Originally published to LinkedIn | June 4, 2025
Contributors: Keren Perla, Ailsa Popilian
Energy is having a surprisingly unifying moment in the Canadian public discourse. The talk of becoming an “energy superpower” is getting serious and inevitably, Alberta will have skin in the game. In the era of energy co-existence, where traditional and low-carbon solutions develop side-by-side, Alberta’s mix of resources, talent, and infrastructure should put it on the leaderboard.
But while Canada debates the friction points for this national vision, global markets are scouting for who’s ready to compete. In 2024, global low-carbon investment increased 11% to a record 2.1 trillion USD. Across the Pacific, companies in Asia are making multi-billion dollar investments in low-emission energy – including in Canada. Across the Atlantic, the EU is forging clean energy trade deals with jurisdictions around the world. Many of these markets see Alberta as a “growing supplier of both traditional energy and clean technologies”, as recently noted by ambassadors from the EU, the UK, and Germany.
While turbulent US energy and trade policy has created unprecedented market uncertainty, this wake-up call also emboldened the strategic necessity to diversify Canadian trade. And regardless of whether tariffs stick around or not, carbon competitiveness will remain a defining factor going forward – especially for markets prioritizing low-carbon energy.
If Canada wants to compete it needs to play well both at home and away – by streamlining interprovincial trade and expanding its reach east and west. Alberta’s emerging portfolio of low-emission, resource-based industries has immense growth potential, and can offer economic diversification opportunities to meet growing domestic and global interests.
A no-regret move
In today’s landscape, diversification is a no-regret move. It hedges against geopolitical tensions, trade disruptions, and economic turmoil. Putting more eggs into more baskets is just smart policy. It’s about building out industries that match our strengths, and for Alberta this must include fast-growing low-emission industries.
With its strong industrial base and proclivity for energy innovation, Alberta has what it takes to be a real contender. When it comes to future energy competitiveness, how much of this opportunity will the province claim, and how quickly can it act?
To compete – and win – in the new global economy, the province will need to evolve the playbook. As the world reshapes industrial strategies, global value chains are forming and realigning and nations are jostling for supremacy. As a result, there’s an economic imperative to:
- Explore the demand for low-carbon supply chains
- Scale new technologies and support for their related products, services, and expertise
- And, secure market share in sectors with high growth potential.
These moves unlock some of the key ingredients of forward-looking industrial strategy – agility, optionality, and resiliency – but we need more goals in more nets.
That’s why the Energy Futures Lab is digging deeper into Alberta’s resource-based, low-emission opportunities and studying their market potential as part of the future energy system. Through a study, we’re exploring where Alberta is positioned to compete. But seizing these opportunities means looking beyond what’s ‘tried and true’ and leaning into innovation, not simply waiting to be asked to play.
Competitiveness is a matter of regional fit
A number of industries are emerging as promising plays and these fall into three strategic buckets:
Clean Energy Enablers: these are industrial opportunities that not only support emissions reduction, but can also drive regional and rural economic development in key regions across the province and act as jobs creators, including:
- Carbon capture and storage (CCS)
- Hydrogen production
- Direct air capture (DAC)
- Geothermal energy production
- Waste-to-energy
- Solar and wind energy
- Nuclear energy (including SMR)
Business Opportunities Abroad: Alberta-based companies have a long history of industrial innovation and bring world-class expertise in areas that are rising in demand globally. Alberta can export expertise and solutions, as well as products. These include:
- Agricultural technology IP
- CCS technology and services
- Geothermal technology and services
Product Export Opportunities: Other supply chain opportunities exist in industries with high growth potential that leverage Alberta’s industrial base and resource strengths, including:
- Minerals and metals production and processing
- Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF)
- Green chemistry
- Carbon utilization
- Ammonia-as-a-fuel
- Alternative proteins
Many of these industries have already laced up and are beginning to skate, with some really picking up speed while others are still earlier in development. While each offers a viable path to diversification, not every opportunity will be a good match. The key is in knowing how to unlock them; opportunities must align with regional interests and build on existing or transferable skills.
Importantly, the play needs to involve stoking the right opportunities in the right places, because what makes sense in the Peace region may not make sense in the badlands or along the eastern slopes. Given not all actors have the same priorities, it often comes down to the best fit.
The days of telling regions and communities what they should do are behind us, knowing that approach has rarely worked. Pulling in the same direction is less ‘elbows up’, and more ‘all-hands on deck’ to shape what comes next. These efforts are a shared process of discovery: facilitating generative conversations, understanding what matters to communities, and seeing where alignment can be built. It’s also about asking what’s possible here? How do we make it happen? and what does success look like?
The study offers multiple lenses as ways to assess which opportunities are the right fit, highlight where interests converge, and where there’s willingness to catalyze these opportunities. But it will take more than interest. To play to its strengths the province must lean into innovation and take steps to secure its place in emerging global value chains. To this end, the Energy Futures Lab will be working in conjunction with ecosystem actors to align behind the most promising opportunities so they can take their best shot.
Developing robust ecosystems around these promising industries will be key. Having support from both the public and private sector, and built upon a foundation of Indigenous participation and leadership, it can be done.
Making the play
Alberta’s next moves can help or hinder its position in the shifting global energy landscape. Place-based strategies that leverage regional strengths can put it on the scoreboard in more sectors, and on the radar of the scouts.
Canada has the building blocks to be an “energy superpower” but to ‘get it built’ means turning potential into performance. For Alberta, this means aligning strategy with global demand and advancing the emerging low-carbon industries that have a real shot at building long-term economic competitiveness.
Does Alberta have what it takes to catalyze these opportunities and truly be an energy all star? The opportunities are real and the market signals are strong. The economy isn’t waiting. And neither should we.
