Linking Renewable Energy to Rural Development - Québec, Canada

The energy sector is a pillar of Québec’s regional competitiveness, and the province is also making investments to improve its specialisation in renewable energy. Québec is currently implementing an ambitious energy strategy that aims to increase the installed hydroelectric capacity further and to support other renewable energy sectors. Smaller-scale renewable energy initiatives are also appearing in connection with existing rural industries, such as forestry, where biomass energy offers another promising rural development opportunity. Québec’s renewable energy policy also aims to revive lagging rural economies by developing their manufacturing sector. The goal of the current deployment of wind energy is to create new jobs in rural communities affected by the decline of primary industries.

This paper examines Québec’s policy interventions for renewable energy, and offers five main findings: i) renewable energy policy can create new manufacturing jobs in lagging rural communities, although this needs a large amount of public resources and there can be issues about the long term sustainability of the policy; ii) Local content requirements (LCRs) are a powerful tool to attract foreign investment in a specific region, but they increase the cost of renewable energy; iii) Focusing efforts on a small number of “winners” within renewable energy technologies can overlook other technologies that could develop better links to rural industries; iv) Deploying a few large-scale projects reduces policy complexity, but also reduces the number of rural dwellers and businesses benefiting; v) If it was to promote a large number of small-scale projects, renewable energy could benefit a larger number of rural businesses and individuals.