Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2675 actions· ✨ 91 recent

The Canada Infrastructure Bank committed CAD 54 million in equity loans under its Indigenous Equity Initiative to support First Nations ownership stakes in the Wasoqonatl Reliability Intertie, a 160-kilometre, 345-kV transmission line running parallel to the existing Onslow, Nova Scotia-to-Salisbury, New Brunswick connection. CAD 36 million goes to Wskijinu'k Mtmo'taqnuow Agency Limited, giving Nova Scotia's 13 Mi'kmaw First Nations an equity stake, and CAD 18 million to MUIN Transmission Limited Partnership, giving New Brunswick Mi'gmaq First Nations their first ownership position in a large-scale clean-energy project. The new financing brings CIB's total commitment to the Wasoqonatl project to CAD 285 million.

On 15 January 2026, Canada Growth Fund Inc. (CGF), a CAD 15bn federal Crown investment vehicle, announced it will lead an up to US$85 million structured financing for Mangrove Water Technologies Ltd. (Mangrove Lithium), a British Columbia-based lithium refiner. CGF's own commitment is up to US$65 million, alongside continued participation from existing investors Breakthrough Energy Ventures and BMW i Ventures; the CGF tranche closed concurrently with a separate CAD 9 million loan from National Bank of Canada backed by the federal Clean Technology Manufacturing Investment Tax Credit. Proceeds commission Mangrove's 1,000-tonne-per-annum Single Stack Plant in Delta, BC and advance development of a planned 20,000-tonne-per-year full-scale plant, with the government citing the deal as reducing reliance on overseas lithium processing and building an onshore mining-to-refining supply chain.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank provided a CAD 42 million (approx. USD 30.7 million) repayable loan to George Gordon Development Limited (GGDL), the economic-development arm of George Gordon First Nation, to fund the Wicehtowak Solar project — a 32.4 MW solar facility in the Rural Municipality of Dufferin, Saskatchewan. The loan enables GGFN to acquire full ownership of the project, which will supply Saskatchewan's grid under a 30-year virtual power purchase agreement with SaskPower and deliver power directly to the adjacent K+S Potash Canada mine. Natural Resources Canada separately provided a CAD 33 million grant under the Smart Renewables Electrification Pathways Program toward the same project.

Natural Resources Canada's Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, Tim Hodgson, announced on 31 October 2025 conditional approval of up to CAD 14,062,500 (USD ~10.0M) in non-repayable federal funding for Focus Graphite Inc. under NRCan's Global Partnerships Initiative, part of the G7 Critical Minerals Action Plan's first tranche of 26 investments and partnerships. Focus Graphite executed the funding agreement on 8 December 2025. The grant covers approximately 73.6% of eligible project costs for a commercial-scale electrothermal fluidized-bed purification demonstration plant converting Quebec natural flake graphite (from the Lac Knife and Lac Tétépisca deposits) into ultra-high-purity battery-anode and advanced materials, with Focus Graphite contributing the remaining CAD 4.79M cash plus CAD 250K in-kind. Eligible expenditures run 14 October 2025 to 31 March 2028.

Natural Resources Canada's Minister of Energy and Natural Resources, Tim Hodgson, announced on 31 October 2025 conditional approval of up to CAD 36.3 million (USD ~25.8M) in Government of Canada funding for Ucore Rare Metals Inc.'s "Pathway to Samarium and Gadolinium Security" project, part of the first tranche of 26 investments and partnerships under the G7 Critical Minerals Action Plan. The package comprises up to CAD 26.3 million in non-repayable contributions from NRCan's Global Partnerships Initiative (GPI) and up to CAD 10 million from the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario). Funding will scale up a commercial-scale RapidSX(TM) separation facility in Kingston, Ontario, intended to be the first dedicated samarium and gadolinium oxide production plant in North America, supporting samarium-cobalt magnet production for defence and other applications. Funding remains subject to due diligence and a Contribution Agreement.

The Government of Canada and the Province of Manitoba jointly launched the Climate and Economy Solutions Program (CESP), providing up to CAD 23 million (~USD 16.4 million) in grants for cost- and emissions-reducing energy projects in the province. The program is funded primarily through Canada's Low Carbon Economy Fund (Recapitalized Low Carbon Economy Leadership Fund), topped up with roughly CAD 4.5 million from the provincial government, and is administered by Manitoba Environment and Climate Change. Eligible grant recipients include municipalities, Northern Affairs communities, Indigenous communities, multi-unit residential building operators, and businesses/not-for-profits partnering with those entities, for stationary-equipment retrofit and efficiency projects, industrial/commercial vehicle retrofits, self-generated renewable energy and fuel-production projects, and EV-charger installations. The initial application window closed December 1, 2025.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank reached financial close on a CAD 660 million (approx. USD 473 million) loan to Irving Pulp & Paper to support "Project NextGen," a CAD 1.5 billion modernization of the company's Kraft pulp mill in west Saint John, New Brunswick — the largest investment in the Canadian forest products industry since 1993. The financing replaces 1970s-era recovery-boiler and steam-turbine technology, adds up to 145 MW of renewable generation capacity (50 MW for mill use, the remainder exported to the provincial grid), and is projected to cut emissions per tonne of Kraft pulp by 50% while eliminating heavy-fuel-oil combustion.

