A new report from the Canada Energy Regulator is projecting important progress in electrical era between now and 2050, partially because of new synthetic intelligence information centres’ thirst for energy.
The report by the federal company presents 4 provide and demand situations for Canada’s oil, gasoline and electrical energy markets: present measures, larger, decrease and net-zero.
In all circumstances, the report says electrical energy will play an more and more essential supply of power, with energy era rising by 30 per cent, on the low finish, to greater than double at this time’s manufacturing ranges by the yr 2050.
“To satisfy rising energy demand in all of the situations, we see surging wind energy alongside a various mixture of different much less variable provide sources,” CER chief economist Darren Christie informed reporters Tuesday.
In all situations, wind power makes up the majority of the ability capability additions, with about 50 to 150 extra gigawatts feeding into the grid by 2050, in comparison with 2023 ranges.
The report from the Canada Power Regulator predicts greater than 96 per cent of recent electrical energy era by the yr 2050 will come from ‘non or low emitting sources,’ with wind power anticipated to be ‘by far’ the biggest extra supply of renewable power.
Courtesy: Canada Power Regulator
Whereas the elevated demand for power will probably be, partially, pushed by financial progress, the report mentioned that forecasting the long run demand from information centres – huge constructions that home the huge computing firepower wanted for synthetic intelligence and different tech functions – poses a problem as a result of they are often fairly giant and unpredictable, relying on growth within the rising business.
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Within the decrease situation, information centres are predicted to extend electrical energy demand by as little as 0.5 gigawatts (GW) by 2030, whereas below the upper situation they’re predicted so as to add as much as 12 GW of electrical energy demand to the nation’s energy grid by 2050.
The report additionally forecasts that greater than 96 per cent of recent era will come from “non or low emitting sources,” with wind power anticipated to be “by far” the biggest extra supply of renewable power.
They predictions don’t embody modifications to Ottawa’s electrical car program in February, together with the scrapping of a mandate to have all new automobiles be electrical by 2035.
The warfare embroiling a lot of the Center East in latest weeks was additionally not explicitly factored into the CER’s projections.
The battle has minimize off shipments of crude from the Persian Gulf by the strategically important Strait of Hormuz, driving world costs up roughly 45 per cent from their pre-war ranges.
Whereas the report forecasts Canada’s crude oil manufacturing to develop within the near-term, output is forecast to peak at completely different deadlines and is tied to world oil costs.
Canada’s oil manufacturing was 5.5 million barrels a day in 2024.
Below the established order situation, manufacturing would attain 6.1 million barrels per day round 2040 and degree off to five.9 million barrels per day by 2050.
In a excessive situation buoyed by sturdy costs, manufacturing would peak at 6.7 million barrels a day in 2044, whereas within the decrease case, manufacturing would progressively decline to five.2 million barrels a day by the yr 2050.
Oilsands crude is anticipated to dominate in every circumstance, with manufacturing from typical and offshore sources being the primary to drop off.
WUDONG, a liquefied pure gasoline (LNG) tanker, fills up at an LNG Canada facility, in an aerial view, in Kitimat, B.C., on Thursday, November 13, 2025.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ethan Cairns
Pure gasoline manufacturing is predicted to extend to between 21 and 32 billion cubic toes per day by 2050, in comparison with the 19 billion cubic toes per day produced in Canada in 2025.
Nonetheless, a lot of the expansion is being pushed by tasks that chill the pure gasoline right into a liquid (LNG) so it may be shipped in specialised tanker abroad.
By 2050, the CER says a few quarter of complete Canadian gasoline manufacturing will probably be tied to liquefied pure gasoline exports.
Greenhouse gasoline emissions fall in the entire CER’s situations, however plateau round 2035 below present insurance policies.
“Reaching internet zero by 2050 would require an economywide transformation in direction of low carbon applied sciences, pushed by extra local weather motion,” the regulator added.
With information from World Information.
© 2026 The Canadian Press
