B.C. energy provider FortisBC now has the green light for a $3.5-billion expansion of an LNG terminal. Located in Delta, B.C. on the industrialized Tilbury Island, the Fortis facility supplies fuel to the lower mainland’s marine shipping industry and overseas LNG market. The expansion will boost the facility’s output by 10 times once complete. The approval, under the new “one project, one review” federal program, came immediately after the B.C. government issued an environmental assessment certificate to FortisBC for the project on Tilbury Island in the Fraser River. “Canada is going to build its way to prosperity. We’re focused on major projects, and this reflects a strategic position for the government,” said Tim Hodgson , Canada’s minister of energy and natural resources, in an interview. “We’re taking what we’ve learned through the [ Major Projects Office ] and bringing that skill and expertise to bear across all projects, backed by a legislative framework that applies to all of them.” Once complete, the expanded Tilbury LNG terminal will supply growing markets for marine bunkering and overseas export. Marine bunkering is the process of supplying and pumping fuel into a ship’s storage tanks to power its engines and onboard generators. Tilbury Island, home to Tilbury Industrial Park, is a major industrial zone in B.C.’s lower mainland. The island is home to several hundred businesses and thousands of workers employed in a variety of industries including aerospace, manufacturing and distribution. That industrial base, paired with direct river access, is what has drawn heavy infrastructure to the island for decades. FortisBC’s LNG facility is the anchor tenant, but it’s not alone. Heidelberg Materials operates a cement grinding plant there, and the proposed Tilbury Marine Jetty, an LNG export terminal, is also in the planning stages. The FortisBC project was originally initiated in February 2020, but the province said it was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Fortis submitted a revised application in February 2026. Rather than running a separate federal review, Ottawa let B.C.’s Environmental Assessment Office to handle the project’s assessment on the federal government’s behalf. “We don’t want to burn bunker fuel anymore,” said Hodgson. “With this expansion, we’re committing to using cleaner natural gas .” Bunker fuel is far dirtier than LNG on sulfur and particulate emissions. Scientists say when a ship switches to LNG, it cuts those emissions by roughly 95 per cent. It also lowers carbon dioxide emissions by a quarter. Fortis has a long history on Tilbury Island. In 1971, the provincial regulated utility company built the original Tilbury LNG facility, the first of its kind in B.C. The TSX stocks to watch following the Canada Investment SummitCanada could boost trade beyond U.S. by $146 billion, says PwC report Back then, it was designed solely as a peak-shaving facility, so-called because its purpose was to smooth out the difference between a utility’s normal supply and the price spikes that would happen on cold winter days. It’s a different business model from an LNG export terminal which liquefies gas continuously to ship overseas. Tilbury is now doing both: its original peak-shaving job, plus growing export and marine-fuel volumes as it expands. Construction for the new storage tank and liquefaction infrastructure is slated to begin in early 2027. • Email: jarose@postmedia.com