Electric vehicles can now power your home for three days

Canada Green Investment Gap highlights lagging EV and clean energy funding as peers surge. With a green recovery budget pending, sustainable finance, green bonds, EV charging, hydrogen, and carbon capture are pivotal to decarbonization.

Key Points

Canada lags peers in EV and clean energy investment, urging faster budget and policy action to cut emissions.

✅ Per capita climate spend trails US and EU benchmarks

✅ EVs, hydrogen, charging need scaled funding now

✅ Strengthen sustainable finance, green bonds, disclosure

Canada is being outpaced on the international stage when it comes to green investments in electric vehicles and green energy solutions, environmental groups say.

The federal government has an opportunity to change course in about three weeks, when the Liberals table their first budget in over two years, the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) argued in a new analysis endorsed by nine other climate action, ecology and conservation organizations.

“Canada’s international peers are ramping up commitments for green recovery, including significant investments from many European countries,” states the analysis, “Investing for Tomorrow, Today,” published March 29.

“To keep up with our global peers, sufficient investments and strengthened regulations, including EV sales regulations, must work in tandem to rapidly decarbonize all sectors of the Canadian economy.”

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland confirmed last week that the federal budget will be tabled April 19. The Liberals are expected to propose between $70 billion and $100 billion in fiscal stimulus to jolt the economy out of its pandemic doldrums.

The government teased a coming economic “green transformation” late last year when Freeland released the fall economic statement, promising to examine federal green bonds, border carbon adjustments and a sustainable finance market, with tweaks like tightening the climate-risk disclosure obligations of corporations.

The government has also proposed a wide range of green measures in its new climate plan released in December — which the think tank called the “most ambitious” in Canada’s history — including energy retrofit programs, boosting hydrogen and other alternative fuels, and rolling out carbon capture technology in a grid where 18% of electricity still came from fossil fuels in 2019.

But the possible “three-year stimulus package to jumpstart our recovery” mentioned in the fall economic statement came with the caveat that the COVID-19 virus would have to be “under control.” While vaccines are being administered, Canada is currently dealing with a rise of highly transmissible variants of the virus.

Freeland spoke with United States Vice-President Kamala Harris on March 25, highlighting potential Canada-U.S. collaboration on EVs alongside the “need to support entrepreneurs, small businesses, young people, low-wage and racialized workers, the care economy, and women” in the context of an economic recovery.

Biden is contemplating a climate recovery plan that could exceed US$2 trillion as Canada looks to capitalize on the U.S. auto pivot to EVs to spur domestic industry. Per capita, that is over 8 times what Canada has announced so far for climate-related spending in the wake of the pandemic, according to a new analysis from green groups.
U.S. President Joe Biden is contemplating a climate and clean energy recovery plan that could “exceed US$2 trillion,” White House officials told reporters this month. “Per capita, that is over eight times what Canada has announced so far for climate-related spending in the wake of the pandemic,” the IISD-led analysis stated.

Biden’s election platform commitment of $508 billion over 10 years in clean energy was also seen as “significantly higher per capita than Canada’s recent commitments.”

Since October 2020, Canada has announced $36 billion in new climate-focused funding, a 2035 EV mandate and other measures, the groups found. By comparison, they noted, a political agreement in Europe proposed that a minimum of 37 per cent of investments in each national recovery plan should support climate action. France and Germany have also committed tens of billions of dollars to support clean hydrogen.

As for electric vehicles (EVs), the United Kingdom has committed $4.9 billion, while Germany has put up $7.5 billion to expand EV adoption and charging infrastructure and sweeten incentive programs for prospective buyers, complementing Canada’s ambitious EV goals announced domestically. The U.K. has also committed $3.5 billion for bike lanes and other active transportation, the groups noted.

Canada announced $400 million over five years this month for a new network of bike lanes, paths, trails and bridges, the first federal fund dedicated to active transportation.

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US Grid Decarbonization demands balancing renewables, reliability, and resilience with smart transmission, storage, siting, and demand response, leveraging digital asset management to modernize infrastructure while meeting climate goals and rising electricity consumption.

Key Points

Low-carbon power while maintaining reliability via renewables, storage, transmission, and digital operations.

