Hydro Riel Station Project not going so well.

On the list of proposed and current Manitoba Hydro capital projects, the Riel Reliability Improvement Initiative Project is one of the lesser known. It is not as big or contentious as Bipole III or Conawapa, but it is still a significant project by most standards.

The $700 million dollar project to "sectionalize" Hydro's southern electricity distribution is intended to improve reliability and facilitate importing power from the US in a circumstance where our power supply suffers a catastrophic failure. You can read more about it on the Hydro web site if you want, but what you should know is that this investment is being made. What you should also know is that, like most of Hydro's recent projects, it is going to be behind schedule and over budget.

Now I don't know that for a fact, but signs are pointing in that direction. The Riel Converter Station was anticipated to be operational by 2014. That gives them 4.5 months to get this thing up and running, and the things that I'm hearing suggest that it is nowhere close.

One problem: one of the lead contractors, Comstock Canada, has declared bankruptcy. Because of its financial woes it failed to pay subcontractors working on the Riel project, and some of those subcontractors understandably stopped working. Comstock owes creditors almost $76 million dollars, ranging from $200 for Windsor Plywood to $3.7 million for Crown Utilities Ltd (which itself has been involved in probably unrelated lawsuits with Manitoba Hydro as recently as 2010.)

With the subcontractors off the job, aspects of the Riel project ground to a halt until eventually Hydro agreed to pay the subcontractors directly. Of course, when one part of a very complex project falls behind schedule, it normally impacts everything else because of overlapping dependencies between the various workstreams. In short, this whole Comstock issue has been very unhelpful.

By the way, Comstock has other troubles too -- it is embroiled in a $50 million lawsuit with Potash Corp and AMEC Americas over a failed project in New Brunswick. Potash Corp terminated their contract because they didn't get their work completed on time or on budget, or to the satisfaction of Potash Corp and AMEC.

Comstock meanwhile claims that Potash Corp and AMEC made life difficult for them by changing requirements all the time. Comstock therefore had no choice but to "perform its work out of sequence, in an 'inefficient' and 'unproductive manner'".

Perhaps it's no coincidence that work on the Riel Station is being performed in an inefficient and unproductive manner.

It is apparently commonplace on that project for work to be repeated or changed on the fly because of poor planning and coordination. For example, concrete will be poured, then it will be torn up because cabling needs to be installed underneath the concrete. Mistakes will happen on a large project, but that sort of thing is happening a lot more than it should on this Riel project.


I can't say if one particular entity is responsible for the poor work flow and mistakes that are made in the construction of this station, I just know that it's not going well, and ultimately it's Manitoba Hydro's responsibility to ensure its projects are properly managed.

I wonder what the new target date and projected cost is for this project...

A thing called Keeyask

A belated follow-up to the earlier post $1.1 Billion deficit might not be our biggest problem. In that post I discussed some of the enormous risks facing Manitoba Hydro:

• over 11 billion dollars in investments in northern Hydro megaprojects, almost exclusively to sell power to a very weak export market in the US
• a track record of escalating costs
• a development with the Cree Nations partners that, fairly or not, places the entire burden of risk on Hydro while sharing potential profits of the Keeyask project.

I'm going to dive a little deeper into this Keeyask thing here. In addition to the Joint Keeyask Development Agreement that I talked about last time, there are Adverse Effects Agreements that layout the process for compensating ... hey ... wait! Where are you going? It's not that boring. Really. Stick around!

Okay. As I was saying ... there are these agreements. There are four of them -- one for each of Tataskweyak Cree Nation, War Lake First Nation, Fox Lake Cree Nation, and York Factory First Nation. Their purpose is "to provide appropriate replacements, substitutions or opportunities to offset unavoidable Keeyask Adverse Effects on practices, customs and traditions integral to the distinctive cultural identity" of the First Nations.

I don't want to lose your attention again so let's get straight to the money: how much will these replacements, substitutions and opportunities cost Manitoba rate payers? Well, it's complicated, but let's start with $7 million. That's not compensation. That's the cost of constructing and furnishing buildings to administer the compensation.

There are two buildings: the TCN Keeyask Centre, and the Fox Lake Gathering Centre in Gillam. Both serve purposes other than administration, for example storage, displaying artifacts, conducting educational seminars, etc..

The Keeyask Centre looks something like this, and is budgeted for $4 million:

I believe this beauty, designed by Friesen Tokar Architects, might be the Fox Lake Gathering Centre that was agreed to in the plan, except that its cost is $7.5 million, not the $3 million that was budgeted:

Okay, moving on ...

