Power that stays on
Where energy decisions come together
In northern and remote communities, reliable energy is a daily necessity. It keeps water systems running, clinics open, and homes warm. It is the backbone of emergency response and local business, the kind of infrastructure people only notice when it fails.
When energy systems are reliable, people rarely think about them at all.
NIERI is the National Indigenous Energy Resilience Initiative, an Indigenous-led initiative establishing the governance infrastructure for reliable, community-led energy planning. The work focuses on what needs to be in place early, before urgency takes over.
NIERI exists because decisions that affect essential services and people’s safety should be made under clear conditions and community authority.
Too often, the conditions for good energy decisions are missing when they are needed most. Timelines collapse. Options narrow. Communities are often brought in only after the direction is already set. When that happens, urgency shapes the outcome instead of long-term logic.
Across Canada, there are well-known examples where systems were installed with good intentions, yet struggled to deliver their promised outcomes once real-world conditions set in. For those communities, the challenge lay in bringing technology, infrastructure, and long-term support into alignment with local realities.
Across the country, there are communities who recognize this story immediately.
NIERI exists to step in earlier.
The initiative supports Indigenous-led planning and governance before projects are chosen or funding is locked in. This creates room for decisions based on local reality and community priorities.
The goal is to move forward with a plan that lasts, rather than reacting to an immediate deadline.
Reliability comes from decisions made before pressure takes over, not from reacting once it has.
Canada’s energy conversation often centres on large projects.
Yet reliability is built across a full spectrum.
It comes from major infrastructure, and from small and medium-scale systems that can help keep communities running day to day. When these systems are planned with care within a community or across a region, they strengthen local services and create space for long-term growth.
For many communities, daily life depends on a single energy system. Those systems are shaped by history, geography, and what already exists on the ground. When that single source is stretched or fails, there is often nothing to fall back on.
Too often, energy systems are funded in isolation, leaving communities to navigate complex decisions without enough support or guidance. Over time, this creates a widening gap between national priorities and the systems people actually depend on.
Years of public reviews have pointed to the same risks. When planning is fragmented and funding is short-term, reliability becomes harder to sustain and good outcomes fade.
Closing this gap means creating decision structures that can see across communities. It means paying attention to the many smaller systems that, together, make Canada truly resilient.
NIERI helps create the conditions for Indigenous-led energy decisions. We bring clarity, context, and alignment to early thinking about reliability.
Reliable power is what keeps phones working, emergency teams ready, and essential services running every day.
What Comes Before Projects
NIERI supports early, exploratory conversations with Indigenous communities and governments. These sessions are for those thinking ahead about energy reliability and wanting to understand the steps that happen before projects and funding decisions are made.
This is a starting point for understanding local context and timing. It is an informal way to look at priorities before any formal application process begins.
