Sponsor
Ontario Water Consortium (OWC) and Mitacs
Program
Mitacs Accelerate/OWC Partnership
For More Information
Visit the OWC/Mitacs partnership webpage to learn more.
Description
The Ontario Water Consortium (OWC) and Mitacs have announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to open strategic partnership opportunities between Ontario’s innovative water companies, municipal utilities and highly trained college, undergraduate, graduate students and post-doctoral fellows.
Through the MOU, OWC will help connect water technology companies and water utilities across Ontario to Mitacs programs to gain access to expertise and for college, undergraduate, graduate students, and post-doctoral fellows to get the practical experience they need to advance their skills, careers, or transition from academia to industry. Over the next three years, this MOU is anticipated to support projects worth over $1.8 million and provide 120 internships.
Topic Interest Areas:
- Remote Water and Sanitation. Potential Themes: water and sanitation accessibility; decentralized and modular water and sanitation; remote monitoring and control; First Nations and remote communities; data driven asset management; cold-weather wastewater treatment.
- Urban Water and Sanitation. Potential Themes: future ready municipal water and wastewater infrastructure; climate change impacts on water and wastewater infrastructure; collection systems of the future; net-zero energy wastewater treatment; data-driven asset management.
- The Circular Economy, Water, & Waste Reduction. Potential Themes: biosolids management, biosolids treatment (e.g., quality and consistency); renewable fuels; bioplastics; high strength wastewater treatment; advanced manufacturing processes.
- Freshwater and the Great Lakes. Potential Themes: “Freshwater for the future”; nutrient reduction and agriculture; sustainable agriculture; algae; monitoring and analytics for water quality; plastics; industrial treatment; water conservation and efficiency; large flow water testing; water-energy nexus; water-food nexus.
Eligibility
Faculty:
- Faculty at all Canadian universities who are eligible to hold Tri-Agency funds, and faculty at Canadian colleges
- Faculty at universities outside of Canada
- Professors who want to send interns to Canada must be located in a Mitacs partner country (see Accelerate International tab for details)
- All disciplines
- Applications from L-II post-secondary institutions partners are encouraged and given priority
Partners/Companies:
- For-profit corporations and eligible not-for-profit corporations, municipalities, and hospitals in Canada
- Under the Accelerate Entrepreneur initiative, eligible intern-owned start-ups at approved incubators. Contact accelerate@mitacs.ca to confirm your start-up’s eligibility.
- For-profit businesses operating outside of Canada
Maximum Project Value
Mitacs contributes roughly half of the funding for internships, which is generously provided by the Governments of Ontario and Canada, and the other half comes from the host company or municipality. That is, Mitacs provides up to $7,500 per 4-month internship with a required 1:1 match.
Indirect Costs
0%
Project Duration
The earliest start date is the date of approval for a project.
Special Notes
Mitacs requires at least 25% ‘on-site’ interaction with the partner, which could be split amongst several partner sites (can be virtual due to COVID).
Please note that research activities carried out in the context of COVID-19 need to adhere to the University of Guelph COVID-19 research principles, policies, guidelines and processes as they may be updated from time to time and communicated on the Office of Research web-page.
Deadlines
If College-level review is required, your College will communicate its earlier internal deadlines.
| Type | Notes |
|---|---|
Internal Deadline | Rolling Intake: Please submit your application, including budget, to the Office of Research Services, research.services@uoguelph.ca, with a signed OR-5 form, at least one week in advance of the planned submission date. |
External Deadline | Lead applicant is responsible for submitting the required application documents to OWC/Mitacs. |
How to Apply
Applicants may apply either through Mitacs or OWC.
- Mitacs will review Accelerate proposals at any time, and once submitted, the application follows the standard Mitacs processes. Mitacs Accelerate proposals have an estimated 6-8 week research reviewer response. Please contact Emily Gordon egordon@mitacs.ca for the Accelerate application documents.
- OWC will approve projects and invite them to the full Mitacs proposal process. The OWC Mitacs Intake Form is available here.