There are numerous "offsetting programs" funded under these Adverse Effects Agreements: language programs, educational programs, grave site restoration programs, youth wilderness traditions programs, etc...  There is an access program for TCN that funds up to 52,000 miles of air transportation for hunting, fishing and trapping each year.

There are budgets for this. On an annual basis for the life of the project, Tataskweyak Cree Nation is funded for $2,124,000 in 2008 dollars, indexed for inflation, with any unspent amounts carried forward.War Lake gets $266,000 each year. Fox Lake gets $710,000 per year, decreasing over time to $100,000 per year. York Factory First Nation gets total funding that adds up to $8,520,000 discounted present value.

In addition to all this there are other aspects to these agreements, including lump sum amounts for Residual Compensation:

Tataskweyak Cree Nation: $3,000,000

War Lake First Nation: $255,000

Fox Lake Cree Nation: $1,581,000

York Factory First Nation: $490,000

There are other clauses that allow for additional losses from traditional activities, other amounts for water levels above or below normal levels ($4,500 per foot per day, adjusted for inflation) and so on.

So what to make of all this? Certainly if you were adding up the costs of lost revenue from hunting and trapping on the 45 square kilometers of flooded land, it would be a miniscule amount by comparison. However intangibles are extremely hard to place a value on -- I know because I've done it in a previous life -- but also there is value in building willing partners with the First Nations.

Whether you feel this is way over the top or fair compensation, it is a cost to Hydro. These tens of millions of dollars will add to the burden, and represent thousands more megawatts of power to be exported to a weak US energy market.

$1.1 Billion deficit might not be our biggest problem

Note: just a couple more posts, then I'll ease off the Hydro stuff for a while. In fact I'll see if I can go the whole summer without posting about Hydro. Should be doable as long as they don't do something stupid like try to build Bipole III with these.

***

Manitobans were treated recently to the news that they are each $1000 more in debt, as their provincial government rings up a deficit north of $1 billion for the first time.

That may sound bad ... and it is ... but there is another financial shit storm brewing out there that you should know about. The name of this storm: Keeyask

Keeyask is a proposed $5.6 billion generating station that is currently going through the environmental assessment stage. The primary purpose of this mega project is to support export sales to the U.S., as we already have enough of capacity for ourselves, and have almost finished construction of the $1.6 Billion 200 MW Waskwatim station, which itself will be used exclusively for exports until 2020.

That's $7.2 billion in hydro damn construction. (The much larger Conawapa, if built, would likely dwarf both of those.) To transport all this power, of course, is the $4 billion Bipole III corridor. If you're keeping track, that's $11.2 billion in construction, the majority of which is only required to support electricity exports.

What's the export market like? Well, so far we have an estimated grand total of $4 billion in export agreements signed. That's a big gap to make up. Maybe you have faith in the electricity export markets ... I know Minister Dave Chomiak does ... but the outlook is not great. The supply of much cheaper natural gas is expanding, and there is no assurance of a big increase in demand for power. Our export contracts contain a fixed price component and a variable component that depends on spot price. We have already seen the variable export price of electricity drop as low as 0.5 cents per kilowatt hour -- about 7% of what you pay on your hydro bill.

What I'm getting at is that there is a huge element of risk here. But that's not the half of it ...

The $11.2 billion capital costs mentioned above are all based on Hydro's estimates. Hydro projects have a habit of growing. For example, Wuskwatim construction costs rose from $900 million to $1.6 billion -- 78 per cent -- and now we also find out that there are "increased operating, administrative and other costs" from this article, and it hasn't even started operating yet!

The cost of Bipole III, as you know by now, has ballooned from $2.2 billion to $4 billion, with construction still a few years away. Even with our current infrastructure it now costs 10 cents per kilowatt hour to produce electron juice according to The Black Rod, who also says that "we'll be losing at least 3 cents a kilowatt hour" on the power we'll export from our new stations. This, based on a PUB report.

Don't believe Black Rod? James Beddome, leader of the Green Party of Manitoba, also quoted vastly increased costs of producing power during the last election. I don't recall the figures, but they were not disputed by Hydro to my knowledge. Just know that, when you read "$11.2 billion capital costs" above, the actual total will be higher. Potentially MUCH higher.

So, at the end of the day, we could have billions more added on to our level of exposure. But wait! There's more ...

Hydro has formed a partnership with neighbouring First Nations communities, the Keeyask Hydropower Limited Partnership, and together they negotiated a revolutionary joint development agreement. That itself sounds reasonable, but here's the thing: the agreement allows the four First Nations to own up to 25% of Keeyask, the financing of which will largely be provided by Hydro itself. No ... that's not the thing that I'm getting at. This is the thing: The First Nations do not have to commit until much later in the process, when the actual construction costs become clear and export opportunities (or lack thereof) clarify.

