TISDALE, Sask – Lorne Calvert is collecting brownie points with his latest green initiative, but the program also has some seeing red.
Biofuel promoters gave the Saskatchewan premier a standing ovation at the North East Saskatchewan Ethanol Forum after he unveiled the Saskatchewan Biofuels Investment Opportunity or SaskBIO Program, a four-year, $80 million repayable loan program for the industry.
Jim Boxall, chair of Ensask Biofuels Ltd., a group attempting to build a 100 million litre ethanol plant at the site of the old Tisdale Alfalfa Dehy plant, said biofuel policy unfolds like the running game in a football contest, a few yards at a time.
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“Today you have given us a first down and we say thank you for it,” Boxall told Calvert.
Kory Teneycke, executive director of the Canadian Renewable Fuels Association, congratulated Calvert for the work he has done on the biofuel file in Regina and Ottawa.
“This is really a tremendously good news announcement for us. It’s a continuation of the leadership that you and your government have shown in this area,” said Teneycke.
“When you say your footprints are all over the federal policy I don’t think that is taking undue credit. I think it’s absolutely the case.”
Not everybody was heaping praise on the provincial NDP. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation issued a News release
news calling on the Saskatchewan government to scrap its loan program.
“Saskatchewan taxpayers have seen this government throw away hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies and investments over the years,” said David MacLean, Saskatchewan director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
“This government has an embarrassing record when it comes to investing in pork plants, ski hills, potato sheds and internet companies and there’s no reason to believe SaskBIO will be any different.”
Lionel LaBelle, former president of the Saskatchewan Ethanol Development Council and ethanol project leader for Gardiner Dam Terminal, praised Calvert, but he was also anxious that the loan program might turn out to be as onerous as its federal counterpart, the EcoABC initiative.
Saskatchewan agriculture minister Mark Wartman assured LaBelle there would be a quicker turn-around time with the provincial program, an assertion backed up by his boss.
“We do not want to see a red tape, bureaucratic system here that’s just going to slow projects down,” said Calvert.
Bill Fraser, marketing manager with Unity’s North West Terminal Ltd., wondered if his ethanol project would be eligible for funding. Construction is planned for early July, one month before the government plans to roll out the SaskBIO program. He was told by program administrators that plants are eligible unless they are producing fuel by that time.
Teneycke told Calvert he was pleased to hear the premier is contemplating establishing E85 corridors in the province, but wondered if his government would consider following Minnesota’s lead by increasing low level ethanol blends beyond the 10 percent mark.
Calvert said the government has plans to do just that, but would have to talk to distributors and retailers about the challenges involved in boosting the blend.
Mike Bryan, chief executive officer of BBI International, a company that publishes numerous biofuel magazines, asked the premier if the program could be spread out beyond four years so projects that are at the “coffee row talk” phase can participate.
Calvert said the $80 million was tailored to well-advanced projects. Depending on how things unfold, a new funding initiative could be developed at the end of the four years.
