Expansion
The company expanded into Western Canada in 2003 with its purchase of Aquila, Inc.'s Canadian assets, formerly owned by TransAlta, Canada's largest publicly traded utility. As a result of this acquisition, Fortis became one of Alberta's major regulated electrical distribution companies, serving 415,000 Albertans in 2005. ATCO Electric is Alberta's other regulated distribution company. Also as a result of the 2003 acquisition, Fortis owns regulated generation, transmission, and distribution assets in British Columbia.
In 2007, Fortis acquired Terasen Gas from Kinder Morgan, which had sold the BC gas utility as a non-strategic asset included in its 2005 acquisition of Terasen Inc.
In addition to its regulated Canadian assets, Fortis also owns unregulated assets in Ontario, British Columbia, and Newfoundland. The majority of its unregulated business consists of hydroelectric generating plants.
Fortis' interests in the Caribbean include a 67% interest in Belize Electricity Limited (BEL) and a 95% interest in Belize Electric Co. Ltd. The Belize Association of Non-Government Organisations took Fortis to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in 2003 to have a new environmental assessment of the Chalillo Dam on the Macal River which was a hydroelectricity development project. Ecologists were concerned over the future of species such as the scarlet macaw, the tapir and the black howler monkey as the project would flood 10 km² of rainforest in Belize. Celebrities such as Harrison Ford and Cameron Diaz supported a movement to stop this dam. Fortis and the Government of Belize supported the project.
On May 30, 2011, it was announced that Fortis has plans to acquire Central Vermont Public Service, an electric utility in the US state of Vermont, for US$700 million, pending stockholder and regulatory approval; this acquisition would be Fortis' first utility acquisition in the United States.
On February 21, 2012, CH Energy Group (a holding company for Central Hudson Gas & Electric, an upstate New York utility), announced a pending acquisition by Fortis valued at $1.5 billion. The acquisition is awaiting approval by CH Energy Group shareholders as well as the New York State Public Service Commission and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
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