What this means is that if Keeyask construction costs escalate, and export revenues do not, the First Nations do not have to buy in. On the other hand, if it looks as though revenues may exceed operating expenses and amortized capital costs, the First Nations can say "ya, we'll take a piece of that" and buy in for a quarter with Hydro as the major creditor.

The deal was arranged in this way to protect the First Nations from risk. Fair enough -- one could argue that they have little capacity to absorb massive losses from a mega project gone awry -- but this heaps all the risk on Manitoba rate payers. It limits the potential upside, while leaving us carrying the entire bag for the down side.

A senior Hydro official tells me that there will be an independent review of these capital investment projects. Other things that I have read elsewhere suggest that it may not be a certainty, or that it might not be completely independent and transparent. I sure hope it is, because these are big bucks we're talking about. If things don't pan out exactly right, billions more could be added Manitoba's summary debt.

(By the way, you should read the recent post by The Black Rod. There are some good quotes and points in there.)

Did you think that's it? Hell no. I'm only just getting started!! The rest is coming in a follow-up post just as soon as I can piece together the time to write it...

MANITOBA ELECTION: STILL UNDECIDED?

I don't blame you. Choosing between the parties in this provincial election is like choosing between a light grey Chevy Malibu and a dark grey Chevy Malibu. If only a bright red Dodge Challenger SRT8 was available...

So far in this election, the boldest idea has come from the Green Party: free bus fare. The second boldest idea has come from the Liberals: relax Sunday shopping laws. Both the Greens and the Liberals are holding back on the excessive spending promises, meanwhile the NDP and PC parties are dropping money bags from helicopters. Unfortunately, neither the Liberals or Greens have a chance in this election. John Gerrard may get re-elected as the Liberal's only seat, meanwhile Green Party leader James Beddome is an underdog in Wolseley and no other Green candidate even has a shot.

The realistic discussion pertains to the NDP and the PCs, but when you look at the two main parties from a high level they look pretty much the same:

CRIME
NDP: more cops on the street
PC: more cops on the street

HEALTH CARE
NDP: more doctors and nurses
PC: more doctors and nurses

ECONOMY
NDP: won't balance the budget
PC: won't balance the budget

TAXES
NDP: minor tax credits with no significant tax reform
PC: minor tax credits with no significant tax reform

EVERYTHING ELSE
NDP: spend lots of money
PC: spend lots of money

Rather than campaigning on ideas, the NDP is campaigning on things the PCs might do, and the PCs are campaigning on things the NDP failed to do. The only difference is the NDP has a track record, and the PCs do not. Whether you think that track record is good or bad may be your deciding factor in voting, but if you're looking for something to tip the balance, this should be it:

BIPOLE III

I haven't blogged about Bipole III 2,587,398 times because I think it's just that interesting. I've written about it because it's an irreversible and extremely costly decision, and also because I have a very low tolerance for idiotic behaviour. The NDP government has routinely addressed problems by throwing money at them rather than making any sort of difficult decision, and this is the most extreme example of that, except in this case there is more at stake than just money.

Let's just cover the main aspects:

COST: The west route will cost about $1 billion more. That's "billion" with a "B". This is if we build additional capacity with Keeyask and Conawapa. If we scrap our export plans because they turn out to be too high-risk or may result in losses for Manitoba Hydro, then the East side route will not require converters, saving us an additional $2 billion, for a total of $3 billion savings.

FOREST: The argument is that the last piece of "pristine" boreal forest east of Lake Winnipeg need to be protected. A) the forest east of Lake Winnipeg is not pristine. There are mines and communities and roads and other things. B) Even if it were "pristine", there are thousands of square KMs of pristine forest elsewhere, from Labrador to the Northwest Territories, in the vast Boreal forest. C) Even if it were the last piece of pristine forest in Canada, the government has already promised to damage it even more than a HVDC line would by zigzagging a new road right through it. D) There are scarce aspen parklands to the west of the lakes. I don't know to what extent the preferred route impacts them, but I know it was a concern in the routing study. E) The west side route plows through as much forest as the east side route. In terms of the quantity of lumber produced, it's a saw-off. (haha, get it? "saw off". Anyways ...)

LINE LOSSES: The amount of electricity burned off in transmission depends on the how close to capacity the lines are running, but whatever the amount, it will be much greater for the west side lines. The cost in lost exports will be in the tens of millions of dollars each year. These lost exports have another cost too: pollution. The wasted 'clean' hydro energy will not displace 'dirty' fossil fuel energy in the US, resulting in thousands of tonnes of additional green-house gas pollution each year. How green is that?

