The federal Liberal government has unveiled its plan for Canada to move away from fully gas-powered cars and toward electric vehicles, mandating that all sales of passenger cars, SUVs, crossovers and light trucks be hybrids, electric or hydrogen-powered by 2035.
“What we’re proposing is that, by 2035, we progressively make it easier and easier to buy electric vehicles,” Environment Minister Stephen Guilbeault told CBC’s Power and Politics.
“So 12 years from now, 100 per cent of new vehicles sold would have to be electric vehicles. But people who have gas-powered engines would be able to continue using them past 2035; they just won’t be able to buy new ones.”
Here are some of your most common questions about the plan.
Can Canada’s electrical grid support the change?
Experts say yes, but not without work.
A 2020 report commissioned by Natural Resources Canada said that due to EVs, electrical power demand on the grid has the potential to increase 22.6 per cent by 2050.
“For a sense of scale, the forecasted [zero-emission vehicle] load is equivalent to adding Ontario’s 2019 annual electrical load to the national grid,” the report says.
“This number is significant, but since the growth is spread over 30 years, with most of the growth happening during the 2030-2050 timeframe, Canadian utilities have 10 years to refine the load forecast and plan for grid expansion.”
More broadly, the federal government said this summer that getting Canada’s grid to net zero by 2035 will require more than $400 billion to replace facilities and expand capacity. Critics say the plan will drive up prices and possibly make electricity less reliable.
Joanna Kyriazis with the think-tank Clean Energy Canada said individual vehicle owners don’t need to worry.
“An electric vehicle actually uses less electricity than a lot of common home appliances like your air conditioner, your water heater, even some space heaters,” she said. “So it’s not going to, you know, severely impact the grid at the household level.”
She said the federal EV mandate should help grid preparations by making the number of electric vehicles more predictable.
‘There is clearly a demand’ for electric vehicles in Canada, says environment minister
‘People who have gas-powered engines would be able to continue using them past 2035. They just wouldn’t be able to buy new ones,’ Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault told Power and Politics regarding his government’s new regulations to increase the number of electric vehicles in Canada.
What about rural Canadians who travel long distances or don’t have access to charging stations?
The Canadian automobile industry shares those concerns. It complains that the charging network is incomplete, especially in rural areas.
“Achieving higher [zero-emission vehicle] sales levels depends on favourable market conditions, stronger consumer purchase incentives … widespread charging infrastructure [and] expanded grid capacity,” said Brian Kingston, president of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association.
Natural Resources Canada estimates that depending on the availability of home charging, Canada will need between 442,000 and 469,000 public charging ports by 2035. It says that as of Dec. 1, there are 10,425 charging stations and 25,246 charging ports.
Under the new plan, automakers will need to earn a minimum number of credits or they could face fines — and one way to earn credits is to install more charging stations.
Guilbeault said a combination of private and public funding will build out the network.
“It’s not happening tomorrow,” he said. “It will happen progressively between now and 2035, and we have time to deploy the infrastructure.”
Sask. prof says province should be able to build charging infrastructure in time for feds’ 2035 EV mandate
A Saskatchewan environmental historian says he believes Saskatchewan should be able to develop enough infrastructure to be able to comply with new federal rules requiring all new vehicles to be electric or plug-in hybrid by 2035.
What if I live somewhere cold?
In an effort to address complaints that EVs are impractical in remote and northern areas, where cold conditions can cut the efficiency of batteries, plug-in hybrids with an all-electric range of 80 kilometres or more will remain eligible for sale in 2035 and beyond.
Earlier this year, Seattle-based firm Recurrent measured range loss in EVs at temperatures between –7 C and –1 C, and found 18 popular models had an average of 70 per cent of their range in freezing conditions, though there was a wide discrepancy depending on the vehicle.
Recurrent stresses that temporary range loss is not permanent battery damage, and when the temperature warms, the maximum range returns. Drivers can compensate for range loss by pre-heating their vehicles before they leave and by buying vehicles with heat pumps.
The government insists that concerns about EV performance in cold weather are overblown, noting that electric vehicles dominate the current sales market in Norway.
“Advancements in battery technology have improved cold-weather performance and increased the range of many currently available models to over 400 kilometres, representing a substantial improvement from earlier models,” Tuesday’s announcement said.
There are a lot of misconceptions about how EVs do in the cold. We heard from an electric vehicle owner and an electric vehicle researcher to set the record straight.
What if I live in an apartment or condo?
Most rental apartments don’t currently come with the electric capacity to charge electric vehicles in-house. While some condo owners have started to push for charging stations to be installed in their buildings, it can be difficult to persuade all residents and a condo board due to high installation costs and resistance from corporate landlords.
There are different incentives and regulations country-wide for new builds to include varying numbers of EV charging stations. The federal government is providing some funding to install EV chargers in multi-dwelling builds. It’s also trying to make changes to the Canadian Electrical Code so that new residential buildings will be EV-ready.
Guilbeault said the number of vehicle owners who aren’t able to charge at home is about 20 per cent.
“You will have reserve parking space — I see it in my neighbourhood — reserve parking space for electric vehicles where people can charge overnight with charging stations that are deployed by municipalities,” he said.
“More and more it’s going to be easier to charge an electric vehicle than it is today.”
How do you charge an EV without a garage or driveway?
Windsor is looking at ways to add more EV chargers across the city, including options for people without a driveway or garage. The CBC’s Chris Ensing looks at what’s working in other cities ahead of the transition to electric vehicles.
What purchase incentives will there be?
The federal government offers a $5,000 rebate for fully electric vehicles and $2,500 for hybrids within certain price points. Quebec, British Columbia and the Atlantic provinces also have provincial rebates that range from $500 to $8,000 depending on certain conditions.
Guilbeault said all provinces should get “on board” with the EV plans, singling out Ontario as one of the laggards.
He said the federal government would stick to its $5,000 rebate for now.
Guilbeault urges provinces to ‘get on board’ with electric vehicle rebates
Federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault is calling on the provinces to ‘get on board’ with incentives to encourage sales of electric vehicles.
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
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