The growth of its “critical” Canadian market is the driver for Pittsburgh-based power management company Eaton to expand its innovation centre in Brossard, Que. that focuses on sustainability and cybersecurity.

Boosting the floor space from 25,000 square feet to 34,000 square feet, the first expansion finished in August adds the capacity for over 50 more employees and an experience centre for the company and its clients to test Eaton’s products. Those include management of distributed energy systems and work on microgrids that emphasize renewable energy.

Another key element is hiring more experts to strengthen cybersecurity for energy, as critical infrastructure is becoming increasingly targeted by malicious actors.

Since opening its innovation centre in November 2023 with around 150 staff, the company aims to add another phase to the facility to focus on physical interactions with its products.

The Quebec government’s demand for jobs in engineering and software is “stimulating and driving” Eaton’s growth.

“We’ve been working there for some time, we’re just bringing together and expanding on what we have been doing,” Luiz Fernando Huet de Bacellar, Eaton’s vice-president of engineering and technology, told Sustainable Biz Canada in an interview.

Enlarging Eaton’s presence in Montreal area

Eaton has been in Montreal for over 40 years, and Brossard in the Greater Montreal Area was a natural location for the innovation centre as it is close to its major Quebec customers such as Hydro-Quebec, de Bacellar explained.

Access to technical talent was the main driver for the location. Brossard is nearby many Montreal universities, and Eaton partners with them to access the pipeline of engineering and software graduates. Plus, the local government is emphasizing job creation in the fields.

At the innovation centre, approximately 200 employees are developing the software and hardware for Eaton’s microgrid offering that helps measure the demand for electricity and understand the cost of using energy.

“You need to make very high-level, complex decisions about what is the most cost-effective and most sustainable approach to how you’re going to respond to that,” de Bacellar said. “These types of operations and software and planning and how you deliver the power and helping the utility companies and the customers when they have local power sources, how to manage these, this is one example of what we are doing there.”

The experience centre that is part of the expansion will open a space for Eaton’s staff and its clients to demonstrate and train on its products. For example, a digital simulation of a solar farm can be created to study how Eaton’s microgrid distributed energy resource management system would function in the field, de Bacellar said.

Cybersecurity, which is “paramount” for Eaton’s software, is also developed at the innovation centre. With the possibility of hacks that can disrupt vital energy operations or hold energy companies hostage with ransomware, protecting energy infrastructure is crucial, the Eaton vice-president explained.

“Providing cybersecurity solutions is as important as providing the functionality of the solutions we give to our customers.”

Elaborating on Eaton

A company that has been around for over a century in power management, Eaton creates products and performs services in the electrical, aerospace and mobility sectors to customers in over 160 countries.

Examples of its sustainability efforts are:

• providing the switchgears for renewable energy equipment;
• aiding in the electric vehicle transition by supporting charger rollout;
• energy management for data centres; and
• aiding in the transition to hydrogen fuel and sustainable aviation fuel.

In Canada, it helped utility Hydro-Quebec develop a microgrid that is used by an Indigenous community in B.C. The award-winning microgrid adds 250 kilowatts of solar energy capacity and 1,000 kilowatt-hours of energy storage, which cuts 4,200 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year.

The company’s target is to invest $3 billion US on research and development in sustainability from 2020 to 2030. To date, it says it has spent $1.3 billion US.

Eaton’s further expansion

Another enlargement is anticipated for the Brossard innovation centre.

Eaton is aiming for a third phase in 2025, searching for adjacent buildings or other areas in Brossard that could be home to a second experience centre designed for testing Eaton’s hardware. Such an expansion will likely resemble a warehouse rather than an office, de Bacellar said, and have enough space for 50 to 100 more employees.

“Significant growth” is happening in Canada, he added, and de Bacellar expects more partnerships and investments in the country.