It seems Canada is responding to that call. Steven Guilbeault, the newly minted minister of environment and climate change, is in Glasgow and knows a thing or two about climate leadership. This is not Minister Guilbeault’s first rodeo; he has been to 19 UN climate summits. 

Canada has committed to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by 40% to 45% below 2005 levels by 2030, and our government has pledged to decarbonize the economy by 2050. It also recently committed to achieving a 100% net-zero-emissions electricity sector by 2035. And waterpower will be central to delivering the goods on this agenda. 

We have a strong base to build on, but getting to that zero-carbon grid will require a great deal of collaboration and negotiation between different industries, utilities and governments. That’s why, two weeks ago, my organization, WaterPower Canada, joined up with five other associations to form Electricity Alliance Canada. The coalition represents the leading suppliers of electricity to consumers and markets in Canada. All of us will work together to promote the power of electrification.

Hydro is already the backbone of Canada’s enviably clean electricity grid. Water flowing through turbines produces close to 90% of Canada’s renewable electricity, and 60% of the country’s electric needs are powered by water. 

Nonetheless, despite having a grid that is 80% non-emitting, Canada’s decarbonization strategy hinges on electrification – the repowering of almost everything in our society that today burns fossil fuels to instead run on zero-emissions electricity. This will mean cars, buildings, factories and more. Efficiency will play an important role in meeting this demand surge, of course. With only 20% of our energy end-use currently electrified, transitioning everything at scale will require us to generate a great deal more new zero-emissions electricity. According to the federal government, Canada may need to double or even triple its capacity.

Some Canadian provinces, such as Saskatchewan, Alberta and Nova Scotia, generate electricity from fossil fuels, and those jurisdictions will soon want to clean up their grids and transition fossil fuels to, ideally, renewables such as wind and water. In those places and elsewhere, Canada’s waterpower fleet stands ready to not only deliver new capacity, but also help smooth and balance the load for variable renewables such as wind and solar.

Domestic electrification will drive demand for new zero-carbon electricity, but so will global markets. As policy-makers increasingly forge ahead with carbon pricing, markets will look to produce goods and services with very low-carbon electricity. Canada’s extensive waterpower fleet will make Canada an attractive destination for investment as these electrons remain the most affordable, flexible and dispatchable form of electricity. We are already seeing this with the growing number of data centres setting up operations in provinces like Quebec. Thanks in large part to this nation’s abundant, cost-competitive, low-emissions waterpower, a 2020 IT industry index, compiled by the New Statesman Media Group, recently ranked Canada the top destination for such facilities.

There is plenty of momentum to build on. We can see it in developments ranging from rapidly growing electric vehicle adoption, to cutting-edge efforts to electrify high-intensity industrial processes such as steel manufacturing and investments in green hydrogen. Whatever new commitments our government brings back from Glasgow, Canada’s waterpower industry is prepared to make them happen.

Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin is the president & CEO of WaterPower Canada.

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Each would maintain an increasing carbon price for large greenhouse gas emitters, including fossil-fuelled power plants. They all want more electricity production from our abundant renewable energy resources, and more sharing of it between regions. And they’ve all proposed initiatives that would drive electrification in sectors currently powered mainly by other energy sources, including passenger vehicle transportation and industrial hydrogen production.  

This high-level consensus represents important progress. But whatever government takes office after the election will need to move quickly to implement and expand upon these commitments if Canada is to successfully meet its emission reduction targets.  

Renewables at the core of our ambitions

Renewable electricity must be at the core of these efforts. In Canada today, we have the tremendous advantage of an electricity supply that is already almost 70% from renewable energy resources. And there is vast undeveloped potential within our flowing inland and marine waters, blowing wind, and shining sun. It’s an enviable starting point.

Moving to fully decarbonize electricity production is critical and within reach in Canada, and we need to do so well before 2050. We then need to expand our use of this invaluable resource, because electricity meets only about one-fifth of Canada’s total final energy needs today.

Renewable electricity will be instrumental in displacing more of the polluting fuels that currently meet the other four-fifths of our final energy. This means we need to dramatically and rapidly ramp up generating capacity. Numerous studies have shown that by 2050 we will need to produce two to three times as much clean power as we do currently.

There are countless potential renewable electricity generation, storage and transmission projects in Canada. A number are already in development and ready to proceed rapidly.  

