Key insights
- Enbridge CEO highlights a surge in energy demand driven by AI and energy security, leading to increased infrastructure projects. The company is expanding its Mainline pipeline network to the US, signaling strong demand for Canadian crude. This suggests positive growth prospects for the energy infrastructure sector, potentially benefiting related US equities.
Enbridge Inc. chief executive Greg Ebel said Friday that investors still aren’t fully appreciating a major shift in energy demand driven by AI, rising electricity consumption and energy-security concerns. He said pipeline and infrastructure companies traded at much richer valuation multiples between 2012 and 2016, during U.S. shale boom.
“We are in a world with an amazing growth macro for energy infrastructure, the best growth opportunities I have seen in 10 to 15 years,” Ebel said after the company released first-quarter earnings.
“It seems to me that investors haven’t yet realized how beneficial and long run that will be.”
The energy giant green-lit $2 billion in new projects in the first quarter — including a US$700-million onshore wind project in Texas to supply power to Meta Platforms Inc. data centres — and is advancing plans to expand its Mainline pipeline network carrying Western Canadian crude oil into the U.S.
Enbridge said the Mainline averaged 3.2 million barrels per day in the first three months of the year, and that the system has been in apportionment — an industry term for when demand exceeds capacity — all year.
An initial expansion of the line has already been approved, but Enbridge is planning a further expansion totalling about 430,000 barrels per day by 2028.
During the quarter, Enbridge also announced two binding open seasons — a customer sign-up process for capacity on a pipeline — for its Flanagan South pipeline and Southern Access extension pipeline.
The two pipelines are part of a route that moves Canadian crude from the Mainline deeper into the U.S. Midwest and Gulf Coast — a path that has generally proved easier to expand than pipelines aimed at Canada’s West Coast.
The company’s $2 billion in newly sanctioned projects brings Enbridge’s inventory of secured growth projects to roughly $40 billion through the end of the decade, driven by rising power demand, new LNG infrastructure and increased oil production.
Ebel said customers are prioritizing speed and reliability over anything else. “There’s no longer the discussion of what colour your molecule or electron is — it’s how quickly can you get me electrons or molecules or barrels,” he said.
“That’s really game on for growth from an Enbridge perspective.”
Enbridge said the war in the Middle East is also driving demand for North American crude exports, including Canadian oil shipped to the U.S. Gulf Coast. The company confirmed Friday it has seen increased customer interest in capacity at its massive Ingleside oil export terminal near Corpus Christi, Texas.
“Exports now are pushing six million barrels (a day) just with the conflict,” Ebel said. “What will be really interesting to see is, even when the conflict is solved, how much more reliance there will be on the U.S. Gulf Coast — and Canada, for that matter.”
Enbridge reported a lower quarterly profit of $2.1 billion Friday, down from $2.2 billion a year earlier. The pipeline giant said the drop was largely because of one-time gains that had boosted first-quarter results in 2025.
Underlying cash flow was stable, however, with Enbridge reporting its key operating metric, adjusted EBITDA, held steady year over year at $5.8 billion.
- Email: mpotkins@postmedia.com
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