✅ Siting wind and solar requires community engagement and environmental review

✅ Balance variable renewables with storage, flexible load, and firm capacity

✅ Modernize transmission and digitize asset data for reliable operations

Last week, over 13,000 energy and technology leaders arrived in Dallas for DISTRIBUTECH International to share knowledge, showcase new technology advancements, and discuss initiatives to prepare for the future of energy. Among the many topics discussed was the critical need to balance rising energy demands and environmental pressures while understanding why the grid isn't 100% renewable today alongside effective climate change solutions.

The most widespread source of energy consumption is electricity. According to The U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2020 electricity consumption rates were roughly 3.8 trillion kWh - 13 times higher than in 1950. With our ever-increasing reliance on electricity, renewables' share of generation is also rising and this number is sure to grow exponentially in the coming years.

How can the US achieve meaningful decarbonization goals without sacrificing reliable and stable energy? Here are 4 of the biggest challenges and practical ways to meet them:

Siting New Solar and Wind Farms
Building renewable energy sources is more difficult than it seems. Scouting for sites is fraught with issues such as community opposition due to local aesthetics and clean energy's hidden costs around disruption to the environment and recreation.

NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) is an influential source of opposition. Local residents join together in an effort to prevent shore front views in wealthy coastal areas from obstruction, which are needed to support offshore wind farms. These farms can also negatively impact local fisheries, while outdoor sports and entertainment activities such as sailing, waterskiing, fishing, or swimming may be disrupted, which are equally opposed by NIMBY advocates.

Utilities must take these concerns into account when scouting for renewable energy sites.

Maintaining Consistent Availability of Generation Capacity
The capacity to generate consistent, reliable electricity is both a regional and nationwide concern.

Wind and solar farms depend on a consistent level of wind velocity and sunny periods, yet wind and solar could meet 80% of U.S. demand and regional concerns must be considered. For example, the southwestern United States is an ideal location for large commercial solar arrays. Areas in the north are more problematic since fall and winter days are shorter, reducing their ability to consistently generate energy. The Midwest is a prime location for wind-based generation since it experiences a consistent level of wind throughout the year.

Nighttime periods and cloudy days virtually eliminate solar farms as a consistent energy source while loss of available winds impacts the reliability of wind as a base load supply of energy generation.

Pivoting From Current Energy Usage Models
Over the last 20 years, utilities have been heavily involved with normalizing consumer energy consumption curves, pursuing grid resilience strategies to manage variability. Due to the high cost of siting new fossil fuel facilities, building new electric grid interconnections, and the high commodity pricing for imported power, utilities were driven to modify their customers’ energy usage patterns.

These consumption regulating policies included:

• Time of use metering to entice customers to use high energy devices at night
• Installation of energy monitoring devices on high use customer equipment to enable the utility to reduce energy demand during peak use periods
• Charging electric vehicles overnight

With fundamental changes occurring in how energy is generated, the availability of renewable power during low or no-sun periods and lower wind levels will require utilities to alter their energy consumption models.

Utilizing Government Support of New Electric Infrastructure
With the proposed government infusion of funds, including a rule to boost renewable transmission, to build and modernize infrastructures, utility leaders will be ideally positioned to drastically improve the reliability of the US electric grid.

Utilities will be involved in aggressive transmission line building projects to ensure the effective distribution of energy across multiple state lines, aligning with the U.S. grid overhaul for renewables underway today. This expansive build out of the US transmission and distribution system will create a dramatic increase in the need to accurately document the location and details of the new utility assets for current tracking and future analysis needs.

Energy leaders must seek advanced technology to provide them with solutions for precisely this purpose. Manual, paper-based field data collection must be replaced with digital workflows which automate and simplify asset data capture and analysis. Continued reliance on manual methods will cause them to lag behind the industry and impede their ability to support renewable energy for the modern era.

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Chinese EV Makers in Europe target the EU market with electric SUVs, battery swapping, competitive pricing, and subsidies, led by NIO, Xpeng, MG, and BYD, starting in Norway amid Europe's zero-emissions push.

Key Points

Chinese EV makers expanding into EU markets with tech, pricing, and lean retail to gain share.

✅ Early launches in Norway leverage EV incentives

✅ Compete via battery swapping, OTA tech, and price

✅ Mix of importers, online sales, and lean dealerships

China's electric carmakers are darting into Europe, hoping to catch traditional auto giants cold and seize a slice of a market supercharged by the continent's EV transition towards zero emissions.

