Canada’s federal government has announced C$97.3 million (almost US$72 million) in new funding for clean transportation projects across the country. It was announced by Natural Resources Canada and other federal departments. The money will support 155 projects in provinces and territories nationwide.
The investment aims to expand electric vehicle (EV) charging, help freight fleets reduce emissions, and increase public awareness of clean transportation.
The Honourable Julie Dabrusin, Minister of Environment and Climate Change and Nature, stated,
“We are making it easier, cleaner, and more affordable for Canadians to get where they need to go by investing in new EV charging infrastructure… Making the switch to an electric vehicle reduces greenhouse gas emissions, and with the EV Affordability Program, drivers can save up to $5000, making EVs more accessible for Canadians to go electric.”
Transportation is Canada’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. According to Environment and Climate Change Canada, transport accounted for about 22–25% of national emissions in 2023, totaling almost 157 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent. Passenger vehicles and freight trucks make up most of these emissions.
Reducing transport emissions is key to Canada’s goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.
Charging Ahead: Billions Flow Into EV Infrastructure
The biggest part of the C$97.3 million package, C$84.4 million, will support EV charging infrastructure. This funding comes from Canada’s Zero Emission Vehicle Infrastructure Program (ZEVIP). It will support 122 projects that will install more than 8,000 new EV chargers across the country.
Canada already has more than 30,000 public charging ports installed, according to Natural Resources Canada. The new chargers will expand coverage in cities, rural areas, highways, workplaces, and multi-unit residential buildings.
Some major recipients include:
- Pollution Probe Foundation: C$7.3 million for 495 chargers.
- Manitoba Motor Dealers Association: C$6.5 million for up to 520 chargers.
- DP World Canada: C$4.375 million for 111 chargers.
- Purolator Inc.: C$2.575 million for 393 chargers.
Municipalities such as Calgary, Vancouver, Regina, Kelowna, Mississauga, and St. John’s are also receiving funding.
The federal government has set a target for 100% of new light-duty vehicle sales to be zero-emission by 2035. Expanding charging infrastructure supports this goal and helps reduce range concerns for drivers.
Greening the Freight Network
The announcement also includes C$5.7 million for three projects under the Green Freight Program. Medium- and heavy-duty trucks play a major role in freight transport. These vehicles consume large amounts of diesel fuel and produce significant emissions.
The Green Freight funding will help fleets with the following:
- Upgrade engines and vehicles,
- Improve fuel efficiency,
- Adopt low-carbon technologies, and
- Improve logistics planning.
Freight trucks represent about 37% of Canada’s transportation emissions, according to federal data. Cutting fuel use in this segment can reduce both operating costs and carbon output.
These projects aim to improve fleet performance while supporting Canada’s broader climate targets.
Education and Indigenous-led Initiatives in the EV Shift
The remaining C$7.2 million will support 30 education and awareness projects across Canada. These initiatives will provide information about EV adoption, charging technology, and clean fuels. They will also help train workers in EV infrastructure installation and maintenance.
Of the 30 projects, 11 are Indigenous-led. These projects focus on increasing awareness and access to clean transportation in Indigenous communities and northern regions.
Activities in this program include:
- Community test-drive events
- Skills training workshops
- Public outreach on clean fuel options
The advocates believe that education helps build confidence in electric mobility and supports long-term adoption.
Part of a Bigger National Electrification Push
The C$97.3 million funding is part of Canada’s broader Automotive Strategy and National Charging Infrastructure Strategy, announced in early 2026.
In addition to this funding, the Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB) increased its charging and hydrogen refueling program by C$1 billion. This brings the total funding in that initiative to C$1.5 billion. The CIB program aims to support up to 5,400 new public fast-charging stations across the country.
The government also continues to provide purchase incentives for zero-emission vehicles. Federal rebates of up to C$5,000 are available for eligible EV buyers under existing programs.
Together, these measures aim to reduce emissions while strengthening Canada’s auto sector and supply chains. More so, the sector’s GHG emissions keep rising again post-COVID 19 pandemic.
Supporting Canada’s Net-Zero and 2035 ZEV Targets
This funding supports Canada’s national climate targets. The federal government plans to cut emissions by 40–45% from 2005 levels by 2030. It also aims for net-zero emissions by 2050.
This commitment is part of the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act. Transportation is the biggest source of emissions in the country, and so cutting vehicle emissions is key to reaching these goals.
Canada has set rules for new light-duty vehicles. By 2035, all sales must be zero-emission. There are interim goals of 20% by 2026 and 60% by 2030. Expanding EV charging helps meet those sales targets by making electric vehicles more practical for drivers across urban and rural areas.
Also, the federal government has set national infrastructure targets of deploying 84,500 EV chargers and 45 hydrogen refueling stations by 2029. These targets aim to ensure that charging and refueling networks grow in step with rising zero-emission vehicle adoption across the country.
Cleaner freight projects also support Canada’s broader plan to cut emissions from medium- and heavy-duty vehicles. The C$97.3 million funding supports Canada’s long-term move to a lower-carbon transportation system. It combines infrastructure investment, fleet upgrades, and education programs.
Closing the Emissions Gap in Transport
Transportation emissions remain high in Canada. Power plant emissions have fallen in recent years, but transport emissions have been slower to drop.
Electric vehicles produce zero tailpipe emissions. Canada’s electricity grid is about 83% non-emitting. So, when powered by it, EVs can greatly reduce carbon output. Heavy-duty vehicle upgrades and freight efficiency improvements also provide measurable reductions.
The new C$97.3 million funding helps close infrastructure gaps and prepares communities for increased EV adoption. It also sends a signal to private investors. Public funding often helps unlock additional private capital in clean energy and infrastructure projects.
