Hydro-Québec Warns of a Looming Power Deficit, and New Brunswick Files a New Rate Case

Hydro-Québec told the public on November 3 that the surplus which ran dry in September could become an import need within three years. In New Brunswick, the government-owned utility filed for a new three-year rate increase, and the federal government put $219 million toward refurbishing the Mactaquac dam.

Developments dated October 12 – November 11, 2026, covering Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Québec and New Brunswick. See the About page for how this scan works and what it can and can’t check.

Québec: a warning of a deficit within three years

Hydro-Québec, the publicly owned utility that generates and sells almost all of the province’s electricity, told reporters around November 3 that demand growth — it is projecting an increase of more than 30% by 2041 — combined with three years of below-normal rain and snowfall, could force the province to import power from the United States or other provinces within three years. That would reverse the story this blog reported in September: a twenty-year-old surplus that Hydro-Québec used to sell south running dry for the first time. We have read only wire-service coverage of the briefing where this was presented, not Hydro-Québec’s own report, so what the company or the provincial government plan to do about it isn’t yet known.

Source: CTV News / BNN Bloomberg (Canadian Press), Nov 3, 2026.

Québec: an energy minister, five weeks after the election

September’s report on Québec’s election left one thing unresolved: who would run the energy file. On October 21 Premier Paul St-Pierre Plamondon named a 23-member cabinet — a “smaller group” by Québec’s own description of it — and gave the energy portfolio to Stéphane Paquet, formally the Minister of Economic Development, Innovation and Energy, who also oversees the Montréal region.

Hydro-Québec’s residential rates, meanwhile, aren’t actually waiting on the new government: the Régie de l’énergie already fixed them through March 2029 last spring, under a government decree (1239-2025) issued by the outgoing administration that capped residential increases at 3% a year. The Régie’s final order sets the actual increases at 3.0% for the year starting April 2026, 2.9% for April 2027, and 2.6% for April 2028. What hasn’t been said publicly by Paquet or the Premier is anything about extending that cap past 2029, or about the agreement with Newfoundland and Labrador to redevelop the Churchill Falls and Gull Island hydro dams.

Sources: Gouvernement du Québec, Conseil des ministres; Noovo Info, Oct 21, 2026; Régie de l’énergie, press release on decision D-2026-033 (French, March 16, 2026) and decision D-2026-081 (French, July 30, 2026, ¶17).

New Brunswick: a new three-year rate request

NB Power, the provincially owned utility that generates and sells nearly all of New Brunswick’s electricity, filed a General Rate Application on October 6 asking the New Brunswick Energy and Utilities Board (NBEUB, the provincial regulator that must approve its rates) for a 5.5% rate increase in each of the next three years. Compounded, that comes to roughly 17.4% by 2029. For a home using 1,350 kWh a month, the first year alone would add about $13.25. This is a separate, later case from the one decided last spring, in which the Board approved a 4.29% increase — not the 4.75% NB Power had requested — with its written reasons issued in August. That request-versus-approved gap is very likely the source of the second, conflicting figure that confused last month’s report. The Board held a procedural conference on November 2 to set a hearing schedule; it hasn’t been set yet.

Sources: NBEUB, Notice — Matter EL-003-2026; NB Power, General Rate Application; CTV News Atlantic, on the Board’s 4.29% decision.

New Brunswick: a federal loan for the Mactaquac dam

Ottawa announced on October 13 a $219 million loan from the Canada Infrastructure Bank, a federal Crown corporation that lends toward infrastructure projects, toward refurbishing NB Power’s 672-megawatt Mactaquac hydroelectric dam on the Saint John River, meant to extend its life to 2068. Per the funding announcement, the money goes toward engineering studies, regulatory reviews and consultation with First Nations; it’s part of a roughly $270 million federal package that also funds a substation upgrade elsewhere in the province. Federal Energy Minister Tim Hodgson said generation is a provincial responsibility and didn’t commit federal money to construction itself.

