Canada is investing more than $13m in five projects that will contribute to electricity grid modernisation in Ontario.

These were announced by Tim Hodgson, Canada’s minister of energy and natural resources, as part of the Energy Innovation Programme (EIP).

“This is how Canada becomes an energy superpower, by working with partners and by investing in the modernisation and optimisation of our electricity system,” said Hodgson. “These efforts are essential to creating a more reliable and resilient network and reducing electricity bills for Canadians.”

Around $6m of this is going to a project run by Alectra Utilities (alectrautilities.com) is Mississauga, Ontario. The objective of this project is to transform Alectras’s distribution grid electricity customers into active electricity system participants by allowing customer-owned devices such as solar panels and batteries to access and benefit from electricity markets.

The project is also receiving the Mission Innovation Green-Powered Future Mission International Collaboration Grant to support the engagement of stakeholders internationally on the success and learnings of the project.

“This initiative supports a more resilient, responsive and customer-focused grid, modernising our planning and control room operations and enabling new markets for our customers as we move from limited distribution system operator trials to full-scale implementation,” said Brian Bentz, CEO of Alectra.

Alectra will also receive $149,645 for a North American flagship project under the Mission Innovation Green Powered Future Mission’s “Five Demos in Five Continents” initiative, leveraging this grant to share knowledge and expertise from its demonstration project and to collaborate with international partners.

HIAH (mchigeeng.ca/hiah-corp) will receive $3.16m to deploy distributed energy resources (DERs) using a multi-port power conversion system to power industrial facilities in rural weak-grid locations in M’Chigeeng, Ontario. This project will develop and demonstrate a multi-port electric power conversion system (AC to DC to AC) that achieves power quality requirements while integrating standby generators, renewable generation and energy storage into a weak grid, thereby enabling a large industrial quarry to transition from diesel generators to renewable sources.

Peak Power (peakpowerenergy.com) has been allocated over £3.1m for a project in Toronto to deploy and demonstrate a DER management system at three locations that can allow simultaneous optimisation of DERs and customer participation in electricity markets.

The fifth project will see Enova Power (enovapower.com) receive $750,000 to operate a distribution-level electricity market in Waterloo, Ontario, using AI-based load forecasting and network-constrained optimisation. Through incentivising DERs, the project aims to resolve capacity constraints at selected feeders and help defer traditional infrastructure investments, mitigating rate increases for ratepayers.

“This project will enhance Enova’s ability to plan and optimise the distribution system through AI-based tools,” said Greig Cameron, CEO of Enova Power. “It will also lay the foundation for local energy procurement and unlock the potential of distributed energy resources for our customers, supporting Enova in creating the electricity system of the future.”