CARIBOU: Yes, there is a threatened caribou herd on the east side of the lake. Based on the 2005 Caribou survey, there are also four or so caribou herds that might be impacted by the west-side line, at least three of which are threatened. Furthermore, these herds have less territory to maneuver than the east-side herd, who's territory extends right into Northern Ontario.

UNESCO: A) A UNESCO official is on record as saying that the east side route will not preclude UNESCO designation. B) the government hasn't even applied for UNESCO designation. C) the east side line would only graze one corner of the proposed UNESCO site, and D) In what way is a UNESCO designation worth $1 billion anyhow?

LAND USE: Aside from forest, there is agricultural land to consider, and to this point, the west side route involves huge compromises. Land owners will need to be compensated; route adjustments will probably be required to avoid owners who refuse to be bought out (since Hydro will not expropriate), further increasing the cost; aerial spraying will be difficult or impossible to do safely along the route, impacting farm productivity; etc ...

EXPORTS: The argument that an east side line will somehow risk exports to the US is laughable. Environmental groups can't stop the US from buying every drop of oil sands petroleum that we can give them. On what grounds could they prevent the US from buying clean power? There are parties who are associated with power producers in the US who want the exports blocked because Hydro is a competitor, but they don't give a shit what side of the lake the route goes down. Honestly. It's preposterous. In fact, this Hydro report suggests that export sales could be compromised by the west side route, because it can't supply reliable power.

RELIABILITY: The west side route would be much less reliable because A) it is in an area of the province that is more prone to tornados and other weather-related disasters, and B) it's a longer route and therefore has more potential to be damaged.

ENERGY SECURITY: Should the Interlake lines go down, the west route would NOT be able to support our energy commitments, whereas the east-side route could carry the load.

TECHNICAL: Lastly, there are other technical aspects of the Bipole line that I can't begin to explain because I don't understand them, but what I understand is this: Hydro engineers prefer the east route. In fact, the east route is not just preferable ... it is the only route that makes sense from a technical perspective. In addition, the west route could require us to build another bipole line 25 years sooner. (source)


In the televised debate, Greg Selinger berated Hugh McFadyen for his "reckless" plan to move the bipole line to the east side. Only Greg would call accepting the advice of engineers, reducing pollution, protecting our energy security and saving $1 billion reckless. The venom and conviction with which Greg lied about the east side route was almost shocking. This isn't a matter of opinion. This isn't a case where each side has equivalent pros and cons that have to be weighed. This is a case where the east side route is superior in every tangible respect, and the costs of going the other way are enormous and long-lasting.

So if there is one issue in this election that should turn your vote, make it this one.

*edit*
here are a couple of other related blogs
stumbling
TTNTBS
dobbin
ice & grain with a good post

Thoughts on Hydro CEO Brennan

As reported, Manitoba Hydro Big Cheese Bob Brennan is retiring. Dan Lett suggests in his commentary that "it is meaningless to ask why he is stepping down." I think otherwise. Being at 70 years of age you certainly can't blame the guy for packing it in, however the timing is meaningful in that it tells a story about how Hydro has been run over the past 11 years.

I have been very critical of Bob Brennan in the past, however I don't doubt that, if left to his own devices, he could have been an excellent CEO. As Dan points out, many of the more controversial decisions were not made by Brennan, but by the very "hands-on" (nice-speak for politically interfering) NDP government. The decision to spend an extra billion dollars on the less environmentally friendly and technically inferior west-side route was made by the government, not by Brennan. Likewise, the decision to plow ahead with aggressive northern Hydro development for export, regardless of the financial viability and irrespective of the risks, was made by the Provincial government, not by the CEO.

My beef with Brennan is not in making these decisions, but in so willingly supporting them. He sold out faster than a Winnipeg Jets home opener. He fudged numbers about Bipole III, he fired a consultant who dared to expose the risks of the Hydro development strategy, and he never wavered from the arm of his political masters. What I question is the man's integrity. If he had any, he would have put up more of a fight. He would have said: "look, according to our engineers the west-side route is inferior to the east-side route. I don't think we should do that." or "there is no need to rush into low-margin, high-risk export contracts." But he did not. Instead he committed to the ill-advised policies of the government of the day, and that now puts him in a bit of a pickle...

With an election pending and a potential change in administration on the horizon, Brennan has pulled the plug. I don't think this is a coincidence. Brennan's willing support of the indefensible NDP policies would make his relationship with a new PC government unworkable. He would either have to reverse course on everything he stood for in the previous years, or he would be in conflict with his new masters and would be forced out. Leaving now allows him to avoid that conundrum and leave on his own terms.

