Construction on a $126-million vaccine plant in Montreal has been completed ahead of schedule and the government is now commissioning the plant, setting up the possibility COVID-19 shots will be manufactured there later this year.

Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne made the announcement Tuesday that the National Research Council’s Biologics Manufacturing Centre had completed construction, but the facility is still months from making vaccines.

The equipment that will be used to make up to 24 million doses a year from the facility still has to be installed, commissioned and tested, and the facility will have to receive certification from Health Canada. Champagne said he is hopeful the first shots could roll-off production lines by December.

“What we anticipate is that, subject to regulatory approval, the plant will be able to produce vaccines by the end of the year, and then obviously more towards mass production at the beginning of next year,” said Champagne.

The government expects to have enough vaccine to inoculate Canadians by late July, but Champagne said the new facility could be used for potential booster shots and the vaccines could also be exported around the world where they will still be needed.

The plant is the larger of two facilities being built at the NRC’s Royalmount campus in Montreal and was one of the earliest investments the government made in vaccine manufacturing. The original plan for the facility was to have it manufacture the Chinese company CanSino’s vaccine. The Chinese government refused to ship samples to Canada for clinical trials and the government’s vaccine task force ultimately decided against buying the company’s vaccine. The Liberals signed a deal with Novavax after the CanSino arrangement collapsed.

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