The project’s cost has grown sharply since NB Power first agreed to it: a 2016 plan put the refurbishment at up to $3.6 billion; NB Power’s CEO said on October 13 the total is now expected to be close to $9 billion. NB Power’s own project page puts the required federal Fisheries Act authorization at around March 2027, with the refurbishment work potentially running until 2037 or 2038.

Sources: BNN Bloomberg (Canadian Press), Oct 13, 2026; Government of New Brunswick; NB Power, Mactaquac Project.

Also this month

• Maine — Central Maine Power’s $189 million rate case keeps moving through hearings scheduled for January; whether CMP asked regulators to reconsider their October 6 denial of temporary rates couldn’t be confirmed. The state energy agency still hasn’t filed the replacement for net energy billing it owed regulators by September 30; its own program page, unchanged for six weeks, still promises a filing “in the coming weeks.”
• New Hampshire — A law allowing small, plug-in portable solar panels (Senate Bill 540) takes effect January 1; last month’s report guessed it might require a regulatory rulemaking — it doesn’t. Whether regulators approved Liberty Utilities’ temporary gas-rate settlement is still unknown; the agency’s online filings are blocked to automated review. A preliminary roadmap on nuclear power, due by late September under an executive order, hasn’t appeared.
• Vermont — This report can no longer confirm the docket number it has been citing for the state’s net-metering rulemaking; a closely related case number is well documented instead, and the correct one needs checking before it’s cited again. A proposed 2.99% rate increase for Burlington’s municipal utility remains unapproved.
• Regional — Federal regulators have ordered every regional grid operator, including the one that runs New England’s grid, to justify or fix its rules for connecting very large new power users — the category a proposed data center in Bow, New Hampshire, falls into. New England’s grid operator must respond by November 16.

A correction

September’s and October’s reports both described a $2.2 billion transmission upgrade — selected by ISO-New England, the independent operator of the regional grid and its wholesale electricity markets, to raise how much power can move into and across Maine and connect new wind turbines near Pittsfield — as a Central Maine Power project. ISO-NE’s own final report, the same one both earlier posts linked, names it a joint proposal with Public Service of New Hampshire and NSTAR Electric Company — together, the two utilities that make up Eversource in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. New Hampshire has a direct stake in this line that neither earlier report mentioned. Dated notes have been added to both earlier posts; their original sentences are kept.

Adoption: public charging stations

The Alternative Fuels Data Center counts charging stations in Canada the same way as in the U.S., so this is the one adoption measure directly comparable across the border; each sub-region is still reported on its own. Movement everywhere is small and looks like ordinary listing churn rather than a trend. Source: DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station API, queried November 11, 2026.

Separately, a question this blog has been carrying since September is now answered: a Canada Energy Regulator report, drawing on Natural Resources Canada’s own data, confirms heat pumps are tracked province by province, rather than lumped into “electric heating” generally — Québec and New Brunswick account for 36% and 13% of the country’s growth in heat pumps since 2000. The catch is the data only runs through 2023, with nothing more recent published. No comparable installed-count figure exists for Maine, New Hampshire or Vermont.

Source: Canada Energy Regulator, Market Snapshot, Aug 12, 2026.

Worth watching next month

• Maine — DOER’s filing of the net energy billing successor; whether CMP sought reconsideration of the temporary-rate denial.
• New Hampshire — the outcome of Liberty’s temporary-rate settlement; whether the nuclear roadmap appears; ISO-NE’s November 16 response on large-load interconnection rules.
• Vermont — confirmation of the net-metering rulemaking’s actual docket number.
• Québec — any statement from Energy Minister Paquet or the Premier on rates, the tariff cap, or the Churchill Falls agreement; Hydro-Québec’s full supply report.
• New Brunswick — hearing dates for NB Power’s new rate request.
• Regional — whether ISO-NE and the states’ committee have a signed agreement for the $2.2 billion Maine–New Hampshire line.