While federal support in the U.S. takes active steps against renewables within the current administration, Canada has made it clear that it is 100 percent committed to ensuring wind, solar, and battery storage are a vital part of its energy infrastructure.
Programs, policies, and incentives have become essential tools that have allowed Canada to be a leader in renewable energy production.
“I think that Canada is open for business in this space, and I think that we are a reliable, stable, and welcoming trading partner,” said Vittoria Bellissimo, president and CEO of the Canadian Renewable Energy Association (CanREA). “We run a conference that we call Clean Power Finance Canada. We ran it in May in Toronto of this year. One of the lessons we learned from that conference is that capital that’s been based in the U.S. and interested in the U.S. market is now very interested in the Canadian market.
That’s a really good news story. We have procurements that are running across Canada. We have a procurement calendar that’s tracking 24 GW of projects coast-to-coast. We have clean technology. We’ve got a whole suite of investment tax credits that look very stable, and we’ve got options for Indigenous equity financing and long-term procurement contracts. We’re hard at work to make ourselves as open for business as we can be.”
Canada stats
The increasing numbers along the Canadian renewables landscape would seem to back up that declaration.
Canada closed 2025 with about 25 GW of installed wind, solar, and energy storage capacity, according to Bellissimo.
“That included about 19 GW of wind,” she said. “2025 was a bit of a quieter year for wind, but a very active year for storage, which was exciting for us. Energy storage was the standout story in Canada, growing more than 500 MW, which sounds small to an American but is large to a Canadian, and it was led by battery storage procurement in Ontario and battery storage facilities coming online in Ontario.”
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what Canada has accomplished, according to Bellissimo. Some of the projects in the works or in operation around Canada include:
Ontario secured 1,115 MW of new wind and solar through the first energy window of its LT2 procurement. That included 200 MW of wind. The average levelized cost of the 13 wind and solar projects was about $89/MWh.
In British Columbia, there was a 2025 call for power that resulted in four projects totaling 1,158 MW. Each of the projects included 51 percent Indigenous equity, which helps put Canada on a path to economic reconciliation. Going further back in British Columbia to 2024, a call to power included nine wind projects and one solar project. Overall, that’s more than 1.3 GW of wind. The average levelized cost was $74/MWh.
There are several projects in the works in Quebec. The target in its provincial integrated resource plan is 10 GW by 2035. Currently, there are projects under construction with an energy target of 964 MW.
In Nova Scotia, there are 168 MW of wind under construction.
“It’s a coast-to-coast story,” Bellissimo said. “We’ve got lots of projects. We’ve got procurement windows opening up, and I’m bullish on wind energy in Canada.”
Investment tax credits
Much of the renewable energy incentive is due to Canada’s investment tax credits (ITCs), which have been an effective endeavor in advancing Canada’s energy needs, according to Bellissimo.
“With the Clean Electricity ITC now law, Canada finally has a complete, stable, multi-year federal incentive framework that runs to 2034, and it gives developers the long-term certainty they need to plan projects,” she said. “The credits are effective on paper and increasingly more so in practice as the federal government works to build out CRA processing capacity with faster, more predictable turnarounds. I think it will be really helpful in fully unlocking the impact of ITCs on the ground.”
As part of Canada’s overall energy-creating spectrum, Bellissimo emphasized that what makes renewables a smart energy choice — in addition to its green power
advantage — is that projects can be planned, built, and operating in a relatively short amount of time compared to other options, such as nuclear.
“Wind, solar, and energy storage remain Canada’s fastest new electricity projects to build,” she said. “Two to three years from contract to operation vs. a decade or more for some alternatives. That speed advantage is very real. There’s an impressive cost advantage, well below the cost of other technologies.”
Complete energy package
Bellissimo pointed out that renewables are meant to be a part of a complete energy package, but the advantage, as well as the affordability, are valid reasons to consider going green.
“CanREA’s position is that it isn’t a zero-sum choice between nuclear and renewables; Canada needs all new supply, and it needs all the new supply it can build as fast as it can build it — wind, solar, and storage remain the fastest technologies to deploy,” she said. “I firmly believe that affordability is king. When you ask customers what they want, affordable always comes first, and the numbers clearly make the case that wind, solar, and storage are the most affordable types of new electricity projects in the world today. If you look at Lazard’s latest Levelized Cost of Energy analysis, that puts nuclear — in U.S. dollars — at $175 to $255/MWh compared with onshore wind at $37 to $99/MWh or utility-scale solar at $40 to $98/MWh. Every decision maker in this sector needs to have those numbers in front of them when they look at what they’re building for the future.”