They include wave and tidal energy on our coasts, hydropower refurbishment and development, new wind and solar generation across the country, and more transmission lines and energy storage to knit it all together. The development, construction and operation of such projects will require significant investment and a very large skilled workforce and will provide significant opportunities for Indigenous communities across the country. Successfully moving to the scale required from a climate change perspective, however, requires swift action. 

A critically important leadership opportunity

Leadership, it is sometimes suggested, involves finding a parade and getting in front of it. The renewable electricity parade is already marching forward, with a great many Canadians cheering it on. Getting in front of it and sustaining its momentum will be a critically important job for whatever government is sworn in later this year. 

That leadership needs to entail maintaining Canada’s long-standing commitments to phase out coal-fired electricity and to work toward a 90%-non-emitting electricity grid by 2030, with full elimination of electricity-related greenhouse gas emissions well before 2050.  

It also must involve encouraging rapid investments in new renewable electricity generation, storage and transmission to both enhance Canada’s future economic competitiveness and meet climate policy objectives. The Canadian Institute for Climate Choices has identified such investments as “safe bets” that will be required on any pathway to significant emission reductions. 

Our post-election leaders must give investors increased certainty by providing a transparent schedule for increased carbon pricing at an accelerating pace that prices-in the impact of emitting generation and solidifies the business case for non-emitting alternatives. They will also need to work with the  provinces and territories to design and implement comprehensive plans to electrify key energy uses and streamline regulatory review and approvals processes for renewable energy projects while maintaining environmental protections. 

In the remaining days of this short campaign, we can indeed take satisfaction from the emerging consensus around Canada’s clean-energy future. But we should also be asking all leaders and candidates pointed questions about their readiness to turn vision into action, and about their keenness to get in front of this ready-made parade. 

Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin, Robert Hornung and Elisa Obermann are the leaders of the Canadian Council on Renewable Electricity (CanCORE), a collaborative initiative of Canada’s national trade associations for the water, wind, solar and marine energy sectors. These sectors produce 68% of Canada’s total annual electricity.

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Elisa Obermann, executive director of Marine Renewables Canada

Francis Bradley, president and CEO of the Canadian Electricity Association 

John Gorman, president and CEO of the Canadian Nuclear Association

Michelle Branigan, CEO of Electricity Human Resources Canada

Robert Hornung, president and CEO of the Canadian Renewable Energy Association

In the depths of the Great Depression in the last century, President Franklin D. Roosevelt launched an effort that revolutionized farm life in the United States. The New Deal’s Rural Electrification Act not only put thousands of jobless people to work, it improved quality of life for struggling rural families and greatly increased productivity in agriculture.

As leaders of the organizations that represent the breadth of Canada’s electricity sector, we believe that this country can seize a similar opportunity as it seeks to recover from the steep economic slump precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Backed by analysis from the International Monetary Fund, the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA) recently urged governments around the world to ensure that their economic recovery efforts are used to modernize their energy systems. In August, incoming federal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland signalled that the restart of Canada’s economy “needs to be green” and that decarbonization “has to be part of it.”

Our country starts with a clear advantage. We are already blessed with a clean electricity system; more than 80% of our power supply comes from non-emitting hydroelectric, nuclear and wind, solar, and marine renewable generation. Our remaining coal-fired power plants are being phased out.

Still, Canada faces huge hurdles in meeting its target of reducing greenhouse gases from 2005 levels by 30% by 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050, as pledged by the Liberal government. Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan has said those goals will be achieved in significant part through electrification. Currently, electricity supplies only 20% of Canada’s final energy use. We can expand that by electrifying areas of the economy that now rely on fossil fuels, including transportation, industry and buildings. 

In its June report, the IEA urged governments to take a number of strategic steps, including accelerating the growth of wind and solar, boosting investments in storage and small modular reactors, and maintaining the bedrock roles for hydroelectric and nuclear.

New technologies will allow us to produce power in more distributed locations, eliminate waste in the system, store electricity for when we need it, and enhance the grid to better serve the needs of digitally sophisticated businesses and residential customers. Governments can support the expansion of electric vehicles (EVs) by offering incentives, investing in charging infrastructure and even mandating that EVs make up a regulated percentage of automakers’ sales. We can use clean electricity to produce hydrogen, in a way that produces no emissions, to fuel industrial processes and large transport trucks and trains.