The announcement of his retirement is therefore a smart move, and it is not insignificant. It tells the story of a senior civil servant who too willingly steered the ship in the wrong direction, and fled in a life boat just short of it hitting the iceberg. The question now is: will we get a new captain that will direct it to safety?

Of TREEs and inverted rates

If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be? A willow? A boabab? A one-man environmental advocacy group?

In the Free Press story earlier this week Lower electric bill for poor urged, something seemed odd: why would environmental groups lobby the Public Utilities Board for lower rates for anyone? Lower rates encourage greater power usage, which is bad for the environment. So .. I decided to take a peek: Who are these groups? How can non-profit organizations afford to hire fancy American lawyers?

The first group -- Time to Respect Earth's Ecosystems (TREE) -- is very small. How small are they? They are soooo small that their head office is a nest. Haha. Oh, I kill me... Would you believe I just came up with that? Actually, this is their head office:

It turns out that TREE is actually just a guy: Peter Miller, Professor of Philosophy, University of Winnipeg. He doesn't even have a web site, but he does have a mission: "Advocacy for a sustainable forest agenda in Manitoba."

So he's a philosopher who is for sustainable forests, but he wants to help poor people. Okay. What about the other group?

Green Action Centre, formerly Resource Conservation Manitoba, is a much larger group. Or, I should say, they are a group. They have a web site with all kinds of information about their causes and activities, which include active transportation, recycling, reducing emissions, composting ... the list goes on, but oddly the list does not include anything about lower hydro rates for poor people. It's not on their blog, or their "events and actions" page, or anywhere else that I could find.

Why is this group hiring lawyers to lobby the government about a policy that's not even on their agenda? Well ... probably because the aforementioned Professor Peter Miller in on their board of directors. What appears to be happening here is that Prof Peter is leveraging the name of a well-known group to lend legitimacy to his personal quest.

On to the second question: how can they (he) afford to retain and pay these consultants and lawyers? Answer: he can't and he doesn't. Who does? You do. Indirectly.

It turns out that this thing about petitioning the Public Utilities Board isn't a one off. In fact, it's pretty much an annual event, and each time Peter Miller applies for and receives a full reimbursement of his costs:

Accordingly, the Board (Public Utilities Board) will award cost in full ... Costs shall be payable by Manitoba Hydro within 30 days of the date of this Order.

He did this in here, here, here, and here in 2008 when he was awarded an eye-popping $142,066 for lawyers and consultants from Arlington, MA, even though according to Hydro the value of their input was very questionable:

The evidence provided by Mr. Weiss to the GRA proceeding was not relevant ... Further, the evidence was duplicative, since it was virtually the same evidence provided by Mr. Weiss, through RCM/TREE, in the 2007 Centra Gas General Rate Application.”

142 Grand for redundant information. Nice. Now, in relation to something like, oh .. I don't know .. bipole III, $142k is peanuts. Nevertheless this is a very expense hobby that Peter Prof has -- it has cost over $300,000 in the last five years alone ... but it hasn't cost him a cent.

So that's who they are and how they get their money. Now ... why? Why is a guy/group whose mission is to protect forests intervening in a PUB hearing to reduce Hydro payments for low income people? This is somebody who once said that supplying power below cost was a "crazy policy", and that "if no one is feeling the pinch from energy prices, why bother?" (source)

It's a tough question to answer. It's not immediately apparent why he's doing this, though I suppose I could phone him and ask him if I really wanted to. I think he's just bored. You may have guessed from my subtly sarcastic remarks two posts ago that I think a two tiered rate structure is a dumb idea. I don't doubt that Peter Prof would agree that it's a dumb idea. He's just run out of good ideas to lobby PUB for.

I actually happen to think that a previous idea of his is a good one ... or at least not a bad one: an inverted rate structure. This is where the first X amount of power is charged at a low rate, and the excess power is charged at a high rate.

If you really want to promote conservation while not bankrupting poor people, this is the way to do it, because as economists like to say: people make decisions on the margin. That is, it's your marginal cost of the next unit that you take into consideration, not the cost of all the units you bought before. Let me illustrate: when you go your friend's social and buy tickets for the 60-pounder of booze, you really only want to buy one ticket because your friend is a cheap skate and his fiancée is a bitch. But you buy three tickets, because the marginal cost of the two extra tickets is half what the cost of the first ticket is. It just seems stupid to buy only one ticket.

Manitoba Hydro actually does have an inverted rate structure ... sort of. There is a slightly higher rate for electricity use in excess of 900 kWh per month. I just checked my past two hydro bills and I use about half that, even though I routinely waste gobs of electricity. I leave my computer on overnight and while I'm at work. I never unplug anything. I have incandescent Christmas lights still, and they're set to turn on at 11 AM. Actually, they're set to come on at dusk, but you get the idea.

