Canada will spend C$1.2 billion (US$843 million) on ocean protection and marine safety as the federal government braces for a surge in commercial vessel traffic driven by LNG, energy and port projects on the West Coast.

Prime Minister Mark Carney announced the package Tuesday in British Columbia, tying the money directly to Ottawa's push to expand export infrastructure. He singled out expansion at the Port of Vancouver and the Roberts Bank Terminal 2 container project as developments expected to add ship calls to the coast. The announcement landed the same week the government confirmed a final investment decision on phase two of LNG Canada in Kitimat.

Carney framed the policy as a "protect while we build" approach — marine-safety capacity scaled up in step with the trade infrastructure Canada is constructing around it.

For carriers, terminal operators and forwarders routing cargo through Vancouver and the Salish Sea, the message is that Ottawa expects traffic volumes — and regulatory scrutiny — to rise substantially over the coming decades. The government said it anticipates vessel traffic to grow significantly on Canada's coasts, placing additional pressure on the existing marine safety and emergency-response network.

The largest single tranche, more than C$740 million over four years, funds marine safety and conservation programs, with the Canadian Coast Guard as the primary beneficiary. The Coast Guard will expand capacity at its Marine Communications and Traffic Services centres, strengthen maritime domain awareness and vessel traffic management, extend VHF radio and radar coverage into currently poorly served areas, and add marine response capability at existing search and rescue stations.

The investment responds to what the government described as significant projected growth in shipping tied to energy, LNG, port and resource-development projects along the British Columbia coast. Each new LNG carrier and container ship call adds demand on traffic separation, pilotage support and emergency response in waters that already handle some of North America's most complex coastal navigation.

Ottawa is also buying capability for pollution incidents beyond crude. Environment and Climate Change Canada will develop new recovery tools for ship-source pollution, covering spills of hazardous and noxious substances and other commercial chemicals. A new high-resolution nearshore ocean forecasting system will deliver better data on currents and other conditions during marine emergencies.

Transport Canada will replace aging digital systems used for cargo inspections, port state control, domestic vessel oversight and seafarer certification. According to the government, the integrated system will improve marine data consolidation, risk analysis, enforcement and regulatory services — a modernisation that ship operators calling at Canadian ports will encounter directly through inspection and compliance processes.

A further C$136 million over four years targets marine-life protection, including an expanded marine mammal spill-response program and measures addressing underwater noise from shipping. Transport Canada will establish a Quiet Vessel Technology Fund to push commercially available noise-reduction technologies into wider use, starting with ferries and tugs operating in the Salish Sea — the waters most affected by Vancouver-bound traffic and Roberts Bank development. Fisheries and Oceans Canada will separately monitor underwater noise and its effects on marine mammals in the Arctic as project-related vessel traffic increases in northern waters.

An additional C$186 million supports Indigenous-led conservation and marine-management programs, including expansion of the Northern Shelf Bioregion Reconciliation Framework Agreement and work in the Lower Fraser River and estuary — the corridor linking Port of Vancouver terminals to the sea.

The spending builds on the Oceans Protection Plan, launched in 2016 and renewed in 2022, which covers marine incident prevention and response, pollution preparedness, hazardous and abandoned vessels, navigation safety and measures to reduce commercial shipping's effects on marine ecosystems.

With Roberts Bank Terminal 2, Vancouver expansion and LNG Canada phase two all moving toward operation, the safety spending signals Ottawa's expectation that West Coast trade volumes — and the vessel traffic that carries them — will keep climbing.