Ottawa will invest $2 billion to build four small modular reactors at Ontario Power Generation’s Darlington site in Bowmanville through the Canada Growth Fund, a move the government says will make Canada the first G7 country to bring SMR technology online.
Ontario added $1 billion through the Building Ontario Fund as part of the same event, with the public financing structured as minority equity stakes.
Ontario Power Generation remains the majority owner and operator, while the Canada Growth Fund will hold 15% and the Building Ontario Fund 7.5% of the project.
Project scope centers on four SMRs totaling 1,200 megawatts, which Ontario says is enough electricity to power about 1.2 million homes once all units are operating. The plan targets $500 million per year of activity flowing into Ontario’s nuclear supply chain, with the first reactor expected to supply power for about 300,000 homes.
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Employment claims in the plan include 18,000 jobs during construction and about 3,700 jobs sustained annually over a 65-year operating life for the four-unit fleet.
Regulatory and schedule markers are already in place. The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission lists the Darlington New Nuclear Project and OPG’s selection of GE Hitachi’s 300-MWe BWRX-300 technology, with licensing work underway since 2022. Trade sources and government timelines point to initial generation as early as 2029.
The public money flows through the Canada Growth Fund, a $15 billion federal investment vehicle. Ottawa says the CGF now counts 16 portfolio companies with $4.75 billion committed across clean-growth projects, and will use the Darlington stake to catalyze additional private capital into Canada’s nuclear supply chain.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford called the SMR build “a downpayment on Ontario’s nuclear energy future.”
“We’re protecting Ontario by supporting good-paying, long-term jobs for Ontario workers and building the energy infrastructure – including both SMRs and new, large-scale nuclear – needed to make Ontario an energy superpower,” he said.
Criticism, however, focused on costs and job math. In an op-ed, Ontario Energy and Mines Minister Stephen Lecce warned that Ontario’s nearly 60 local distribution companies face a financing cliff over the next 25 years, highlighting that it’s unfit to “harness our full economic potential with an outdated electricity distribution system.”
“Ontario’s nearly 60 utilities (Local Distribution Companies) were fundamentally designed before the rising demand, new technologies, new housing, and growing communities we see today,” he wrote. “This is putting pressures on LDCs that most were never designed to handle.”
He further cited an Electricity Distributors Association estimate of up to $120 billion required to meet demand growth. He also pointed to municipal debt limits, credit-rating pressures, and recent increases in development charges to address distribution shortfalls.
“But if the backbone of our system — the distribution networks that bring power to homes, businesses, and factories — cannot keep up, Ontario risks falling behind. We cannot let that happen,” he added.
Citing a 2018 Ontario Energy Board report, Lecce quoted it: “Utilities will need to modernize their systems, adopt innovative technologies, and explore new business and partnership models to meet evolving customer expectations and ensure long term system reliability and value for money.”
Ottawa’s quick facts set an average reduction of up to 2.3 million tonnes of carbon annually between 2029 and 2050 once the four units are built out. Earlier Ontario approvals allow OPG to proceed on the first of four rate-regulated SMRs. The government’s Major Projects Office is designed to accelerate remaining approvals by acting as a single window for project proponents.
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