Nio Inc (NIO.N), among a small group of challengers, launches its ES8 electric SUV in Oslo on Thursday - the first foray outside China for a company that is virtually unheard of in Europe even though it's valued at about $57 billion.

Other brands unfamiliar to many Europeans that have started selling or plan to sell cars on the continent include Aiways, BYD's (002594.SZ) Tang, SAIC's (600104.SS) MG, Dongfeng's VOYAH, and Great Wall's (601633.SS) ORA.

Yet Europe, a crowded, competitive car market dominated by famous brands, has proved elusive for Chinese carmakers in the past. They made strategic slips and also contended with a perception that China, long associated with cheap mass-production, could not compete on quality.

Indeed, Nio Chief Executive William Li told Reuters he foresees a long road to success in a mature market where it is "very difficult to be successful".

Chinese carmakers may need up to a decade to "gain a firm foothold" in Europe, the billionaire entrepreneur said - a forecast echoed by He Xiaopeng, CEO of electric vehicle (EV) maker Xpeng (9868.HK) who told Reuters his company needs 10 years "to lay a good foundation" on the continent.

These new players, many of which have only ever made electric vehicles, believe they have a window of opportunity to finally crack the lucrative market.

While electric car sales in the European Union more than doubled last year and jumped 130% in the first half of this year, even as threats to the EV boom persist, traditional manufacturers are still gradually shifting their large vehicle ranges over to electric and have yet to flood the thirsty market with models.

"The market is not that busy yet, if you compare it with combustion-engine models where each of the major carmakers has a whole range of vehicles," said Alexander Klose, who heads the foreign operations of Chinese electric vehicle maker Aiways.

"That is where we think we have an opportunity," he added on a drive around Munich in a U5, a crossover SUV on sale in Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France, where new EV rules are aimed at discouraging purchases of Chinese models.

The U5 starts at 30,000 euros ($35,000) in Germany - below the average new car price and most local EV prices - before factoring in 9,000 euros in EV subsidies, though France's EV incentives have tightened for Chinese models - and comes in just four colours and two trim levels to minimize costs.

'GERMAN PEOPLE BUY GERMAN CARS'
As Chinese carmakers gear up to enter Europe, they are trying out different business models, from relying on importers, low-cost retail options or building up more traditional dealerships.

The new reality that top Western carmakers like BMW (BMWG.DE) and Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) now produce cars in technological powerhouse China, where the EV market is intensely competitive, has likely undermined past perceptions of low quality workmanship - though they can be hard to shake.

Antje Levers, a teacher who lives in western Germany near the Dutch border, and her husband owned a diesel Chevrolet Orlando but wanted a greener option. They bought an Aiways U5 last year after plenty of research to fend off criticism for not buying local, and loves its handling and low running costs.

She said people had told her: "You can't buy a Chinese car, they're plastic and cheap and do not support German jobs." But she feels that is no longer true in a global car industry where you find German auto parts in Chinese cars and vice versa.

"German people buy German cars, so to buy a Chinese car you need to have a little courage," the 47-year-old added. "Sometimes you just have to be open for new things."

NIO LANDS IN NORWAY WITH NOMI
Nio launches its ES8 electric SUV alongside a NIO House - part-showroom, part-cafe and workspace for customers in the capital of Norway, a country that's also the initial base for Xpeng.

Norwegian state support for EVs has put the country at the forefront of the shift to electric. It makes sense as a European entry point because customers are used to electric vehicles so only have to be sold on an unknown Chinese brand, said Christina Bu, secretary general of the Norwegian EV Association.

"If you go to another European country you may struggle to sell both," said Bu, adding that her organisation has talked extensively with a number of Chinese EV makers keen to learn market specifics and consumer culture before launching there.

She is uncertain, though, how consumers will react to Nio's approach of swapping out batteries for customers rather than stopping to charge them, a contrast to other EV battery strategies in the industry, or the carmaker's strategy of leasing rather than selling batteries to customers.

"But where the Chinese are really at the forefront is the technology," she added, referring in particular to Nomi, the digital assistant in the dashboard of Nio's cars.

NEWCOMERS' STRATEGIES DIVERGE
One size does not fit all. While Nio and Xpeng have been hiring staff building up their organizations in Norway, SAIC's MG works through a car importer to sell cars in a handful of European markets.

Aiways is trying an lower-cost approach to selling cars in Europe, though Klose says it varies by market.

