Canada Pursues Nuclear Expansion as Western Utilities Coordinate on Reactor Buildout
Canada's provincial utilities are beginning to coordinate on new nuclear construction, with Bruce Power signing a memorandum of understanding with SaskPower on April 16, 2026, to share its experience in large-scale reactor development. The agreement follows years of feasibility work in Saskatchewan and positions Canada to add capacity beyond its existing fleet — while the Candu reactor design's unique fuel flexibility keeps export opportunities open.3
SaskPower's interest in nuclear is not incidental. The province holds the world's richest uranium deposits but has never operated a commercial reactor, relying instead on coal and gas for dispatchable generation. A partnership with Bruce Power — which operates the world's largest nuclear site by output — gives the Saskatchewan project a credible institutional model and a potential route to financing.3
The timing coincides with a significant revision to how Goldman Sachs models global nuclear demand. In its May 2026 edition of "Nuclear Nuggets," the bank added approximately 46 GW of small modular reactor deployments to its 2045 forecast, lifting projected nuclear generation by 6% and adding around 62 million pounds of uranium demand — a 17% increase to prior long-run estimates. Uranium spot prices were holding in the mid-to-high $80s per pound as of mid-May 2026, with term pricing near $90 per pound.4
Canada's expansion sits within an explicit western coordination framework. In 2023, the United States, Britain, Canada, France, and Japan formed the "Sapporo Five" group and committed to at least $4.2 billion in joint investment in new uranium enrichment capacity. The rationale was direct: Rosatom controls a disproportionate share of global enrichment services, and western utilities remain structurally exposed.2
That exposure has narrowed. In 2025, Europe's reliance on Russian enriched uranium fell sharply to 24% of its needs, down from 38% in 2024, according to data cited by The Economist. The shift came partly through purchases from US and European enrichers. But building meaningful enrichment capacity takes years, and the $4.2 billion Sapporo commitment is a start rather than a solution.2
France's parallel nuclear expansion illustrates the scale of ambition and the complications involved. The European Commission launched a state-aid investigation in May 2026 into France's plan to subsidise six new reactors with a combined capacity of 10 GW, a project the French government has estimated will cost EUR 73 billion. The probe concerns whether the proposed subsidy structure distorts the broader European electricity market.1
The French programme offers a cautionary reference on costs. France's Flamanville EPR reactor, a single unit, reportedly came in at around $35 billion — more than double its initial estimate — and finished seven years behind schedule. Any Canadian programme targeting multiple new-build units will confront the same procurement and construction risk unless it can establish repeatable, standardised designs at scale.2
That is precisely the argument for the Candu reactor technology. Unlike the dominant light-water designs that require enriched uranium fuel, the Candu can run on natural uranium, reducing dependence on enrichment services and offering a differentiated value proposition in markets that want to minimise supply-chain exposure to US or Russian intermediaries. The Bruce Power-SaskPower agreement keeps the domestic Candu ecosystem active at a moment when reactor builders are competing globally to establish reference plants.3
The uranium equity market is pricing some scepticism into the longer-horizon demand story. The URA uranium ETF fell 3.17% on Friday (2026-06-26), suggesting investors are not treating policy announcements as near-term demand catalysts. Goldman's 17% uranium demand uplift assumes SMR construction ramps begin in the late 2020s — a timeline that still requires regulatory approvals, site selection, and project financing that have not yet closed at scale.
Canada's immediate test is whether the Bruce Power-SaskPower MoU produces a concrete investment decision in Saskatchewan and whether Ottawa will fund a competitive Candu export campaign against the American and European reactor builders now bidding for the same pipeline of projects. The MoU framework has existed before without producing a built plant.