership-building organization.  We engage government agencies, private businesses and other non-profit organizations that have a legitimate interest in an issue to help us find solutions. 

We are a donor-based organization.  We maintain a practical, independent perspective by drawing upon the financial support of a broad spectrum of individuals.

We seek to represent the needs of the general public.  We work to make visible the needs of all, as distinct from the needs of interested parties, in finding environmental solutions.  Our goal is to serve the needs of both this generation and future generations for a clean and healthy environment.

We are “results-oriented”.  We choose issues and engage in activities when we judge that we may reasonably expect tangible results that improve the environment from our participation.

We choose our scope of activity to ensure that we can achieve results.  We direct our attention to Canadian issues, and we concentrate on clean air and clean water, because we believe that this scope of activity allows us to focus our efforts where we have demonstrated competence.

We consider all facets of an issue. We resist the temptation to oversimplify issues that are truly complex, just as we avoid clouding issues that are quite simple.  We challenge our donors, our partners and the public to think through the important, sometimes difficult, environmental problems we all face.

We approach issues fair-mindedly, based upon fact. We listen respectfully to the points of view of all stakeholders in an environmental issue, and we take our position based upon sound scientific research and our commitment to serving the general public interest.

We are non-partisan, yet engaged politically.  We are willing to work cooperatively with all levels of government and all political parties to ensure that the environmental needs of current and future generations are addressed through public debate, legislation and policy initiatives.

We seek professional competence in all aspects of our business.  Our credibility and our ability to achieve positive results rest, in part, upon our ability to do our jobs creditably and to interact with colleagues on the basis of shared professional standards of excellence.

We adopt good ideas wherever we find them.  We adopt positions, crediting our sources, based on the good of the environment, and not upon philosophical or ideological labels.