In Germany, for instance, the company sells its cars through Euronics, an association of independent electronics retailers, rather than building traditional dealerships.

It aims to sell across the EU by next year and to enter the U.S. market by 2023, said Klose, a former Volvo and Ford executive.

Past failed attempts by Chinese carmakers to conquer Europe are unlikely to hurt Chinese EV makers today, as consumers have grown accustomed to electronics coming from China, he added.

Such failures included Brilliance in 2007, whose vehicle received one out of five stars in a German car crash test, damaging the brand.

"The fact there are more Chinese carmakers entering the market will also help us, as it will make Chinese brands more accepted by consumers," Klose said.

Selling cars to Europeans is a "tough business, especially if your product isn't well known," said Arnie Richters, chairman of Brussels-based industry group Platform for Electromobility.

"But if they bring a lot of innovation they have a lot of opportunity."

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U.S. EV Manufacturing Expansion accelerates decarbonization as Ford and SK Innovation invest in lithium-ion batteries and truck assembly in Tennessee and Kentucky, building new factories, jobs, and supply chain infrastructure in right-to-work states.

Key Points

A rapid scale-up of U.S. electric vehicle production, battery plants, and assembly lines fueled by major investments.

✅ Ford and SK build battery and truck plants by 2025

✅ $11.4B investment, 11,000 jobs in TN and KY

✅ Right-to-work context reshapes union dynamics

One theme of this newsletter is that the world’s physical infrastructure will have to massively change if we want to decarbonize the economy by 2050, which the United Nations has said is necessary to avoid the worst effects of the climate crisis. This won’t be as simple as passing a carbon tax or a clean-electricity mandate: Wires will have to be strung as the power grid expands; solar farms will have to be erected; industries will have to be remade. And although that kind of change can be orchestrated only by the government (hence the importance of the infrastructure bills in Congress), consumers and companies will ultimately do most of the work to make it happen.

Take electric cars, for instance. An electric car is an expensive, highly specialized piece of technology, but building one takes even more expensive, specialized technology—tools that tend to be custom-made, large and heavy, and spread across a factory or the world. And if you want those tools to produce a car in a few years, you have to start planning now, as the EV timeline accelerates ahead.

That’s exactly what Ford is doing: Last night, the automaker and SK Innovation, a South Korean battery manufacturer, announced that they were spending $11.4 billion to build two new multi-factory centers in Tennessee and Kentucky that are scheduled to begin production in 2025. The facilities, which will hire a combined 11,000 employees, will manufacture EV batteries and assemble electric F-series pickup trucks. While Ford already has several factories in Kentucky, this will be its first plant in Tennessee in six decades. The 3,600-acre Tennessee facility, located an hour outside Memphis, will be Ford’s largest campus ever—and its first new American vehicle-assembly plant in decades.

The politics of this announcement are worth dwelling on. Ford and SK Innovation were lured to Tennessee with $500 million in incentives; Kentucky gave them $300 million and more than 1,500 acres of free land. Ford’s workers in Detroit have historically been unionized—and, indeed, a source of power in the national labor movement. But with these new factories, Ford is edging into a more anti-union environment: Both Tennessee and Kentucky are right-to-work states, meaning that local laws prevent unions from requiring that only unionized employees work in a certain facility. In an interview, Jim Farley, Ford’s CEO, played coy about whether either factory will be unionized. (Last week, the company announced that it was investing $250 million, a comparative pittance, to expand EV production at its unionized Michigan facilities.)

That news might depress those on the left who hope that old-school unions, such as the United Auto Workers, can enjoy the benefits of electrification. But you can see the outline of a potential political bargain here. Climate-concerned Democrats get to see EV production expand in the U.S., creating opportunities for Canada to capitalize as supply chains shift, while climate-wary Republicans get to add jobs in their home states. (And unions get shafted.) Whether that bargain can successfully grow support for more federal climate policy, further accelerating the financial-political-technological feedback loop that I’ve dubbed “the green vortex,” remains to be seen.

Read: How the U.S. made progress on climate change without ever passing a bill

More important than the announcement is what it portends. In the past, environmentalists have complained that even when the law has required that automakers make climate-friendly cars, they haven’t treated them as a major product. It’s easy to tune out climate-friendly announcements as so much corporate greenwashing, amid recurring EV hype, but Ford’s two new factories represent real money: The automaker’s share of the investment exceeds its 2019 annual earnings. This investment is sufficiently large that Ford will treat EVs as a serious business line.

