Canada’s public infrastructure pipeline has never been bigger.
According to ReNew Canada’s 2026 Top100 Projects Report, the combined value of the country’s 100 largest public infrastructure builds has climbed to $343 billion, a $43 billion jump from the year before and the steepest annual increase the report has recorded in two decades.
Nuclear power is the single biggest driver of that growth, but transit, ports, critical minerals and Arctic infrastructure are all pulling their weight.
For contractors, equipment suppliers and civil engineering firms across North America, 2026 is shaping up to be one of the busiest years in a generation.
Below is a rundown of the projects setting the pace, the provinces capturing the lion’s share of investment, and what the pipeline means for the construction sector heading into 2027.
NUCLEAR TAKES THE CROWN
Ontario’s nuclear renaissance now accounts for four of the six most valuable projects on the national list.
Leading the pack is the Pickering Generating Station Refurbishment, a life-extension of four CANDU “B” units valued at roughly $26.8 billion that is expected to create more than 30,000 construction jobs and keep the plant supplying power to about two million homes for another three decades.
Ontario Power Generation has moved the project into its execution phase after securing provincial approval, with full refurbishment work on Units 5 through 8 set to begin in 2027.
Close behind is the Darlington New Nuclear Project in Bowmanville, where OPG is building four GE Hitachi BWRX-300 small modular reactors — the first grid-scale SMR deployment in a G7 country.
Excavation of the first reactor building shaft is more than 80 percent complete, and prefabricated basemat modules are being assembled ahead of a planned lift into the shaft.
The federal government has taken a 7.5 percent equity stake in the project through the Canada Growth Fund, and Ottawa has referred it to the Major Projects Office as a nation-building priority.
Elsewhere in Ontario, the decade-long Darlington Nuclear Refurbishment wrapped up in early 2026, finishing four months ahead of schedule and $150 million under budget after employing more than 6,000 workers at peak.
Bruce Power’s parallel refurbishment of six of its eight units at Tiverton continues on a similar multi-decade timeline, delivered through the Shoreline Power Group joint venture of Aecon, AtkinsRéalis and United Engineers & Constructors.
Nuclear projects now make up four of the top six spots on Canada’s infrastructure rankings — a sector that barely registered on the list a decade ago.
TORONTO’S TRANSIT BUILD-OUT ACCELERATES
Ontario hosts 42 of the 100 largest infrastructure projects in Canada, including the top eight nationally, and transit is the second major pillar behind that dominance.
The GO Expansion On-Corridor Works program — the largest transit undertaking in Ontario’s history — is electrifying more than 600 kilometres of track and modernising signalling across the Greater Golden Horseshoe under a progressive design-build-operate-maintain agreement between Metrolinx, Infrastructure Ontario and the ONxpress Transportation Partners consortium.
The Ontario Line, a 15.6-kilometre rapid transit line connecting Flemingdon Park to Exhibition/Ontario Place, is advancing through tunnelling and station construction, with 15 stations planned and connections into the existing subway and GO Transit networks.
Nearby, the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension has broken ground on its final tunnel segment, the Hazel McCallion LRT (formerly the Hurontario LRT) has entered final testing and commissioning in Mississauga and Brampton, and the TTC has awarded a progressive design-build contract for the Bloor-Yonge Capacity Improvement project to expand one of the network’s busiest interchange stations.
PORTS AND TRADE CORRIDORS GET A FEDERAL PUSH
With trade diversification now a national priority, port infrastructure has jumped to the front of the federal government’s Major Projects Office agenda.
The Contrecoeur Terminal Container Project, which will expand the Port of Montreal’s container-handling capacity by roughly 60 percent, was among the first projects referred to the MPO and is projected to generate about $140 million a year in economic benefits.
Prime Minister Mark Carney broke ground on the terminal expansion personally, underlining its status as a flagship nation-building build.
