Where Canada’s open project registers look, and where they are silent

Summary

Ask how many major projects are under way or planned in Canada and the answer depends on which list you open. When the registers were read at the end of October 2026, Natural Resources Canada’s inventory covered natural-resource projects in all 13 provinces and territories and listed 318 of them. British Columbia publishes its own register of projects across every sector, which listed 648. Ontario publishes a sample of key public infrastructure projects and, above the display threshold used here, listed 262.

None of these numbers measures how much is being built. They measure what each publisher has chosen to list. This note sets out what each register covers, how the same province can look very different depending on the register, and where no open register was found.

Four registers, four different questions

Because the cost measures differ, Northline never adds them together. A project can also appear in more than one register, and the Investment & Development Monitor flags possible matches instead of merging them.

One province, several pictures

The two federal registers cover every province and territory, so they allow a like-for-like count of what each lists. They are not interchangeable: one covers natural-resource projects and the other publicly funded infrastructure. A province with a short list in one can have a long list in the other.

British Columbia’s register lists 648 projects in a single source, and Ontario’s lists 262 in another. Those two counts come from different registers with different rules, so they are not a comparison of the two provinces.

Where no open register was found

For Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador and the three territories, this review did not find an openly licensed provincial or territorial register of major projects. Manitoba publishes a highway and infrastructure capital plan that carries no cost field. Alberta publishes a register whose reuse terms are unconfirmed, so it is not used here. For the places without a register, only the two federal registers are used, and they list natural-resource and federally funded public projects only.

That is a statement about what was found on 31 October 2026. It is not evidence that those places have fewer projects.

What the registers cannot tell us

• How much is being invested. A listed cost is an estimate for one project. It is not annual spending and not a contribution to GDP.
• How many jobs follow. None of the registers used here is a source of realised employment.
• Whether projects proceed. Registers record plans and approvals; projects are delayed or cancelled.
• Whether two registers describe the same project. Names and costs sometimes match closely; Northline flags those cases and leaves the records separate.

Explore it yourself

The Investment & Development Monitor shows every register on one map, with each project’s source, licence and what its cost figure means. The coverage table lists, for every province and territory, which registers exist, which are shown and which were not found.