The following is a re-print of the June 2025 edition of Shift Storm, the CCPA’s monthly newsletter which focuses on the intersection of work and climate change. Click here to subscribe to Shift Storm and get the latest updates straight to your inbox as soon as they come out.
U.S. tariffs and geopolitical destabilization have spurred an overdue appetite for industrial policy in Canada. Decades of economic development led by the private sector has created deep vulnerabilities in the Canadian economy, and public leadership will be necessary to reassert independence and ensure long-term prosperity in a rapidly changing world.
It’s an argument well-made in a major new report published by the Transition Accelerator, The Right Move at the Right Time, which calls this a “once-in-a-generation” opportunity to transform the Canadian economy. The paper argues that Canada needs a central authority to identify priority sectors and to facilitate coordination between industry and government in those sectors. Crucially, those sectors need to be aligned with a net-zero economy over the long term not only to reduce emissions but also to take advantage of emerging opportunities in a decarbonizing global economy. A separate report from the Transition Accelerator this month, The Productivity Benefits of High-Value, Low-Carbon Investment, highlights mass timber, sustainable aviation fuel and electric vehicles as opportunity areas.
These recommendations generally align with the CCPA’s own work on industrial policy, including the Alternative Federal Budget and our 2022 citizen’s guide to green industrial policy. Our work emphasizes a stronger voice for workers in industrial policy as well as a more grassroots approach to determining industrial priorities, especially at the regional level. We’d like to see more aggressive use of Crown corporations to drive new technologies and markets, and we’d prefer a focus on truly zero-emission industries rather than biofuels and the like. But we fully agree on the core project of leveraging the state to accelerate long-term, strategic industrial development in the public interest.
The new federal government is using much of the same language. The Liberal election platform and the PM’s mandate letter talk about industrial policy priorities, and the government’s signature Building Canada Act is couched in terms of accelerating industrial projects in the “national interest.” Unfortunately, there are several major issues with the government’s approach so far.
First, weakening Indigenous rights and environmental protections, which the Conservative-backed Building Canada Act is designed to do, is clearly not in the public interest, whether or not a project is deemed to be in the “national interest.” Industrial development should be done in service of Indigenous reconciliation, decarbonization and other social and environmental priorities, not in spite of them.
Second, the federal government’s industrial priorities include defence spending and fossil fuel infrastructure, neither of which is consistent with a cleaner and healthier economy. Indeed, they are counterproductive to much of the green industrial work we ought to be doing.
Third, there is a big difference between nation-building projects and a nation-building strategy. One-off initiatives are flashy, but facilitating an industrial transformation takes more systematic and sustained effort. This is a major focus of the Transition Accelerator report. In the absence of a big picture vision—popularized by economist Mariana Mazzucato as a mission-oriented industrial strategy—and a long-term commitment to specific technologies and supply chains, industrial policy efforts are much more likely to fail.
It’s not too late for the federal government to articulate a clear and productive industrial vision—one that is consistent with long-term sustainability and inclusive prosperity. But it’s clear we have a lot of work to do.
Lots of research to dive into this month before the summer lull, so let’s get into it.
Storm surge: this month’s key reads
Landmark report lays the groundwork for Indigenous-led climate policy
Indigenous Climate Action has released Land Back is Climate Policy, the final installment of its ambitious Decolonizing Climate Policy research project. It builds on the findings of a previous report, featured in this newsletter back in 2023, that focused on barriers to Indigenous climate leadership in Canada—especially the role of settler climate policy in perpetuating colonialism.
The new report is a tour de force of good ideas grounded in extensive interviews with Indigenous youth and communities. It documents all of the many ways Indigenous Peoples are already leading on climate policy, and the ways in which Indigenous worldviews can transform climate action for the better.
There is a clear message for Indigenous allies in the climate policy space: stop getting in the way by defending colonial institutions, and start actively supporting Indigenous sovereignty. Self-determination is the central theme of the work, including the necessity of free, prior and informed consent for projects on Indigenous land. It’s precisely the opposite approach to the one being taken by the federal government right now.
Large-scale worker training an essential input for decarbonization
One of the most underappreciated barriers to decarbonizing the Canadian economy is an insufficient skilled workforce. Despite rising unemployment, there are already large skill shortages in some sectors, such as the building trades, that are projected to rise significantly as an aging workforce retires. Canada is on track for more than a million skilled trade job openings in the next decade alone.
A new report from the Pembina Institute, Recruit, Train, Retain, explores these trends and the need for more proactive workforce development to realize Canada’s climate commitments. Our grand infrastructure dreams will grind to a halt without enough skilled workers in every region of the country.
Incidentally, workforce development is a big part of industrial strategy. Coordinating the training pipeline with projected labour needs in strategic sectors is a key role of government. Historically, government training programs have deferred to market demand, but that approach is insufficient in a context where public leadership is driving a particular economic trajectory. Given the long timelines associated with apprenticeships, in particular, we need to start training new workers ten years before they’re needed.
Among the Pembina report’s recommendations is the necessity of increasing public spending on post-secondary institutions. Colleges and universities are being squeezed at precisely the moment we need more capacity, not less.
UK releases business-first industrial strategy
Keeping on with our industrial strategy theme this month, the government of the UK published its much-anticipated Modern Industrial Strategy, which checks many of the boxes described above. It is comprehensive, mission-oriented and consistent with a net-zero economy. Decarbonization is a central theme of the strategy, and the eight industrial priority areas identified in the plan, such as advanced manufacturing, life sciences and the creative industry, are generally consistent with that goal (the main exceptions being the defence industry and carbon capture in the energy industry).
