Energy trade volume between Canada, the US, and Mexico

🇨🇦 🇺🇸 🇲🇽 ⚡ Three of the world's largest economies, one massive energy network, and unprecedented trade tensions… here's how it all connects ↓

Canadian and Mexican policymakers and businesses may have needed a strong drink a few months back when their countries were hit by massive tariffs by the United States. But it’s worth recalling that not every sector was equally impacted.

Take energy. Canada is actually the largest energy supplier of US imports (and the second-largest energy importer from the US), serving for example as the source of 60% of all US oil imports.

With this in mind, and knowing how sensitive Americans are about prices at the gas pump, the Trump administration kept Canadian oil and energy tariffs at 10%, rather than the 25% slapped on everything else from Canada (and Mexico).

But don’t think North American energy integration is exclusive to the US-Canadian border.

So if Canada anchors 60%, where does Mexico’s $78B actually change the calculus?

As the two largest trading partners, the US and Mexico also have a significant energy relationship, albeit one smaller than its US-Canadian counterpart.

Mexico and the United States traded an impressive $78B (almost the size of Uruguay’s economy) in energy goods last year, a majority of which was also in fossil fuels like oil or natural gas.

Yet there’s also the so-called energy transition to consider. Renewable, greener, and more advanced energy sources such as nuclear power or hydrogen have grown in importance.

Meanwhile, the integration of power grids and electric infrastructure across borders can help the continent avoid outages and gaps.

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