Good afternoon, Madam Chair.
Thank you to the members of the committee for inviting me.
My name is Jason Clark, and I'm the vice-president at New Economy Canada. We are an alliance of more than 70 businesses, labour organizations and indigenous partners. Together we represent over 485,000 workers across emerging and traditional sectors, such as manufacturing, electricity, mining, construction and clean technology, generating over $200 billion in annual revenue.
Increasingly, Canada's economic agenda is pinned to projects that require a significant amount of affordable, reliable power. Put another way, our electricity system is central to the country's economic growth, industrial competitiveness and investment future. That's why Canada's national electricity strategy is so important. We need to double the grid and accelerate electrification while increasing the share of non-emitting sources of power as we track towards net zero by 2050.
Expanding and modernizing Canada's grid will require an enormous amount of capital, up to $1 trillion by 2050 according to the strategy itself. A recent RBC analysis pegged electricity growth as a $680-billion investment opportunity by 2035 alone.
The payoff is a Canadian economy that's more efficient, more productive, more energy-secure, lower in cost and ultimately cleaner. The strategy sets the right ambition with technology that exists today, improving at great speed, and costs are coming down.
To attract the scale of investment this opportunity requires, budget 2026 can focus on two priorities: extending the clean economy investment tax credits to 2040 and investing in new major transmission projects. Please allow me to elaborate.
First, budget 2026 should expand, extend and simplify the clean economy ITCs to 2040. Building a new energy regime will take dedicated long-term commitments from a diversity of investors. Stable and long-term tax credits give investors the certainty they need to deploy capital in Canadian electricity and manufacturing.
Extending the ITCs by five years to 2040 would create a longer window for development, supporting new projects alongside industry, training providers, contractors and asset owners by reducing the risk of rushed project timelines, workforce bottlenecks and missed opportunities for project development.
Expanding the criteria will help deliver on the economic potential of the tax credits themselves. Specifically, that means adding trusts, co-operatives and other community-owned entities into the clean electricity ITC. Further, refine the clean technology ITC to ensure the 2023 fall economic statement amendments include waste biomass heat generation and apply to integrated industrial process heat systems, including cement alternative lower-carbon fuel.
Second, budget 2026 should significantly invest in electricity transmission as a critical nation-building economic project. Silos of electricity are costing Canadians money and slowing economic growth.
The federal government has three critical roles to play: direction, financing and coordination. A low-cost immediate opportunity is developing a cost-benefit framework to identify the projects that will deliver the most benefits and the optimal financing to balance risk among provincial ratepayers and federal taxpayers. The government should invest in the transmission interconnect strategy using tools like the Canada strong fund or alternative mechanisms such as debt financing. Finally, the government can help establish clear roles for governments and utilities to support the provincial and territorial national energy corridor agreement.
Here's the opportunity: Canada already has one of the cleanest electricity systems in the world. That's a major economic advantage in a global economy increasingly shaped by energy security, industrial competitiveness and access to clean power. However, with the ballooning demand of electricity from industry and households, that advantage won't hold. We need to build faster, connect our grids and give investors certainty to invest here in Canada.
The electricity strategy gets the ambition right, but budget 2026 can go further by building the electricity system that growth will depend on.
Thank you, Madam Chair, for the opportunity, and I look forward to the committee's questions.