And if you look around globally, you’ll see that Ford isn’t alone. EVs are no longer the neglected stepchild of the global car industry. Here are some recent headlines:

Nine percent of new cars sold globally this year will be EVs or plug-in hybrids, according to S&P Global. That’s up from 3 percent two years ago, a staggering, iPhone-like rise.

GM, Ford, Volkswagen, Toyota, BMW, and the parent company of Fiat-Chrysler have all pledged that by 2030, at least 40 percent of their new cars worldwide will run on a non-gasoline source, and there is scope for Canada-U.S. collaboration as companies turn to electric cars. A few years ago, the standard forecast was that half of new cars sold in the U.S. would be electric by 2050. That timeline has moved up significantly not only in America, but around the world. (In fact, counter to its high-tech self-image, America is the laggard in this global transition. The two largest markets for EVs worldwide are China and the European Union.)

More remarkably (and importantly), automakers are spending like they actually believe that goal: The auto industry as a whole will pump more than $500 billion into EV investment by 2030, and new assembly deals are putting Canada in the race. Ford’s investment in these two plants represents less than a third of its planned total $30 billion investment in EV production by 2025, and that’s relatively small compared with its peers’. Volkswagen has announced more than $60 billion in investment. Honda has committed $46 billion.

Norway could phase out gas cars ahead of schedule. The country has one of the world’s most robust pro-EV policies, and it is still outperforming its own mandates. In the most recent accounting period, eight out of 10 cars had some sort of electric drivetrain. If the current trend holds, Norway would sell its last gas car in April of next year—and while I doubt the demise will be that steep, consumer preferences are running well ahead of its schedule to ban new gas-car sales by 2025.

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Michigan Distributed Energy Cap Repeal advances a bipartisan bill to boost rooftop solar and net metering, countering DTE and Consumers Energy claims, expanding energy freedom, jobs, and climate resilience across investor-owned utility territories.

Key Points

A Michigan bill to remove the 1% distributed energy cap, expanding rooftop solar, net metering, and clean energy jobs.

✅ Removes 1% distributed generation cap statewide

✅ Supports rooftop solar, net metering, and job growth

✅ Counters utility cost-shift claims with updated tariffs

A bipartisan group of Michigan lawmakers has introduced legislation to eliminate a 1% cap on distributed energy in the state’s investor-owned utility territories.

It’s the third time in recent years that such legislation has been introduced. Though utilities and their political allies have successfully blocked it to date, through tactics some critics say reflect utilities tilting the solar market by incumbents, advocates see an opportunity with a change in state Republican caucus leadership and Michigan’s burgeoning solar industry approaching the cap in some utility territories.

The bill also has support from a broad swath of legislators for reasons having to do with job creation, energy freedom and the environment, amid broader debates over states' push for renewables and affordability. Already the bill has received multiple hearings, even as DTE Energy and Consumers Energy, Michigan’s largest private utilities, are ramping up attacks in an effort to block the bill. 

“It’s going to be vehemently opposed by the utilities but there are only benefits to this if you are anybody but DTE,” said Democratic state Rep. Yousef Rabhi, who cosigned HB 4236 and has helped draft language in previous bills. “If we remove the cap, then we’re putting the public’s interest first, and we’re putting DTE’s interest first if we keep the cap in place.” 

The Michigan Legislature enacted the cap as part of a sweeping 2016 energy bill that clean energy advocates say included a number of provisions that have kneecapped the small-scale distributed energy industry, particularly home solar. The law caps distributed energy production at 1% of a utility’s average in-state peak load for the past five years. 

Republicans have controlled the Legislature and committees since the law was enacted, amid parallel moves such as the Wyoming clean energy bill in another state, and previous attempts to cut the language haven’t received House committee hearings. However, former Republican House leader Lee Chatfield has been replaced, and already the new bill, introduced by Republican state Rep. Gregory Markkanen, the energy committee’s vice chair, has had two hearings. 

Previous attempts to cut the language were also a part of a larger package of bills, and this time around the bill is a standalone. The legislation is also moving as Consumers and Upper Peninsula Power Co. have voluntarily doubled their cap to two percent, which advocates say highlights the need to repeal the cap . 