The Government of Canada announced CAD 16.5 million in cumulative federal funding (CAD 13.5 million newly announced, on top of an earlier CAD 3 million tranche) for the Kluane N'tsi (Lhù'ààn Mân N'tsi) Wind Energy Project, an Indigenous-owned 900-kW wind turbine with battery storage integrated into the diesel grid serving Burwash Landing and Destruction Bay, Yukon. Funding is drawn from three federal programs — Natural Resources Canada's Clean Energy for Rural and Remote Communities program (~CAD 13 million), Housing, Infrastructure and Communities Canada's Arctic Energy Fund (CAD 2 million), and Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs Canada's Northern REACHE program (CAD 1.5 million) — with the Government of Yukon contributing a further ~CAD 2 million. The project allows the Kluane First Nation to operate the community diesel grid in "diesel-off" mode when wind generation is sufficient, the first grid-scale project in Canada to do so, cutting diesel use by roughly 300,000 litres per year.

Invest Ontario, the Government of Ontario's investment-attraction agency, signed a non-binding term sheet to provide up to CAD 17.5 million (~USD 12.7 million) in state loan support to Electra Battery Materials Corporation toward its ~CAD 100 million project to build what the company describes as North America's first cobalt sulfate refinery, at Temiskaming Shores, Ontario. The funding is explicitly conditional on the parties reaching a definitive agreement and is intended to reduce reliance on foreign-controlled (principally Chinese) cobalt-refining capacity for EV and energy-storage battery supply chains.

On 29 July 2025, the Government of British Columbia signed a CAD 200 (USD 144.9) million contribution agreement with Haisla Nation to fund the electrification infrastructure needed to run the Cedar LNG export terminal near Kitimat on clean B.C. grid power rather than on-site natural gas. The funding covers a new 287-kilovolt transmission line, a new substation, new distribution lines, and nearshore electrification, and adds to CAD 200 million in federal support for the facility announced earlier in 2025. Cedar LNG is a floating LNG terminal jointly owned by Haisla Nation and Pembina Pipeline Corporation, scheduled to begin operations in late 2028.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank closed a CAD 24 million (approx. USD 18 million) loan to the Onimiskiw Opitciwan Limited Partnership, owned by the Atikamekw of Opitciwan First Nation in Northern Quebec, to build and operate a 4.8-megawatt biomass cogeneration facility. The plant will burn bark, sawdust and woodchips from an adjacent sawmill to generate electricity and process steam, displacing an estimated 4.6 million litres of diesel per year and cutting over 11,000 tonnes of emissions annually for the remote, diesel-dependent community of 2,500 people.

On 22 July 2025 the Government of Quebec, via Investissement Québec, announced a CAD 145 million (~USD 106 million) capital injection into Groupe Océan, a Quebec-based shipbuilding, harbour-towing and dredging firm. The package comprises CAD 75 million in preferred shares from the Quebec government plus CAD 34 million from the Fund for the Growth of Quebec Businesses and CAD 36 million from Investissement Québec's own equity funds. The stated purpose is to expand Groupe Océan's shipyards (Quebec City and L'Isle-aux-Coudres), preserve its head office and ~1,120 jobs in Quebec, and position the firm to win work under Canada's federal National Shipbuilding Strategy.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank committed a CAD 50 million (approx. USD 36.5 million) loan to Creative Energy, an operator of district energy systems, to finance deep-decarbonization building-retrofit projects in British Columbia and Ontario. The financing is part of CIB's Building Retrofits Initiative, under which the Bank has committed more than CAD 1.2 billion to sustainable building upgrades. The flagship project under the loan retrofits 12 buildings at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops, BC, switching from natural-gas heating to a centralized air-source/water-source heat-pump district system projected to cut heating-related emissions at the campus by 95%.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank committed CAD 108.3 million (approx. USD 78.9 million) to the 102.2-megawatt Mesgi'g Ugju's'n 2 (MU2) wind farm in the Gespe'gewa'gi (Gaspesie-Iles-de-la-Madeleine) region of Quebec. The financing comprises a CAD 15.8 million equity loan to the Mi'gmawei Mawiomi Business Corporation (MMBC) — CIB's first Indigenous equity loan in Quebec — and a CAD 92.5 million construction loan for the project as a whole. MU2 is a partnership between MMBC, representing the Gesgapegiag, Gespeg and Listuguj Mi'gmaq communities, and Innergex Renewable Energy Inc., with a 30-year power purchase agreement with Hydro-Quebec.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB) and Scotiabank announced a CAD 100 million (approx. USD 73 million) financing partnership under CIB's Building Retrofit Initiative (BRI), CIB's second partnership with a Canadian financial institution under that program. Scotiabank Commercial Banking Real Estate clients — owners of commercial, industrial, office, and multi-residential buildings — gain access to low-cost financing for deep energy retrofits (envelope upgrades, HVAC electrification, automation/fuel switching, lighting, EV charging) that cut a building's emissions by at least 30%. Scotiabank markets, originates, underwrites, and administers the loans on the partnership's behalf; CIB has now committed more than CAD 1 billion under the BRI overall.

The Canada Infrastructure Bank closed a CAD 97 million (approx. USD 70.7 million) loan to finance the 84-megawatt Wedgeport Wind project in the Municipal District of Argyle, Nova Scotia. The project is a partnership between Elemental Energy, Stevens Wind and Sipekne'katik First Nation (SFN), and comprises 12 Nordex seven-megawatt turbines built under Nova Scotia's Rate Based Procurement process. It is CIB's second partnership with Elemental Energy and SFN following an earlier Nova Scotia wind deal.

On 3 June 2025, Canada Growth Fund Inc. (CGF), a CAD 15bn federal Crown investment vehicle, announced a second financing commitment of up to CAD 138 million (approx. USD 100.6 million) to Eavor Technologies Inc., a Calgary-based advanced closed-loop geothermal technology company. The commitment structures as CAD 89 million at financial close and a further CAD 48 million contingent on Eavor meeting predetermined development milestones, and is intended to accelerate commercial deployment of Eavor's Eavor-Loop technology. This follows CGF's initial CAD 90 million investment in Eavor in October 2023.