Ontario’s nuclear ambitions are getting bigger.

The Ford government envisions a province that not only relies on nuclear power for much of its own electricity, but exports Ontario-made nuclear technology across Canada and eventually around the world: from large-scale reactors and small modular reactors to tiny, transportable plants capable of powering mines and remote communities.

On Monday, Energy Minister Stephen Lecce said that vision is beginning to move from the drawing board to reality.

Ontario-based BWXT Canada has been selected to fabricate and deploy the reactor technology for a proposed 50-megawatt transportable nuclear power plant in Belledune, N.B., a project the province is billing as Canada’s first of its kind.

The Indigenous-led project is expected to provide enough electricity for as many as 40,000 homes and create more than 150 jobs during development and roughly 40 permanent positions once operational.

For Lecce, however, this goes well beyond one New Brunswick project.

“I really do believe we can take this technology and we can deploy these micro transportable reactors to the most remote parts of the Earth,” Lecce said Monday, adding that the Arctic and Northern Ontario both have mines and communities that can struggle to access reliable power.

The announcement offers another piece of an increasingly expansive nuclear strategy in Ontario. But how close is the province to actually realizing the nuclear future it has been promising?

There are signs of tangible progress.

Nuclear already supplies roughly half of Ontario’s electricity, while the province says its domestic industry supports about 80,000 jobs across more than 200 companies. More than 90 per cent of spending on nuclear projects remains in Canada, according to the province.

Ontario has also moved to build what it says will be the G7’s first grid-scale SMR at the Darlington nuclear site, alongside its refurbishment program for existing reactors.

Lecce said that Ontario’s recent refurbishment work is evidence that the province can execute ambitious projects, and that Canadian companies now have an opportunity to turn that expertise into an export industry.

But the government’s end goal is enormous.

Its integrated energy plan, Energy for Generations, envisions nuclear forming the backbone of a massive expansion of Ontario’s electricity system as demand grows.

The Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) has forecast electricity demand could rise by as much as 90 per cent by 2050 as the province adds homes, electrifies transportation and industry, expands manufacturing and develops its critical-minerals sector.

The province says its broader nuclear buildout could ultimately create 150,000 jobs and contribute $800 billion to the Canadian economy.

But the New Brunswick announcement does not mean fleets of Ontario-built microreactors are about to begin appearing across Northern Canada.

The Belledune facility is a pilot that is intended to establish a commercial power plant and an operations, maintenance and training hub that could eventually support a larger fleet serving remote and northern communities.

But neither the province nor the company were able to provide immediate deadlines for the next steps now that the company was chosen.

Perhaps the government’s strongest evidence that Ontario can deliver complicated nuclear projects is Darlington.

OPG began the execution phase of its $12.8-billion refurbishment of Darlington’s four CANDU reactors in October 2016. The project involved taking each reactor offline one at a time and replacing or refurbishing major components to extend the station’s operating life by roughly another 30 years.

The sequence stretched across a decade: Unit 2 was refurbished between October 2016 and June 2020; Unit 3 between September 2020 and July 2023; Unit 1 between February 2022 and November 2024; and Unit 4 between July 2023 and March 2026.

With Unit 4 back at full power this spring, the entire refurbishment was completed four months ahead of the original schedule and $150 million below its $12.8-billion budget, according to OPG.

About 200 kilometres northwest of Toronto, an even longer refurbishment program is underway at Bruce Power.

Bruce’s Life-Extension Program dates to a 2015 agreement with the Independent Electricity System Operator and began in 2016. Its most intensive portion — the Major Component Replacement program — started in January 2020 and involves refurbishing six reactors, Units 3 through 8. The work includes replacing pressure tubes, calandria tubes, feeder tubes and steam generators, among other major components.

Unit 4 was taken offline in early 2025 and is scheduled to complete its refurbishment in 2027. Unit 5 began its outage in 2026 and is scheduled through 2029. Units 7 and 8 follow later, with the overall Major Component Replacement program scheduled to finish in 2033.

Pickering also represents another significant piece of Ontario’s strategy, but one that is much less advanced than Darlington.

The Ford government has asked OPG to pursue refurbishment of Pickering’s four B units, which would potentially extend their operating lives by several decades.

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission authorized the B units to operate through the end of 2026, while OPG moved from the project’s initiation phase into its more detailed definition phase. The province’s integrated energy plan anticipates refurbishment work beginning in 2027, subject to final approvals, with completion in the mid-2030s.

Building an entirely new reactor is a more consequential test of Ontario’s nuclear ambitions.

The first BWRX-300 is supposed to be connected to Ontario’s grid by the end of 2030. Ontario and OPG are planning three additional BWRX-300s at Darlington, creating a four-reactor SMR fleet with a combined capacity of roughly 1,200 MW — enough, according to the province, to power about 1.2 million homes.

Ontario is studying a potential new large-scale nuclear station at OPG’s Wesleyville property near Port Hope with capacity of up to 10,000 MW. Bruce Power is separately pursuing Bruce C, a potential new nuclear development of up to 4,800 MW. Both are still in pre-development phase.

The Belledune project announced Monday would use Ontario-based BWXT Canada’s technology for a 50-MW Indigenous-led pilot in New Brunswick.
There is still a significant regulatory milestone ahead. OPG applied in March 2026 for a 20-year operating licence for the first reactor. The CNSC expects the process to include public consultation and a hearing, likely in 2027.

Ontario is trying to present nuclear as an industrial strategy: domestic intellectual property, Ontario manufacturers and skilled workers would build technology that could then be sold elsewhere.

The transportable reactor fits neatly into that strategy because it tackles a problem conventional nuclear plants cannot easily solve. Instead of constructing a massive permanent generating station, the idea combines microreactors with plants designed to be manufactured off-site and transported to where electricity is needed (potentially mines, Indigenous communities and remote settlements that otherwise depend heavily on diesel or lack sufficient grid connections.)