A far better idea than having separate low rates for poor people, or capping their payments at 6% of their income, or whatever dude is suggesting, would be for Hydro to lower the rates for a basic minimum level of monthly electricity use -- enough to run your fridge, stove, and lights. Nothing more. Set that at maybe 3 ¢ per kWh. Everything above that should be charged at cost, whatever that is, or maybe a little more. Probably something like 9 or 10 ¢ per kWh. If I'm paying three times as much for my marginal power usage, I may be more inclined to power down my PC at night.

Low income people should save money overall because presumably they don't have 60 inch plasmas sucking up megawatts every evening, so most of their power usage should fall within the lower rate bracket. The catch is that people who heat their homes with electricity will get screwed. Maybe something else can be worked out for them. It should be easier for Hydro to keep track of who has baseboard heat than how much everybody's income is, after all, Hydro is the gas supplier too.

Thoughts from the past week

The dance of the yellow machines

Hearing about the snow-clearing problems in New York and London may give you a new appreciation for the efficiency of the snow clearers here in Winnipeg. I was caught behind a small fleet of loaders this past weekend as they made their way through suburbia cleaning up the intersections. They each pick their intersection or back-alley or driveway, scooping away the snow with their twenty-thousand pound machines, mindful of the impatient drivers like me trying to squeeze past them. They do their thing, leap-frogging each other up the street, and before you know it they're gone.

They ought to be good, of course. They do it enough. But unless you are unfortunate enough to get caught behind a convoy of graders on a long stretch of road, the daunting task of clearing the city of snow gets accomplished without a whole lot of inconvenience to anyone. Here's to the big yellow machines.

***
Two tier hydro

You may have read that there is a move afoot to force Hydro to provide different rates for poor people. I think this is a great idea. For too long elected and accountable officials have held a strangle-hold on social policy. Having to explain your policies to the taxpayers is really quite onerous. It's unreasonable, when you think about it. I mean, suppose you as an MLA or Premier wanted to engineer a social policy that, to the majority of voters, seems ill-advised. You simply can't do it because the pleebs might vote you out of office. Why not offload policy implementation to crown-corporations and unaccountable arms-length organizations, via government controlled boards? That way you can execute your vision without having to worry about answering to the common folk.

We should have thought of this a long time ago. Imagine the perfectly regulated paradise we would be living in if we could utilize all of these other avenues to implement policy rather than having to plan for everything in the government budget and explain it to the voters.

***
Max style

Max Poulin's number is being retired by the Winnipeg Goldeyes. There is no more deserving person than Max, who was been a such a key part of the organization for so long. In minor league ball, you really have to appreciate it when a talented individual like this stays with the club for so long. Too often a club such as the Goldeyes cannot retain talent and character long enough to really form an identity with the fans, but Max was certainly an exception.

Not only was Max a good ball player, but the guy's got some style too:

source: ChrisD

He looks like he was yanked straight out of 1925. I could never pull off that look. It's a good example of how each person has their own individual look that works for them. I still haven't found my "look". I hope to God it doesn't involve cross-dressing because I really don't want to do that.

***
Speaking of looking good...


Have a good week, all.

St. Joseph wind farm

In case you weren't aware, a new wind farm is springing out of the frozen tundra south of Winnipeg. It is just west of Hwy 75 near the town of St. Joseph, and it is about 35% larger than the St. Leon wind farm and will be the largest wind farm built in Canada this year, according to Manitoba Hydro.

They are going hard, working on that thing. I counted at least five cranes raising 5 different turbines, a few dozen already built and many more in various stages of completion. They really are quite a marvelous thing up close. The blades are over 50 yards from tip to hub, gracefully curving and reshaping the entire length. The total span of the blades would be about the same as a football field. It's hard to imagine these monsters being turned by nothing more than air.

Some pics:

I see they chose the Siemens X5600 flux capacitor. Good choice...

Ow ow ow my head is stuck. O0oo nice bearings!

This whole wind farm almost didn't happen. The original partners, Babcock & Brown of Australia, went bankrupt. The liquidated North American assets of B&B ended up in a firm called Pattern Energy, the current partner. This deal with Pattern only happened because Hydro threw them a $260 million line of credit.

It is hard to evaluate this deal because it is not straight forward, and as usual we don't have all of the information. I tried to make sense of it back in March. I am not going to redo all of those calculations, but knowing now that the going rate for hydro exports is somewhere around $0.03 / kwh, the break-even $0.08 / kwh I came up with back then doesn't look so spectacular. I don't doubt that there are errors in my assumptions or calculations as I was likely drunk when I wrote that. If anybody out there has better info please let me know.