The biggest red flag is the strategy’s capitulation to the private sector. Two of the plan’s four major pillars are explicitly focused on making it easier to do business, in part through deregulation, and creating “enduring partnerships” with business (i.e., P3s). In matters of investment, the plan sets out “a strategic course that allows business to make long-term decisions” with no institutionalized input from communities or workers. And while the plan creates some new public institutions, such as an Industrial Strategy Council, they are mainly relegated to advisory roles.
The published strategy is only the first step for the UK. The government has promised additional sectoral strategies, and it will need to budget for the new spending it has promised or implied. Despite its limitations, this is a useful example for Canada to consider in the development of our own industrial strategy.
Research radar: the latest developments in work and climate
Indigenous-led development a path forward for critical minerals. The Canadian Climate Institute released Critical Path, which explores how Canada can benefit economically from booming demand for critical minerals without compromising on Indigenous rights or environmental protection. It’s a fine line to walk, but I appreciate CCI’s recommendation that Indigenous communities should have ownership stakes and a degree of control over any projects on their territories. The report also emphasizes that trying to rush projects through—like the government is attempting to do with the Building Canada Act—is ultimately counterproductive. Rushed projects attract legal challenges and are prone to costly errors down the line.
Canada’s big bet on LNG a recipe for economic failure. The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis finds in a new analysis that the purported economic benefits of liquified natural gas for Canada are likely transient due to growing competition and a looming supply glut. Despite federal and provincial governments banking on LNG as an industry of the future, in the long term these projects will likely worsen affordability, environmental quality and economic stability in their communities.
Federal adaptation plan too weak given rising climate impacts. The Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development has found once again that a federal climate plan is too vague and unambitious to meet a major challenge. This time, it is the National Adaptation Strategy that comes under fire for failing to prioritize the greatest climate risks, to allocate sufficient resources or to develop a framework for measuring results. Climate adaptation is vital, but a piecemeal approach won’t insulate us from the growing impacts of extreme weather.
Disadvantaged communities are being cut out of the EV transition. A study published in Nature Communications finds that disadvantaged communities in the U.S.—defined by low socioeconomic status and a high dependence on fossil fuels—have access to half as many electric vehicle charging stations as other communities. It’s not an especially surprising finding given the North American EV market’s focus on luxury vehicles and at-home charging, but it reinforces the risk of transition policies exacerbating inequality.
UK must leave oil in the ground to meet emissions goals… Researchers at University College London published The Climate Implications of New Oil and Gas Fields in the UK, which makes it very clear that the UK cannot develop any additional fossil fuel projects without endangering domestic and global climate commitments. The recognition that most fossil fuels need to go unburned has been established for a long time, but governments around the world continue to entertain expansion plans.
…while scaling up offshore wind in its place. The UK’s Energy Transition Unit published Striking the Balance, which models different scenarios for the future of the UK’s offshore energy workforce. While offshore oil and gas jobs are slated to decline in the coming decades in most scenarios, they can be more than offset through an expansion of offshore wind power. It’s a prime opportunity for a just transition but only if the public sector can mobilize the requisite investment.
Ireland publishes first official just transition report. Kudos to the Just Transition Commission of Ireland for releasing its introductory report this month. This newsletter is a big fan of the Scottish Just Transition Commission, and the new Irish commission has a similar mandate. The initial report focuses on the big picture for Ireland, recommending a comprehensive just transition strategy and the institutional framework necessary to support it. Hopefully, the commission will follow in the footsteps of their Scottish counterparts by engaging directly with workers and communities in future work.
RBC remains the biggest climate villain in the Canadian banking sector. The 2025 edition of the Banking on Climate Chaos report by a coalition of global ENGOs lists RBC as the 8th largest fossil fuel financier in the world, increasing its financing to the fossil fuel industry by US$34.3 billion over last year. Every major Canadian bank is overinvested in fossil fuels relative to its international peers. The report calls out the Coastal GasLink pipeline project, which is being pushed through Wetʼsuwetʼen territory in the face of significant opposition, as a particularly egregious project. Collectively, the global banking sector committed US$429 billion toward fossil fuel expansion projects last year.
Global climate investment falling short by half or more. Speaking of finance, a new report from Oil Change International, Private Fantasies, Public Realities, finds that the world is only spending 38 per cent of what is necessary to achieve a just transition to a net-zero global economy. A similar finding is buried in the International Energy Agency’s latest World Energy Investment report, which concludes that clean energy investment needs to double or triple to meet climate goals. According to OCI, the main issue is deference to the private sector and the hope that the market will voluntarily shift its investment dollars from dirty to clean sectors. The report calls for stronger green industrial policy as a solution.
South Africa a case study in why carbon tariffs work. The Net-Zero Tracker published Carbon Competitiveness, which describes the need for South Africa to decarbonize its exports to meet the demands of the EU and other economies that apply a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) to imports. In short, a CBAM applies the domestic carbon price to any good that was produced without facing a carbon price of its own. It’s a smart policy, now being entertained by Canada, to offset the competitiveness concerns of domestic carbon pricing systems. One of the big takeaways from this report, however, is that CBAMs are not only about domestic competitiveness—they also apply helpful pressure on other countries to improve their own climate policies.
The AI industry is booming, but it may be making us stupid. In this month’s AI corner, Stanford University published its 2025 Artificial Intelligence Index Report, which is a really helpful overview of just about everything going on in the sector, including technological changes, government regulation, environmental impacts and public opinion. It notes, for example, that AI optimism is low in Canada—only 40 per cent of polled respondents felt AI was a net positive—but rising quickly compared to previous years. A separate study from MIT’s Media Lab, Your Brain on ChatGPT, offers a warning about the cognitive consequences of relying on AI tools. In short, the more we use them, the less our brains work. It’s another canary in the coal mine for unregulated AI use.