Moreover, the installation of 8,000 new chargers will increase national charging coverage. Freight modernization projects will reduce diesel use, while education programs will improve awareness and workforce skills.
These steps support Canada’s commitment to reducing emissions by 40–45% below 2005 levels by 2030, while moving toward net-zero by 2050.
The C$97.3 million investment is one part of a broader national effort. As charging networks grow and fleets modernize, Canada’s transportation sector may gradually lower its carbon footprint. Further policy support, infrastructure development, and private investment will determine the pace of that transition.
- READ MORE: From Now to 2060: How Canada’s SMRs and Maritime Nuclear Power Will Drive a Net-Zero Future
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The accounting differences that decide whether your nature investment shows up in inventory, in BVCM, or nowhere at all.
The question reaches a procurement team about three weeks before the next sustainability committee meeting. Someone has read about insetting. Someone else has just signed off on an offset purchase. The CSO wants to know if the two are interchangeable. The answer is no, and the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard is the reason why.
This article walks through what each term means at audit-grade specificity, what the standards actually say about how each gets counted, and how to decide which tool fits which target. The insetting vs offsetting question is one of the most-searched in corporate climate strategy, and one of the most poorly answered. By the end of this piece, you should be able to brief a committee on the difference without notes.
The two definitions, in plain English
Offsetting means buying carbon credits generated outside your value chain and retiring them against your residual emissions. The reduction happens somewhere else, financed by you, and the credit is the receipt.
Insetting means investing in emission reductions or removals inside your own value chain, typically with suppliers, where the reduction is directly linked to the products and services you buy. The reduction happens inside the boundary of your Scope 3 inventory, and the accounting treatment is fundamentally different.
The shorthand from the University of Oxford’s Nature-based Insetting Initiative is useful: insetting is what you do with the supply chain you have; offsetting is what you do with the supply chain you do not have.
What the GHG Protocol Land Sector Standard actually says
The GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard, finalised in 2024 after a multi-year pilot, sets the rules for how land-based emission reductions and removals enter corporate inventories. The Standard distinguishes between inventory accounting (Scope 1, 2, and 3) and project or intervention accounting (a separate methodology for crediting).
For insetting, the practical implication is that supplier-level interventions, when properly measured and attributed, can reduce your Scope 3 category 1 (purchased goods and services) emissions in your inventory. The reduction is not a credit retired against the inventory; it is a lower inventory number, period.
For offsetting, the credit is retired separately. It can be reported as a contribution toward a net-zero claim under the SBTi Beyond Value Chain Mitigation framework or as part of a VCMI Carbon Integrity claim, but it does not lower the inventory number.
A practical consequence: if your Science Based Target requires a 50% absolute reduction in Scope 3 emissions by 2030, insetting moves you toward the target. Offsetting does not. This single point of difference reshapes the procurement decision.
When insetting counts toward Scope 3 (and when it does not)
Insetting counts toward Scope 3 only when several conditions are met:
- The intervention must occur with an entity in your value chain.
- The emissions reduction or removal must be measured against a defensible baseline.
- The reduction must be attributed to your share of that supplier’s output, not double-counted with other buyers.
- It must follow the inventory accounting rules in the GHG Protocol Land Sector Standard, not the project accounting rules used to generate credits.
The most common failure mode is double counting. If your supplier sells the same reduction as a credit on the voluntary market and also reports it to you as a Scope 3 reduction, the math breaks. The Standard requires you to address this risk, typically by purchasing and retiring the supplier-issued credit as part of your inventory or by contractual provisions that prevent the supplier from selling the reduction twice.
When insetting does not count toward Scope 3: when the intervention sits with a supplier you do not buy from, when the baseline is not defensible, when the attribution is unclear, or when the documentation does not survive audit. Those cases default to Beyond Value Chain Mitigation, which is still useful but operates on a different ledger.
The procurement and supplier engagement question
Insetting is harder than offsetting. That is the unfashionable truth most buyers eventually confront. Offsetting is a transaction; insetting is a relationship.
To run an insetting program, you need supplier mapping precise enough to know which farms or facilities sit at which Scope 3 boundary. You need an engagement model that gets suppliers to participate, which usually requires multi-year commitments and shared economics. You need an MRV architecture that measures the right things and produces audit-ready documentation. And you need a contractual structure that prevents double counting and protects both sides.
The trade-off you receive in return is significant. Reductions count against your inventory rather than your residual. Supplier relationships deepen, which protects sourcing continuity. Yield and quality improvements often follow regenerative interventions, which reduces your input cost over time. And the regulatory file, under CSRD, CSDDD, EUDR, and the SBTi FLAG Guidance, is materially stronger.
Choosing the right tool for the right target
A practical decision rule. If your target is a science-based Scope 3 reduction and you operate in a FLAG sector or source FLAG commodities, insetting is the structurally correct tool. If your target is a net-zero claim that includes neutralising hard-to-abate residual emissions outside your value chain, BVCM via high-integrity offsets is the structurally correct tool. Most companies with material Scope 3 exposure need both, in different proportions, sequenced over time.
The sequencing matters. Insetting takes longer to stand up but produces a permanent reduction in the inventory. Offsetting can be transacted faster but does not change the inventory and now sits under tighter claim restrictions. Treat them as complementary tools with different jobs, not as substitutes. The Accountability Framework Initiative and the IUCN Global Standard for Nature-based Solutions both provide useful guardrails for the insetting side, with biodiversity, human rights, and benefit-sharing requirements that go beyond carbon math.
If you are mapping a Scope 3 reduction roadmap and need to scope which interventions count toward your inventory versus which sit in Beyond Value Chain Mitigation, the carbon and sustainability experts at Carbon Credit Capital can help you structure a nature-based supply chain investment program that fits your FLAG exposure, your target architecture, and your audit horizon. Schedule a consultation.
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