There are benefits too: in the jobs created and money spent locally, and in having a more diversified energy grid.

Then there is the issue with sleep loss, headaches, diarrhea, spontaneous abortions, deformed skulls and missing eyeballs.

Watt kind of a deal is this?

Are you shocked and concerned that Manitoba Hydro is selling electricity to the U.S. for barely 1/3 the price that we pay here in Manitoba?

most of Manitoba Hydro's export sales last year were made on the spot market and sold for an average of 2.37 cents per kilowatt hour, down dramatically from 2008-09 and a fraction of what Manitoba homeowners pay. -fp-

You shouldn't be too concerned because spot market prices change, and we could be selling it for much more next year. Look at this as a blip. What you should be concerned about are the long term deals that Hydro is negotiating, and don't be surprised if the "locked in" prices are shockingly low. The hints are already on the Hydro web site:

• The extension of our existing contract with Xcel Energy was signed for 'close to' $3b for 375-500 mW of power for 10 years. This works out to about $0.068 / kWh. No additional generating power required.
  
• The new contract signed with Wisconsin Public Service is also for up to 500 mW of power, but it is for 15 years, will require new hydroelectric facilities and the bipole III line, but is only anticipated to be worth 'over $2b'. This works out to something more in the range of $0.03 / kWh

Although the details need to be worked out, what it looks like is we're selling 5 more years of power for almost $1b less than what we're currently selling to Xcel.

I don't know how much the Keeyask dam will cost, but Wuskwatim will cost $1.3b (if all goes well I assume) and it only produces 200 mW. I need to do some ball-parking here, but since Keeyask is a much larger dam (695 mW) I will guesstimate that it will cost as least twice as much ... say $2.6b. bipole III will cost $2.2b. How are we going to get our money back on this $6.1b investment? By selling our power for 3 cents?

If we sell our power to Wisconsin and to Minnesota Power (15 years, up to 250 mW) at that rate, the present value of that revenue using a modest 5% discount rate is only $2.08b. Using a 3% discount rate we'll break even after 100 years. With a 3.5% discount rate we never get our money back.

Of course it's much more complicated than that, but all I'm doing here is what we in the biz call a "sanity check", and to me the numbers aren't adding up. At the very least we can get a sense of the risk that the whistle-blower chick was talking about.

*****

I took issue with M.A. Welch's statement in the paper that the east side bipole III route is "less green". I've suggested on this blog before that incremental line losses from the west side could have displaced coal power in the U.S. thereby eliminating 500 million pounds of CO2 pollution each year, or potentially much more.

I emailed Mary Agnes, who sent me a thoughtful response conceding that perhaps she could have worded it differently, but pointing out that all the environmental groups support the west side. My response (in part):

I'm not sure that every environmental group agrees the west side is greener. The ones that I've seen take a position on it -- Boreal Forest Network, CPAWS, etc. -- have a mandate to protect the forest. They may not be ambivalent towards pollution and global warming, but to them cutting down trees will trump the waste of 50 MW of power, even if the waste of power is more significant in the larger view.

I have difficulty accepting that any objective environmentalist could advocate the waste of that much power, and I maintain that picking the west side route has nothing to do with saving the environment. If you want to know what it's really about read my last post on this subject.

Bipole Disorder: Billion dollar insurance policy

Writing about the Bipole III debacle is like banging my head against the wall. People should be outraged about the apparent colossal waste of money, but instead the general public just yawns: "Oh there goes the silly government again, wasting money. Nothing new there."

Even though I know my efforts are futile, I still can't let it go. I had to try to find out more from our government about why they chose the much costlier and wasteful west side route. So, on goes my helmet ...

***
I spoke to an MLA and to a senior staffer in the department responsible for Manitoba Hydro. They essentially confirmed what I knew all along: that the UNESCO Heritage thing is just a red herring. It's a catchy and easily-consumable hunk of bull shit that they could toss out there instead of the dry, unpalatable truth. Not their exact words, but nor did they pretend that it was an important factor.

An important factor is the licensing process. This process includes a scoping statement and environmental impact assessment (the later not yet complete) followed by a one year period during which interested parties and communities can intervene. This is where the fun begins. Now, the people I talked to didn't actually say "we don't want to negotiate with the Indians" but it was made clear that doing so was expected to be an ordeal. That is understandable. Though some First Nations communities on the east side of the province supported the project, dealing with those that did not could certainly be painful. We know, for example, that the Hollow Water community can be a first class pain in the ass when it wants to be, and you can bet they're one of the communities opposing the project.