Rabhi said there’s bipartisan support because many conservatives and progressives view it as an infringement on customers’ energy freedom since the cap will eventually effectively prohibit new distributed energy generation. Legislators say the existing law kills jobs because it severely limits the clean energy industry’s growth, and Rabhi said he’s also strongly motivated by increasing renewable energy production to address climate change. 

In February, Michigan Public Service Commission Chairman Dan Scripps testified to the House committee, with observers also pointing to FERC action on aggregated DERs as relevant context, that the commission is “supportive in taking steps to ensure solar developers in Michigan are able to continue operating and thus support in concept the idea of lifting or eliminating the cap” in order to protect the home solar industry. 

The state’s solar industry has long criticized the cap, and removing it is a “no brainer,” said Dave Strenski, executive director of Solar Ypsi, which promotes rooftop solar in Ypsilanti. 

“If they have a cap and we reach that cap, then rooftop solar is shut down in Michigan,” he said. “The utilities don’t mind solar as long as they own it, and that’s what it boils down to.”  

The state’s utilities see the situation differently. Spokespeople for DTE and Consumers told the Energy News Network that lifting the cap would shift the cost burden of maintaining their territory-wide infrastructure from all customers to low income customers who can’t afford to install solar panels, often invoking reliability examples such as California's reliance on fossil generation to justify caution.

The bill “doesn’t address the subsidy certain customers are paid at the expense of those who cannot afford to put solar panels on their homes,” said Katie Carey, Consumers Energy’s spokesperson. 

However, clean energy advocates argue that studies have found that to be untrue. And even if it were true, Rabhi said, the utilities told lawmakers in 2016 that a new inflow/outflow tariff that the companies successfully pushed for to replace net metering dramatically reduced compensation for home solar users and would address that inequality. 

“DTE’s and Consumers’ own argument is that by making that change, distributed generation is no longer a ‘burden’ on low income customers, so now we have inflow/outflow and the problem should be solved,” Rabhi said. 

He added that claims that DTE and Consumers are looking out for low-income customers are disingenuous because they have repeatedly fought larger allowances for programs that help those customers, and refuse to “dip into their massive corporate profits and make sure poor people don’t have to pay as much for electricity.”

“I don’t want to hear a sob story from DTE about how putting solar panels on the house is going to hurt poor people,” he said. “That is entirely the definition of hypocrisy — that’s the utilities using poor people as a pawn and that’s why people are sick of these corporations.” 

The companies have already begun their public relations attack designed to help thwart the bill. DTE and Consumers spread money generously among Republicans and Democrats in the Legislature each cycle, and the two companies’ dark money nonprofits launched a round of ads targeting Democratic lawmakers, reflecting the broader solar wars playing out nationally. Several sit on the House Energy Committee, which must approve the bill before it can go in front of the full Legislature. 

The DTE-backed Alliance For Michigan Power and Consumers Energy-funded Citizens Energizing Michigan’s Economy have purchased dozens of Facebook ads alluding to action by the legislators, though there hasn’t been a vote. 

Facebook ads aren’t uncommon as they get “bang for their buck,” said Matt Kasper, research director with utility industry watchdog Energy And Policy Institute. Already hundreds of thousands of people have potentially viewed the ads and the groups have only spent thousands of dollars. The ads are likely designed to get Facebook users to interact with the legislators on the issue, Kasper said, even if there’s little information in the ad, and the info in the ad that does exist is highly misleading.

DTE and Consumers spokespersons declined to comment on the spending and directed questions to the dark money nonprofits. No one there could be reached for comment.

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Canada Offshore Wind Amendments streamline offshore energy regulators in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador, enabling green hydrogen, submerged land licences, regional assessments, MPAs standards, while raising fisheries compensation, navigation, and Indigenous consultation considerations.

Key Points

Reforms assign offshore wind to joint regulators, enable seabed licensing, and address fisheries and Indigenous issues.

✅ Assigns wind oversight to Canada-NS and Canada-NL offshore regulators

✅ Introduces single submerged land licence and regional assessments

✅ Addresses fisheries, navigation, MPAs, and Indigenous consultation

Canada's offshore accords with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador are being updated to promote development of offshore wind farms, but it's not clear yet whether any compensation will be paid to fishermen displaced by wind farms.

Amendments introduced Tuesday in Ottawa by the federal government assign regulatory authority for wind power to jointly managed offshore boards — now renamed the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Energy Regulator and Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Energy Regulator.

