Power Sustainable plans $10-billion investment push in Canadian infrastructure and companies over five years

Montreal-based Power Sustainable plans to channel at least $10-billion into Canadian infrastructure and companies over the next five years, aiming to capture a surge in investor interest in Canada by pivoting further toward its home market.

The sustainability-focused asset manager, a subsidiary of financial services giant Power Corp. of Canada POW-T, plans to invest from its own funds, draw in capital from co-investors, and tap debt markets to finance a growing pipeline of potential projects.

Meeting the $10-billion target would roughly double Power Sustainable’s total investing activity since it launched its first energy infrastructure strategy in 2021. Since then, the company has expanded to make private equity investments in clean energy, industrial and agrifood businesses, as well as private loans to infrastructure companies.

Chief executive officer Bruce Heyman, a former U.S. ambassador to Canada who joined Power Sustainable two years ago, said in an interview that a rapid and aggressive shift by the United States to reshape trade through tariffs “has forced us to rethink capital deployment and how and where we would do that.”

Some Canadian and global investors are showing more than just curiosity about Canada, he said. They are specifically looking for more exposure to Canada.

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Power Sustainable chairman Olivier Desmarais, whose family controls Power Corp., has travelled extensively to countries such as the United Arab Emirates and China as part of visits that Prime Minister Mark Carney made over the past year to forge new investment ties.

Some investors have said, “We want to invest with you, but we want Canada,” Mr. Heyman said. There were even institutions that offered significantly larger financial commitments than he expected “if we could give them pure, Canada-only strategies.”

Power Sustainable invests across North America and other developed countries, including in the U.S., but has redirected capital that might otherwise have been deployed abroad to pursue domestic investments, contributing to the $10-billion goal.

“We are focused on Canada, and we wanted to profoundly put our stake in the ground and say we’re going to lean in on this moment,” Mr. Heyman said.

Next week, Mr. Carney and major pension funds will stage the first Canada Investment Summit, drawing CEOs from most of the world’s most prominent financial companies to Toronto.

It will take place against the backdrop of a trade war. After Canada walked away from negotiations to lower tariff rates and imposed retaliatory tariffs on Tuesday, U.S. President Donald Trump escalated the dispute by promising to ban some Canadian alcohol, motorcycles and dairy products and add additional tariffs on Sep. 29.

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As tensions flare, Mr. Heyman said he is “trying to look over the horizon here, as best I can.” He is focusing on the growing demand around the world for energy, critical minerals, food, water and talent – all of which are sectors where Canada can contribute.

“I actually think this bit of uncertainty creates the economic opportunity for some outsized returns for investors,” he said.

Ottawa has set a target to attract $500-billion in new private-sector investment to Canada over five years, and earmarked 18 major infrastructure, energy and mining projects as important to the country.

As those projects get funded, “there are dozens, if not hundreds, of additional businesses that will need to build out supply chains and infrastructure,” including in energy and transportation, in order to “feed those projects,” Mr. Heyman said. “We see incredible investment opportunities.”

Some of the planned $10-billion in investments will come from funds Power Sustainable has raised for its core strategies. But co-investments from global partners and the ability to tap financing, including from the Big Six Canadian banks, will be key to meeting the target.

Power Sustainable is in advanced discussions with investors from the Middle East, Europe, Asia and the U.S., Mr. Heyman said. And the company has projects amounting to about one gigawatt of renewable energy that are “ready to be deployed in Canada.”

“Our pipeline of conversations in that regard is deep and robust for additional projects in Canada,” he said.