The startups reimagining Canada’s approach to wildfires

Aug 7

A drone flies near the Brunswick Creek wildfire in July. The BC Wildfire Service completed its first drone ignition operation which involves dropping chemical payloads to start controlled burns and halt advancing wildfires. July 21, 2026. Photo courtesy of BC Wildfire Service

By Isobel Farquharson

The oppressive sepia skies above North American cities this summer are all too familiar to Canadians who have grown unwillingly accustomed to intensifying wildfire seasons.

The hot, dry conditions forecast for BC could see another challenging week amid an already devastating season.

Canada is warming twice as fast as the global average and is home to more than a quarter of the world’s boreal forests, making it especially vulnerable to wildfires as heatwaves become longer, hotter and more frequent.

A handful of Canadian startups are developing novel solutions to the country’s worsening wildfire problem.

Backed by federal grants, provincial funds and private climate-tech investors, these firms are creating technologies to prevent fires before they start and detect them more intelligently when they do.

While traditional methods of firefighting will remain essential, new approaches for wildfire prevention, detection and mitigation could help ease the burden on thinly stretched firefighting teams.

“Wildfire risk is no longer seasonal, it’s structural," said Sarah Goodman, president and CEO of NorthX, a Vancouver-based investor in early-stage “climate hard-tech” companies.

This reporting is produced with support from I-SEA’s Climate Solutions project and is not behind National Observer’s subscriber paywall. Readers are asked to create a FREE National Observer account to access the full article.

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