Previously the boards regulated only offshore oil and gas projects.

The industry association promoting offshore wind development, Marine Renewables Canada, called the changes a crucial step.

"The tabling of the accord act amendments marks the beginning of, really, a new industry, one that can play a significant role in our clean energy future," said  Lisen Bassett, a spokesperson for Marine Renewables Canada. 

Nova Scotia's lone member of the federal cabinet, Immigration Minister Sean Fraser, also talked up prospects at a news conference in Ottawa.

'We have lots of water'

"The potential that we have, particularly when it comes to offshore wind and hydrogen is extraordinary," said Fraser.

"There are real projects, like Vineyard Wind, with real investors talking about real jobs."

Sharing the stage with assembled Liberal MPs from Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador was Nova Scotia Environment Minister Tim Halman, representing a Progressive Conservative government in Halifax.

"If you've ever visited us or Newfoundland, you know we have lots of water, you know we have lots of wind, and we're gearing up to take advantage of those natural resources in a clean, sustainable way. We're paving the way for projects such as offshore wind, tidal energy in Nova Scotia, and green hydrogen production," said Halman.

Before a call for bids is issued, authorities will identify areas suitable for development, conservation or fishing.

The legislation does not outline compensation to fishermen excluded from offshore areas because of wind farm approvals.

Regional assessments

Federal officials said potential conflicts can be addressed in regional assessments underway in both provinces.

Minister of Natural Resources of Canada Jonathan Wilkinson said fisheries and navigation issues will have to be dealt with.

"Those are things that will have to be addressed in the context of each potential project. But the idea is obviously to ensure that those impacts are not significant," Wilkinson said.

Speaking after the event, Christine Bonnell-Eisnor, chair of what is still called the Canada Nova Scotia Offshore Petroleum Board, said what compensation — if any — will be paid to fishermen has yet to be determined.

"It is a question that we're asking as well. Governments are setting the policy and what terms and conditions would be associated with a sea bed licence. That is a question governments are working on and what compensation would look like for fishers."

Scott Tessier, who chairs  the Newfoundland Board, added "the experience has been the same next door in Nova Scotia, the petroleum sector and the fishing sector have an excellent history of cooperation and communication and I don't expect it look any different for offshore renewable energy projects."

Nova Scotia in a hurry to get going

The legislation says the offshore regulator would promote compensation schemes developed by industry and fishing groups linked to fishing gear.

Nova Scotia is in a hurry to get going.

The Houston government has set a target of issuing five gigawatts of licences for offshore wind by 2030, with leasing starting in 2025, reflecting momentum in the U.S. offshore wind market as well. It is intended largely for green hydrogen production. That's almost twice the province's peak electricity demand in winter, which is 2.2 gigawatts.

The amendments will streamline seabed approvals by creating a single "submerged land" licence, echoing B.C.'s streamlined process for clean energy projects, instead of the exploration, significant discovery and production licences used for petroleum development.

Federal and provincial ministers will issue calls for bids and approve licences, akin to BOEM lease requests seen in the U.S. market.

The amendments will ensure Marine Protected Area's  (MPAs) standards apply in all offshore areas governed by the regulations.

Marine protected areas

Wilkinson suggested, but declined, three times to explicitly state that offshore wind farms would be excluded from within Marine Protected Areas.

After this story was initially published on Tuesday, Natural Resources Canada sent CBC a statement indicating offshore wind farms may be permitted inside MPAs.

Spokesperson Barre Campbell noted that all MPAs established in Canada after April 25, 2019, will be subject to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans new standards that prohibit key industrial activities, including oil and gas exploration, development and production.

"Offshore renewable energy activities and infrastructure are not key industrial activities," Campbell said in a statement.

"Other activities may be prohibited, however, if they are not consistent with the conservation objectives that are established by the relevant department that has or that will establish a marine protected area."

Federal impact assessment process

The new federal impact assessment process will apply in offshore energy development, and recent legal rulings such as the Cornwall wind farm decision highlight how courts can influence project timelines.

For petroleum projects, future significant discovery licences will be limited to 25 years replacing the current indefinite term.

Existing significant discovery licences have been an ongoing exception and are not subject to the 25-year limit. Both offshore energy regulators will be given the authority to fulfil the Crown's duty to consult with Indigenous peoples

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