On the west coast, Roberts Bank Terminal 2 — a project to roughly double the size of the Port of Vancouver — remains under review, while the Northwest B.C.
transmission corridor being twinned by BC Hydro is being positioned to unlock further port, LNG and critical minerals development along the same trade routes.
LNG AND ENERGY EXPORTS
Two liquefied natural gas projects anchor the energy side of the nation-building list.
LNG Canada’s proposed Phase 2 expansion in Kitimat, B.C. would double the facility’s production and make it the world’s second-largest LNG export terminal, with Ottawa estimating it could attract $33 billion in private capital on top of the roughly $48.3 billion already spent building Phase 1 and the Coastal GasLink pipeline.
Further north, the Ksi Lisims LNG project — a floating liquefaction facility proposed by Western LNG, Rockies LNG and the Nisga’a Nation near Prince Rupert — has cleared its environmental assessment and is paired with an 800-kilometre Prince Rupert Gas Transmission pipeline, though it continues to face opposition from neighbouring First Nations.
CRITICAL MINERALS AND ARCTIC INFRASTRUCTURE
Ottawa’s Major Projects Office has also fast-tracked a wave of mining and northern infrastructure builds.
In Saskatchewan, Foran’s McIlvenna Bay copper mine is aiming to begin production in mid-2026, while in northwestern B.C. the Red Chris Mine expansion — a $2.6 billion shift from open-pit to underground block-cave mining — is expected to extend the mine’s life by more than a decade and lift annual copper output by over 15 percent.
Ontario’s Ring of Fire, an estimated 8,000-square-kilometre critical minerals region in Treaty 9 territory, remains the most closely watched — and most contested — project on the list, with road-access negotiations between the province and Webequie First Nation continuing alongside a separate federal environmental assessment request tied to the Eagle’s Nest nickel project.
Further north, the Mackenzie Valley Highway and the Grays Bay Road and Port project in the Northwest Territories and Nunavut have both been referred to the MPO as part of a push to connect Arctic and northern communities to year-round road access and export capacity.
- Ring of Fire critical minerals corridor — Northern Ontario, Treaty 9 territory
- Red Chris Mine expansion — $2.6B, northwestern British Columbia
- McIlvenna Bay Foran Copper Mine — Saskatchewan
- Mackenzie Valley Highway & Grays Bay Road and Port — Northwest Territories / Nunavut
- Northwest B.C. transmission twinning — BC Hydro
HYDRO, HEALTHCARE AND THE REST OF THE PIPELINE
British Columbia’s Site C Clean Energy Project, the largest infrastructure build in the province, reached a fresh milestone in 2026 with its fourth generating unit brought online, putting the dam at roughly two-thirds of full capacity.
Healthcare construction remains one of the steadiest categories nationally, accounting for 21 of the Top100 projects, led by the Peter Gilgan Mississauga Hospital — a 2.8 million-square-foot, 950-bed replacement facility that will become Canada’s largest teaching hospital when it opens, with excavation already more than 45 percent complete under a progressive design-build model.
WHAT IT MEANS FOR CONTRACTORS AND EQUIPMENT SUPPLIERS
For the construction and heavy equipment sector, the scale of this pipeline is both an opportunity and a warning.
Ontario alone is expected to see close to 270,000 experienced tradespeople retire over the next decade while needing more than 154,000 new workers by 2034 just to deliver its currently planned infrastructure and housing program.
Roughly 8 percent of total construction costs in the province are tied to U.S. imports, leaving major projects exposed to currency swings and cross-border tariff policy even as demand for cranes, tunnel boring equipment, concrete supply and specialised trades reaches historic highs.
With nuclear, transit, ports, LNG and critical minerals all competing for the same skilled labour, plant and materials at once, contractors bidding into the Canadian market in 2026 and 2027 should expect tighter equipment availability, longer lead times on specialised components, and sustained upward pressure on labour costs — trends CCE News will continue tracking as the country’s $343 billion infrastructure build-out moves from planning into execution.
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