Dr. Bryan Brulotte is Chairman of Sterling-Trust, a Canadian private equity firm. He brings more than four decades of leadership experience spanning the military, private, and public sectors.Canada has spent years debating how to become an energy superpower while sitting on one of the greatest strategic energy advantages in the world. We possess enormous uranium resources, decades of nuclear engineering expertise, an established domestic supply chain, and rapidly growing demand for reliable electricity. Nuclear power should no longer be treated simply as another option for generating electricity; it should be treated as a strategic Canadian industry.Saskatchewan has provided a glimpse of what that could look like. Premier Scott Moe’s government has established a goal of at least 2,600 megawatts of nuclear generation by 2050, including at least 600 megawatts associated with development near Estevan and more than 2,000 megawatts from two proposed large reactors. The first large reactor is targeted for operation by 2042, while the Rafferty site near Estevan has been selected for further study for small modular reactors. The numbers behind Saskatchewan’s opportunity are remarkable. Canada is the world’s second-largest uranium producer, and approximately 24% of global uranium production in 2024 came from Saskatchewan. Nearly 90% of Canadian uranium production is exported, meaning we already possess a strategic commodity the world increasingly wants.Consider the scale. The federal government estimates that, operating at full capacity, Saskatchewan’s uranium producers could mine and mill enough uranium each year to produce the equivalent of 170% of Canada’s present annual electricity demand through nuclear power. Few countries possess anything comparable: abundant resources, established reactor technology, engineering expertise, and an advanced domestic nuclear supply chain. .Imagine another major Canadian industry in which we possessed the raw material, technology, intellectual property, engineering expertise, skilled workforce, and a growing domestic market for the finished product. We would immediately recognize it as a strategic national asset. Nuclear energy should be treated no differently.The opportunity is not simply to dig uranium out of the ground and ship it elsewhere. Canada can capture considerably more of the value chain by turning Canadian uranium into Canadian electricity using Canadian engineering, manufacturing, and workers. We can simultaneously expand exports of uranium, reactor technology, nuclear components, engineering services, and potentially electricity to our allies.Energy sovereignty strengthens this argument considerably. CANDU reactors operate using natural rather than enriched uranium, and Canada’s CANDU fuel supply chain is almost entirely domestic. In an increasingly uncertain world, Canada has the unusual ability to control much of the chain from uranium in the ground to electricity entering the grid without depending upon foreign uranium-enrichment capacity. This is becoming much more than a Saskatchewan story. Ontario is advancing new nuclear development, Alberta is developing its nuclear roadmap, Saskatchewan is examining both large and small reactors, and New Brunswick is considering the future of Point Lepreau. Canada already has more than 250 companies participating in its nuclear supply chain and approximately 90,000 direct and indirect nuclear sector jobs, with 90% of industry positions classified as high-skilled. .The demand is coming whether we prepare for it or not. Canada’s electricity capacity is projected to need to double over approximately the next 25 years as electrification, advanced manufacturing, mining, and data infrastructure expand. Artificial intelligence and data centres will add another increasingly important source of demand for dependable electricity. This changes the nuclear debate. Canada should not simply ask how we replace existing generating capacity; we should ask where the enormous quantity of additional electricity required to build a richer and more productive country will come from. If we want new mines, critical mineral processing, advanced manufacturing, data centres, and other energy-intensive industries, somebody must generate the electricity to power them.Nuclear will not do this alone. Hydro, natural gas, wind, solar, and other technologies should all play roles according to regional circumstances and economics. But an advanced industrial economy requires enormous quantities of reliable power available around the clock, and nuclear provides precisely that kind of firm generation.The international opportunity may be even larger. Thirty-eight countries have endorsed the goal of tripling global nuclear capacity by 2050, while more than 30 countries are pursuing nuclear power for the first time. Canada therefore enters this global nuclear expansion with uranium, reactor technology, engineering expertise, and an established export record already in hand..There will also be important choices about technology. Saskatchewan could eventually consider Canadian CANDU technology alongside the AP1000 developed by Westinghouse, itself now owned by Canadian companies Cameco and Brookfield. Those decisions must ultimately be based on economics, reliability, and technical requirements, but governments should also recognize their consequences for domestic intellectual property, manufacturing, fuel supply, and long-term energy sovereignty.None of this means nuclear power is easy. New reactors require enormous upfront capital, regulatory approvals can take years, and international experience demonstrates how quickly construction delays and cost overruns can undermine otherwise sound projects. The answer is not blank government cheques, but disciplined procurement, predictable regulatory timelines, private capital wherever appropriate, and, critically, standardized reactor fleets rather than continually reinventing projects.Canada should therefore think beyond individual power plants and develop an integrated nuclear industrial strategy encompassing uranium, fuel processing, reactor construction, engineering, research, skilled trades, transmission infrastructure, and exports. Ottawa and the provinces should coordinate where doing so reduces costs and construction risk, while allowing private investment and competition to impose financial discipline. Canada’s objective should be to build an industry, not merely a collection of reactors.For decades, Canada possessed the resources and technology to become one of the world’s great nuclear powers but lacked the ambition to fully exploit them. Saskatchewan’s decision suggests that this may finally be changing. The uranium is Canadian, the expertise is Canadian, much of the technology can be Canadian, and the electricity demand is certainly coming.The opportunity is bigger than generating power. Nuclear energy can strengthen our economy, reinforce our sovereignty, develop Western and Northern Canada, support our allies, and create an export industry built around something Canada already does exceptionally well. We do not need to invent this advantage; we already have it.Dr. Bryan Brulotte is Chairman of Sterling-Trust, a Canadian private equity firm. He brings more than four decades of leadership experience spanning the military, private, and public sectors.
