SASKATOON – SaskPower will cost its customers $273 million because it refuses to implement a conservation program that could render a new $40 million high voltage power line from Saskatoon to Regina unnecessary, said a group opposed to the project.
“We keep telling SaskPower conservation will save your customers hundreds of millions of dollars and they treat us like the enemy,” said Jim Smith, a spokesperson for Condie Line Evaluation and Review. The group represents 85 percent of residents affected by the 230-kilovolt line slated to run from Condie, northwest of Regina, to the Queen Elizabeth switching station in Saskatoon.
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No borrowing required
The 18-page report said a modest conservation program would save $273 million for SaskPower customers over the next 20 years and also save the provincial government from having to borrow $446 million to build the 270-megawatt Shand Two power station.
“By not seriously examining conservation as an alternative, Sask-Power is squandering its customers’ money,” said Smith.
Eldon Lautermilch, the minister responsible for SaskPower, was in China this week and could not be reached for comment.
A spokesperson for SaskPower said the line has been approved by the government and the Saskatchewan environment department and will go ahead as planned.
“All of us need electricity,” said Larry Christie, describing the report as “exaggerated.”
He said the line is needed to provide electricity to people in northern Saskatchewan.
The new Condie line will save 25 megawatts of power which is being lost due to the inefficient lines in place now, Christie said.
The conservation program the landowner group suggested would use government incentives like low-interest loans to encourage industrial customers to replace older electrical motors with higher, more efficient engines, and homeowners to switch to energy-efficient appliances.
Christie said many of the measures are already in place, pointing to SaskPower’s Power Smart program.
Another member of the landowners group, Darrin Qualman, dismissed suggestions that opposition to the line is rooted in “not-in-my-backyard” sentiments.
“This is about making governments and crown corporations responsible for their actions,” said Qualman.
If the line goes ahead, it will run through a quarter section of his Dundurn area farm, making it almost impossible to irrigate or aerial spray, he said.
Qualman said his group represents 230 landowners who said they will not sign easements for the new line. He’s not ruling out the possibility of setting up blockades or taking the group’s battle to court.
“We are not discounting any actions which may occur,” he told reporters at a news conference Oct. 17.
Construction of the new line is scheduled to start in the spring of 1997.