CanREA’s numbers also mirror those estimates, according to Bellissimo.
“CanREA’s own cost analysis has a similar conclusion for Canada with a build-out that maximizes wind, solar, and storage alongside other supply options,” she said. “A household electricity bill increases far more than a system without them, so we can build nuclear, but we’re going to want to build more wind, solar, and storage along with it.”
A surprising effect of the U.S.’s recent tariff war with Canada and the rest of the world has been that these belligerent policies have actually had a positive outcome when it comes to Canadian renewables, according to Bellissimo.
“One of the things that has come out of the U.S. tariffs is the desire from Canada to be its own best customer,” she said. “What came out of that is a tariff that the Canadian government put on steel-derivative products, including wind-turbine towers. It’s a measure that was put in place publicly to try to encourage consumption of the one domestic wind-tower manufacturer products. We’re certainly trying to build robust, resilient supply chains, so we’re going to need a lot of different product markets. It’s a big country, so we’re going to need wind-turbine towers that are accessible all across the country, and we’re building out fast.”
CanREA’s four pillars
To its credit — and purpose — CanREA is working hard across the renewables spectrum with an outline of four pillars to aid in building projects faster, as well as adding more projects than ever before, according to Bellissimo. The first one is policy and regulatory.
“You probably hear about this a lot,” she said. “It’s everything from land use and permitting to environmental and wildlife approvals, municipal requirements, crown land policy, transmission policy, and interconnections to the electricity system. All of these need attention in order to enable project delivery. Developers need visibility on grid capacity, costs, and timelines before they bid in procurements, not afterwards. We’re making progress in some jurisdictions more than others across Canada, but there’s a lot of work to be done in this area.”
Public and community support make up the second pillar, according to Bellissimo.
“This includes project hosting or, as my colleagues like to say, it’s a volunteer sport,” she said. “We have a great story to tell in the Canadian renewable sector, and we need to keep telling it. Landowners and communities that have benefited from these projects certainly need to tell it as well. We are leaning into public engagement. We want to spend more time talking with people about the electricity they use and why wind, solar, and energy storage are essential systems that we’re building in Canada and beyond. That conversation matters. When people understand the system, they’re more likely to support the decisions that make it work.”
Pillar three is the supply chain, according to Bellissimo.
“Project delivery is absolutely dependent on access to reliable, robust, and resilient supply chains,” she said. “Our federal government has stated time and time again that we’re going to be our own best customer. There is interest in using Canadian products and services in our projects. Electricity systems are growing everywhere — you hear this probably all the time and not just in Canada. Canada needs to compete globally for components, so we need to be very, very strategic with our approach to supply chains going forward.”
To that end, Bellissimo said the workforce is also a valid concern being addressed by CanREA.
“We have a workforce initiative, and the federal government has put some effort into building better workforces and building better training programs,” she said. “We don’t want to end up in an environment where we don’t have the human power to power the electricity systems we need.”
The fourth and final pillar, according to Bellissimo, involves financing, procurement, and Indigenous prosperity.
“We really do need to come up with reasonable procurement roadmaps and better risk sharing and equal access to capital,” she said. “There’s a lot of good news stories when it comes to Indigenous partners coming to the table in these projects, but I just don’t think we’re all the way there yet. We are certainly working well with all of the entities in this space, and we’re trying to ensure that there is access to equity early on in the project life cycle so that Indigenous groups can participate in these projects. It’s been a really nice story for economic reconciliation.”
Room for improvement
However, Bellissimo said there are still some kinks to be worked out when it comes to Canada’s renewables sector.
“It’s not perfect; nothing ever is,” she said. “There’s certainly some work that needs to be done on ensuring there’s access to equity earlier in the project life cycle so that IPP partners don’t have to step in and figure out a way to finance the beginning phases. But, it’s getting better, and you’re seeing new, exciting projects announced all the time.”
Across the Canadian landscape, good-news stories about the benefits of renewables are part of practically every province. There are exceptions, of course, but even those hopefully will be temporary, according to Bellissimo.
“You’ve probably heard about Alberta,” she said. “It’s my home province, and it’s certainly not a very good news story on the renewables front right now. I’m bullish on energy storage for Alberta in the short to medium term. I think there will be opportunities for hybrid projects — solar plus storage. And as people become more comfortable with the market, there’ll be more opportunities. But the right kind of decision-making from policymakers in the electricity space right now is to get as much electricity as possible and get it as low-cost as possible. From that perspective, wind, solar, and storage should be the first three technologies in your lineup.”
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