With a focus on energy efficiency, and as the cost of innovative technology continues to fall, we can ensure that the low-carbon transition is affordable and doesn’t impose a burden on Canadians who may struggle to recover from the economic impacts of the pandemic.

In an open letter published June 29, nearly 50 corporate leaders called for “bold federal investment in a green recovery.” They noted that Canada produces more renewable power than any country other than China and can expand that production to boost exports and lead in innovative technology such as emissions-free hydrogen. Given Canada’s leadership in non-emitting generation, we have an opportunity to grow the role of diverse electricity sources and pursue novel and innovative technologies as we increase the use of electricity in our energy mix.

In approving clean-energy stimulus, the federal government should follow some basic principles: 

• target projects that can start quickly or be accelerated; 
• reflect Canada’s diverse electricity markets;
• encourage partnerships with Indigenous and other local communities; and
• streamline its own regulatory processes while working with provinces to ensure there are not regulatory barriers to innovation.

However, government must also ensure the financial health of the industry when making these future-proofing investments. The economic battering has left many businesses and residential customers unable to pay their bills. Government can help by offsetting COVID-related costs for industry and continuing to support our customers as they navigate an uncertain economy.

In pursuing an electrification strategy, Ottawa will have to work with provinces that regulate and, in many cases, own the power generation and transmission assets. Projects such as inter-provincial transmission lines that would provide a regional market for clean power clearly need enhanced collaboration between governments. Provincial governments, municipalities, and schools, colleges and universities are obvious candidates for investments in energy efficiency and distributed energy projects that will pay dividends for many years. Efforts need to be coordinated.

All these changes require workers with different skill sets that call for updated training to manage them. Industry actors will need to ensure that there is a plan to recruit and retain that next generation of employees to innovate and manage the grid of the 21st century.

As governments turn to stimulus spending to revitalize Canada’s economy, this country’s long-term decarbonization goals can receive a significant boost if we make clean electricity the country’s single largest energy source. Done right, it will yield an energy system that is affordable, resilient, and ready for the net-zero economy of tomorrow. 

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Whatever that stimulus looks like, it will need to accomplish two things: get Canadians back to work and address the climate crisis with strategic infrastructure investments. The smart approach would involve investing in infrastructure that leverages existing competitive advantages and builds on and secures that edge. Three moves would accomplish that.

First, in a carbon-constrained global economy, jurisdictions that produce goods and services with low embedded greenhouse gas emissions will have an edge over those that don’t. For a glimpse of things to come, think of Apple’s recent first purchase of aluminum from Quebec. Federal leadership, and collaboration with the provinces and territories, should be focused on cleaning our electricity supply first and foremost.

Provinces with significant hydroelectricity surpluses share borders with others still reliant on coal and diesel that are looking for cleaner alternatives. Ottawa can facilitate the simple solution of stringing new “extension cords” from clean and renewable energy supply to demand (i.e. new transmission lines), as it recently did between Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

Ottawa could also help waterpower generators looking to optimize the performance and longevity of their facilities. By refurbishing and redeveloping existing generation facilities, some producers could increase annual output by a quarter or more. These investments represent a win-win: they typically yield a lower cost of electricity than investments in any other supply options do, and they increase clean and renewable electricity supply with a negligible additional environmental footprint.

Finally, like any savvy investor, Ottawa should be planning for the future. The falling costs of harnessing wind and solar energy means our electricity supply will be increasingly variable and weather-dependent. At the same time, Canada will need to significantly increase flexible and dependable generation and energy storage to balance supply and demand during periods of planned and unplanned wind and solar energy surpluses and deficits. Waterpower does this well. Augmenting our existing fleet with more energy-storage approaches, such as “pumped storage” and “green hydrogen,” will also be needed. Proposals for both are already being developed across Canada. For instance, five of the most promising pumped hydro projects could add up to 2,400 megawatts of installed generation capacity with an estimated capital cost of $6 billion.

Canada needs more investment in green infrastructure. It’s only common sense to focus on both our green and our blue (waterpower) economy. Six out of 10 Canadian homes and businesses are currently powered by clean and renewable hydroelectricity. Leveraging and building on our existing competitive waterpower advantages would add billions of dollars of investment and tens of thousands of new jobs each year, to a sector that already contributes more than $30 billion to the Canadian economy and supports a labour force 130,000 strong.

Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin is the president & CEO of WaterPower Canada, the national trade association for hydroelectricity producers and their goods-and-services providers.

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