Oil pipelines, nuclear build-outs, mines and data centres will anchor Mark Carney’s pitch at next week’s elite gathering of foreign investors in Toronto.
But he may not be offering up Canada’s airports, at least for now, based on a list of potential investments that the government began distributing to selected Investment Summit attendees on Wednesday.
The document, a copy of which was obtained by the Star, offers a window into the aims of the much-hyped summit that the prime minister has convened for Sept. 14 and 15, as he seeks to kick-start $1 trillion in domestic investment while decreasing economic reliance on the United States.
Its list of 167 domestic projects, for which the government will be courting global capital, skews heavily toward energy and natural resources.
Approximately two thirds of its offerings involve fossil fuels, renewable energy and mining. Among the largest opportunities being touted in those sectors are the planned new oil pipeline to the west coast, new liquid natural gas pipelines and terminals, and a massive wind-energy project under consideration in Nova Scotia.
The rest of the list is comprised primarily of ports, data centres and advanced-manufacturing projects, largely in the defence sector.
The heavy resource focus means that the pitchbook is also considerably weighted toward Western Canada and to some extent Atlantic Canada, with relatively few listed projects in Ontario.
Document touts projects at a wide range of investment readiness
However, a couple of its biggest would-be investments are in the expansion of the Bruce nuclear power station and the proposed new Wesleyville nuclear station. It also includes long-touted Ring of Fire mining opportunities in northern Ontario, although it dampens expectations by signalling that would be a long-term investment requiring patient capital.
Ontario is also well-represented in the defence-industrial opportunities. And that section of the prospectus includes at least one would-be project that has not previously been on the public radar: a pitch by the Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association, whose members are under siege from U.S. tariffs, to leverage their manufacturing capacity to make land defence systems and specialty industrial vehicles.
The document as a whole includes projects at a wide range of investment readiness. Some of them, especially in the oil-and-gas space, already have approvals in place and are at advanced stages of development. Others, including many of the clean-energy projects, are for now much more notional.
Across the board, the government appears to be seeking equity or financing for projects to build new assets or expand existing ones. The prospectus does not signal any intent to simply sell existing assets to foreign owners.
That could ease sovereignty concerns surrounding the summit, which is expected to be attended by CEOs of leading sovereign wealth funds, as well as private-equity executives from both the United States and overseas.
However, it does not necessarily preclude Carney using the summit to also announce next steps toward privatizing airports or other infrastructure that’s currently owned publicly, which remains a subject among Canadian finance leaders who have been tracking the summit’s lead-up.
The document itself makes clear that potential investments are not limited to what’s on the list, stating up front that it “highlights selected investment opportunities in Canada and is not intended to represent a comprehensive list of all ongoing projects nationwide.”
That scope is seemingly reflected in the dollar figures listed in the report. Despite the $1-trillion figure being touted by Carney, as the amount of investment being sought over the next five years, all of the pitchbook’s projects add up to less than $500-billion in projected capital expenditures.
It’s unlikely that investments adding up to anything approaching even that sum will be announced at the summit itself.
While the government did not offer comment on the prospectus itself, a senior official (speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly) told the Star earlier on Wednesday that while “there will definitely be announcements” at the event, it is not intended as a “signing ceremony.”
The idea, the official said, is more to bring together potential project backers and connect them with proponents, with the results best judged in the months that follow.
