Taking part in the consultations on projects affecting your community
Do you have questions or concerns about the impacts and benefits of our projects and operations?
We want to hear from you! Your input plays a key role at every stage of the life cycle of the facilities Hydro-Québec builds and operates near your community.
Attentive to your concerns from the get-go
Fulfilling our core mission sometimes involves doing maintenance work or building new infrastructures like generating stations, dams, transmission lines and substations. Before undertaking any such work, we consult with all local stakeholders, including representatives from any Indigenous communities concerned, with the aim of carrying out the best possible project.
Hydro-Québec has a dedicated team of Indigenous relations advisors to handle all communications with the various communities.
Information gathering
We want Indigenous communities to have a say in every stage of our projects, from the drawing board right through to commissioning and operation.
This means that, from the design and planning stages onward, we collect the community's comments and concerns on the technical, environmental and social aspects of each project. We analyze this information and use it to help us determine the best way forward for both Hydro-Québec and the host environment.
Depending on the scope of a given project, the amount of time required between gathering the information and selecting the optimal solution can vary. Indeed, this process often involves a series of discussions.
An ongoing conversation
We want the relationships established with Indigenous communities during the consultations to continue throughout the project and beyond. In particular, we set out to ensure that all agreed-upon measures are enforced on the jobsites.
But since maintaining close ties with the communities who host our infrastructures is a priority for us, our interest in your questions and concerns continues long after construction is over and the facility is up and running.
Adapted collaborative mechanisms
From the very start of the first in situ studies or inventories, we establish the mechanisms through which we can work together with the community. These mechanisms remain active throughout subsequent project stages and are the means through which community members can actively participate in the studies, influence the project and benefit from the economic spinoffs.
For example, working with Indigenous community leaders and representatives, we launch discussions on such topics as:
Land use
The natural environment
Environmental follow-up
Assigning mandates
An overview of current projects
At any given time, hundreds of projects of every size are ongoing or being planned across Québec. Visit the Projects section of our website to get a sense of what's going on right now. You can also visit Planning tomorrow's energy supply today to see how Hydro-Québec intends to meet future energy needs.