Canada Plans New Nuclear Strategy, Eyes Microreactor Feasibility Study

Ottawa has started to turn its nuclear ambitions into a concrete policy package, with Energy and Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson saying Canada will get a new Nuclear Energy Strategy before the end of 2026 and pairing that reset with a $40 million microreactor feasibility study for remote northern defence sites.

The move matters because it is not just another broad clean-energy pledge. Natural Resources Canada said the strategy is meant to strengthen affordability and energy security at home while helping Canada compete in a global nuclear market it says could grow to as much as $200 billion a year by 2030. Hodgson said the plan will be built with provinces and territories, utilities, industry, Indigenous partners, and labour, signaling that Ottawa wants a national framework, not a string of one-off project decisions.

The microreactor piece is the clearest near-term test. Hodgson announced a joint feasibility program with the Department of National Defence and Atomic Energy of Canada Limited to assess Canadian-controlled microreactor technology in the North. The Department of National Defence has committed an initial $40 million in 2026-2027, after earlier federal spending of $6 million in 2025-2026, including $4.7 million for research and development at Chalk River Laboratories. That puts a real dollar figure on where the strategy could unlock first: remote communities, northern logistics, and defence installations where diesel is expensive and reliability matters more than scale.

For the first wave of beneficiaries, the names are already familiar. Provinces and utilities that took part in Canada’s SMR Roadmap, including Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, New Brunswick, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut, are now positioned to shape the next phase of planning. Chalk River Laboratories also stands to benefit again, after Ottawa committed $2.2 billion over 10 years in capital investments there. AtkinsRéalis, which was already promised up to $304 million over four years in March 2025 for the MONARK CANDU concept, remains one of the clearest industrial players to watch as Canada tries to support both large-reactor modernization and smaller reactor pathways.

The biggest gap is no longer the rhetoric. It is the pipeline from strategy to licensed, financed, and procured reactors. Canada’s Nuclear Safety Commission remains the independent regulator, which means any microreactor or SMR path still has to clear safety, security, and environmental review before it can move into build mode. That is where the federal reset will be judged: whether it produces faster licensing, clearer procurement signals, stronger Indigenous participation, and bankable projects, or whether it stays at the level of a national roadmap.

Hodgson used the language of an “energy superpower” and said Ottawa wants to “derisk” nuclear investments, back domestic supply chains, and support export growth. The real test now is whether that vision can move from conference-stage policy to reactors that can actually be built, licensed, and delivered in the North.