Ontario Premier Doug Ford stated this week that his province is considering a halt to electricity exports to the United States. Ford described the potential measure as a response to trade policies initiated by President Trump, telling The Associated Press on Monday that "everything is on the table" and he would "do whatever it takes" to protect regional interests.
The remarks come amid an ongoing trade dispute between the two nations. Ford expanded on his position during a Wednesday press conference, suggesting that a coordinated "Team Canada" approach involving multiple provinces would be necessary to implement such a measure effectively, noting that Ontario is not the only province that supplies power to the U.S. market.
According to data cited by the Canada Energy Regulator and the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Canada provided less than 1 percent of the total electricity consumed in the U.S. last year. However, experts noted that the reliance on these imports is higher in specific Northern U.S. regions. Doug Arent, a global fellow at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy, stated that a unilateral cutoff by Ontario would likely be a "symbolic gesture" rather than a material disruption.
John Parsons, a senior lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, said that losing Canadian imports would force U.S. grid operators to activate more expensive domestic power plants. Parsons noted this shift would result in both higher costs for consumers and increased carbon dioxide emissions. Arent added that if multiple provinces joined the effort and the shutoff lasted more than a few days, residents in the Northeast U.S. could see price impacts on their monthly bills.
The scale of the impact depends on the duration of the proposed cutoff. Arent noted that price increases would likely become noticeable if a shutoff persisted for "days or weeks," potentially appearing in household utility bills within the same month. Because the U.S. grid is interconnected, the sudden withdrawal of Canadian supply could force regional grid operators to adjust energy procurement strategies in real-time. This sets a precedent for using energy exports as a direct retaliatory tool in North American trade negotiations, a move Ford suggested would be most effective if adopted by other Canadian provinces.
What happens next remains dependent on provincial coordination and the progression of the broader trade dispute. No specific date for a service termination has been set, as Ford stated he cannot act alone and is seeking a unified "Team Canada" strategy. The U.S. administration has not yet issued a formal response to the Premier's comments, and it is not yet known if other power-exporting provinces, such as Quebec or Manitoba, will join Ontario’s proposed plan.