“Faster, quicker, immediate”: what we heard at the 2026 Ontario Energy Conference

On October 13, the Ontario Energy Conference convened government officials, regulators, and key energy sector stakeholders in Toronto to discuss the pressing matters facing the provincial energy system. Jointly hosted by the Ontario Energy Association and the Association of Power Production of Ontario, the fifth annual conference featured speeches by Premier Doug Ford, Minister of Energy and Mines Stephen Lecce, Ontario Energy Board (OEB) CEO Carolyn Calwell, and Jason Fitzsimmons, the new President and CEO of the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO), in his first public address to the sector. This bulletin highlights the key discussions, challenges, and needs facing Ontario’s energy sector that emerged at the conference.

What you need to know

• Ambition meets urgency. Ontario continues to set ambitious goals to establish itself as an energy superpower. Participants, however, conveyed a greater sense of urgency to expedite development timelines and to attract greater private investment.
• Energy, security, and geopolitics. Stressing that Canada is united, Ontario is placing greater emphasis on sovereignty and security in energy and infrastructure supply chains. Although the Buy Ontario Act and the Buy Ontario Directives provide some direction, draft regulations aimed more directly at energy stakeholders under the Protect Ontario by Unleashing Our Economy Act, 2025 remain outstanding.
• Urgent need for investment and financing. Investment vehicles and public funds such as the Building Ontario Fund and Canada Infrastructure Bank remain integral to de-risking projects and crowding in private capital. Participants also highlighted the urgent need for investment in Ontario's distribution sector, to ensure that the last mile of the energy system can support the province’s economic growth and affordability objectives.
• Data centres. Energy-intensive data centres loomed large at the conference. Following the release of Ontario's draft Data Centre Playbook in August, participants unanimously recognized that data centres must demonstrate local benefits and community support to gain access to local markets and Ontario’s clean electricity grid.

Takeaways

Call for growth, leadership, and expediency

In his keynote speech, Premier Ford described Ontario as a global energy superpower. He highlighted the province’s expertise and leadership in the nuclear buildout, noting that Ontario is the first G7 jurisdiction to develop small modular reactor (SMR) technology, through Unit 1 of the Darlington New Nuclear Project. The Premier also pointed to Ontario’s recent partnership with Alberta on the Northern Shield Energy Corridor, a proposed 3,300 km pipeline from Hardisty, Alberta to a refining hub in Sarnia, Ontario, and highlighted the successful completion of the Napanee Battery Energy Storage System, Canada’s largest battery storage project¹. He emphasized the significant economic and generation capacity associated with major infrastructure investments, stating that these types of projects are expected to add $800 billion to provincial GDP, and that large-scale nuclear, SMRs, and hydroelectric dams aim to add 16,000 MW of new supply to the grid². These strategic goals for building out Ontario’s energy system are articulated in the Province’s Integrated Energy Plan (IEP), released just over a year ago.

Critical to enabling this growth is what the Premier described as the need to be “faster, quicker, [and] immediate”. This theme reverberated throughout the conference, with speakers calling for a greater sense of urgency in infrastructure development and critical need for investment. The Premier himself pointed to the speed with which Canada built its first railway system in the late 1800s. Ultimately, there is a strong desire to reduce red tape and expedite projects in the province.

The new “ESG”

In his first speech as IESO President and CEO, Jason Fitzsimmons described a new “ESG”, referring to energy, security, and geopolitics. Several sessions addressed the evolving need to rebuild Ontario’s supply chains, and to protect Canadian sovereignty and workers from external economic pressures. While emphasizing that Canada is united, the Premier acknowledged that Ontario can no longer rely on the United States for the province’s prosperity and security. Industry participants also observed that the United States remains the province’s greatest competitor, citing concerns that production may shift to the United States to avoid tariffs.

This discussion extended to Ontario’s current supply chain and domestic content policies, including the newly enacted Buy Ontario Act and the corresponding Buy Ontario Act Directives. Industry participants acknowledged that, while these policies aim to create jobs and protect key sectors, they may also make the jurisdiction less cost-efficient, as the compliance measures needed to account for Ontario-made and Canadian-made goods and services add costs that are ultimately passed on to consumers. Supply chain policies also remain somewhat in flux for major energy infrastructure projects. Ontario has not yet issued draft regulations under the Protect Ontario by Unleashing Our Economy Act, 2025, which introduced directive- and regulation-making authority to impose procurement restrictions based on the country, region, or territory of origin of goods or services procured by specified energy sector participants, including the IESO, Ontario Power Generation (OPG), and certain rate-regulated entities.

The need for greater investment

Speakers emphasized the need to attract greater investment across the energy sector. Discussion focused on the growing role of investment mechanisms such as the federal Investment Tax Credits, and established public funds like the Building Ontario Fund and Canada Infrastructure Bank, which provide public capital, de-risk projects and help draw in private investors. Proponents also highlighted meaningful opportunities for partnership and equity investment with First Nations and other Indigenous communities.

Speakers repeatedly stressed the urgent need for investment in the critical “last mile” of the system, referring to Ontario’s electricity distribution sector. Research from Ivey Business School was highlighted, showing a median level of underinvestment of 6% among Ontario local distribution companies (LDCs) relative to an economic benchmark. The investment gap is even greater under a scenario in which LDCs meaningfully modernize the grid, with 88% of LDC-years showing underinvestment against this benchmark³. This is particularly relevant in light of the OEB’s recently released distribution system operator (DSO) roadmap, which notes that grid modernization, including advanced communications and monitoring, would further support distributed energy resource (DER) integration, resiliency, and distribution system operational capabilities⁴.

In discussing the critical need for investment in the last mile, stakeholders also noted that Ontario’s electricity distribution market remains fragmented, with 58 licensed distributors ranging significantly in size and scale. Pointing to the work of the 2025 Panel for Utility Leadership and Service Excellence (PULSE)⁵, PULSE Chair Anthony Haines called for the removal of the departure tax and changes to corporate governance to facilitate LDC investment. In his remarks over dinner, Minister Stephen Lecce also referred to PULSE’s work and signaled that the government would take a phased approach to implementing the panel’s recommendations.

Data centres, data centres, data centres

Almost every session, in one form or another, addressed data centres. While Ontario already hosts data centres, they have been relatively small in scale. The prospect of large-scale data centres housing generative AI models is changing the conversation around how the grid can, and should, accommodate significant new electricity loads. In his keynote address⁶, IESO President Fitzsimmons noted that, as of this summer, data centre connection requests totaled roughly 7,000 MW, which is double the amount reported this March. However, speakers cautioned that the connection queue may overstate the demand that will ultimately materialize. The barriers to entering the queue can be relatively low, while the more significant costs are incurred later in the connection process, making it difficult to assess which projects are likely to proceed.

A related question was how to regulate data centres in the province. With the passing of Bill 40 in December 2025, Ontario departed from the principle of non-discriminatory grid access for data centre connections and gave the Minister new regulatory powers to review and approve those connections, with the details to be established by regulation. In August, Ontario released its draft Data Centre Playbook, which sets out the principles by which the Province will prioritize certain data centres, including advancing economic development, protecting data security and digital sovereignty, and earning public confidence by providing local benefits and mitigating environmental impacts. Despite uncertainty about which projects will ultimately proceed, the IESO President noted that the volume of proposals is itself an important signal: capital is looking to Ontario.

Stakeholders acknowledged that the conversation has changed, given the scale and importance of AI in society. With provinces developing bespoke frameworks for data centre connections, proponents understand that they cannot simply connect; they must secure local support and buy-in. For a data centre, success means gaining access to a local market with community support, which can be demonstrated through benefits such as construction jobs and municipal property tax revenue.

Affordability as a measure of success

Affordability was another recurring theme. In her keynote address⁷, OEB CEO Calwell stressed the importance of affordability within the OEB’s mandate, pointing to a 13% year-over-year increase in uptake of programs such as the Ontario Electricity Support Program and the Low-income Energy Assistance Program as a key indicator of the near-term affordability challenge that customers face.

Affordability is one of the four principles of Ontario’s IEP, which emphasizes keeping energy costs low for families, businesses, and industry. The IEP highlights the potential for Distributed Energy Resources (DERs), including local generation, batteries, smart home technologies, and electric vehicles, to reduce costs, enhance resilience, and enable consumers to participate more actively in the energy system. The IEP also acknowledges that realizing these benefits will require continued investment by LDCs in grid modernization⁸.

Overall, the discussion underscored that affordability affects all stakeholders and can no longer be viewed solely as a ratepayer issue. It is a shared responsibility and a key measure of the province’s competitiveness. Participants emphasized both the near-term challenge of maintaining affordability while investing in the infrastructure needed to enable economic growth, and the long-term implications of the decisions Ontario is making today: A grid that cannot support growth may ultimately be the least affordable outcome, as jobs and investment move elsewhere, and fixed system costs are borne by fewer ratepayers.

Conclusion

The 2026 Ontario Energy Conference served as an important litmus test for the province’s energy sector. While Ontario continues to position itself as an energy superpower and the sector as an economic imperative for Canada, stakeholders clearly expressed a growing urgency to realize this potential. In Premier Ford’s words, the focus is now on making everything “faster, quicker, immediate”.