In addition, the government says it has a concern about opposition in the U.S. to the east-side route. Not from just one group, but from a coalition of interest groups including environmental groups, local power producers (imagine that, eh?) and others. It's not really about the trees though. It's an emotional issue. The transmission routing study on the Hydro web site refers at different points to the area east of Lake Winnipeg as an "upscale address" that has "emotional appeal" and could be a "cause celebre" should the opposition gain momentum. According to my government buddy, the combination of all of these factors that I cannot seem to type without using "quotation marks" threatens to elevate the opposition to the east side route from mere annoyance to something much bigger.

So strong is this opposition, says the government, that it not only threatens to derail future power sales to Minnesota, but all power sales to the U.S.. These groups are apparently just fine with the west side route, thus the additional cost of the west side route can be considered "insurance" for our exports. A $600 million insurance policy with annual payments in the tens of millions of dollars. This, I am told, is one of the major factors in selecting the west side route.
You would figure that a united coalition so strong as to threaten billions of dollars in exports of clean energy between two nations might warrant a story in a newspaper or something. So would I, so I ran some searches of the five highest circulation Minnesota newspapers (Star Tribune, Pioneer Press, Rochester Post Bulletin, Duluth News Tribune, Southwest Journal) and came up with no relevant reference to Manitoba Hydro at all. How do you alter government policy without getting your word out to the public? Maybe this coalition is a covert black-ops kind of opposition, where men in trench coats smoking cigarattes approach Minnesota politicians in empty parking garages and make veiled threats about buying power that requires pine trees in Canada to be cut down.
Let's consider the supposed opposition from environmental groups for a second. What environmental group would endorse a solution that would cause somewhere between 30-70 mW of electricity to be wasted? Enough power to light the city of Brandon, vanished into thin air in the form of heat from line losses, just to save a few trees? What about the scarce Boreal Plains ecozone on the west side that the transmission routing study says demands greater protection than the vast forest on the east side? What about the fragile Saskatchewan River Delta and other "Areas of Special Interest" on the west side that are not adequately protected?

So it amounts to this: If there is opposition from environmental groups, then that opposition has it's foundation in ignorance. Ignorance of the true environmental pros and cons of the two routing options. This is something that can easily be combated: "Hey, you in the hemp shirt with the granola bar. did you know that you're advocating the waste of 50mW of CLEAN electricity?"
Such granola-crunchers may be found in an organization called NRDC. This is not a Minnesota group. It is a large organization that opposes development of various ecosystems all over the western hemisphere, and like to interview native elders who say such things as "There's a big spruce tree that fell down in one of our rivers many years ago. And it's still there. Nobody's ever moved it." They have also interviewed Robert Kennedy about our forest, but if you read the related articles on their site there is concern about flooding, forestry and mining, but very little mention of transmission.

I am convinced that most environmental groups in the U.S. don't give a shit where we put our line, as long as they can buy our green energy. There is one exception: an organization called Fresh Energy. Fresh Energy is a non-profit organization that feigns environmental stewardship, but is a lobbying organization for certain Minnesota energy producers. It opposes exports from MB Hydro in general, according to the routing study, although it is very doubtful that they have the clout to actually stop those exports. However, the thinking is that disputes with native communities over east-side routing could give them additional ammunition, which brings us back to issue #1: navigating the hostile First Nations.

Yes, but let's also consider the difficulties negotiating the west side route: There are still First Nations Communities that need to be dealt with, but also farmers. Ukrainian farmers. (I have no idea what that's supposed to mean.) The point is, there is a great deal of territory that needs to be navigated including flood zones, parklands, and farms. Many many many farms. About that: Apparently* Hydro is committed to certain limitations in setting it's route through this farmland, including
1. Hydro will not expropriate any land. It will negotiate all settlements with the land owners.
2. Hydro will not run the line within 600m of any residence.
3. Hydro will not run the line diagonally across any farmland. Yes, you read that correctly. Yes, I do know what diagonal means.

I have input these limitations into an advanced computer model to simulate what the Bipole III route might look like on the west side of the province:


Who knows how much this will really cost and how much longer the line really will be when all is said and done. Why would Hydro, which is billions of dollars in debt already, incur all of this additional cost and hardship, rather than taking their lumps with the first nations communities (which they have experience with) thereby saving a freighter-load of money? A: They wouldn't. However, because this issue is so important to Manitobans, the Manitoba government took an "advisory role" in the process during which they advised Hydro to leave the east side alone. Why is this issue so important to Manitobans? Beacuse if the "coalition of environmentalists" in the U.S. (a.k.a. Fresh Energy/NRDC) causes all of our electricity export contracts to vanish, then the province will take a huge economic hit. We just can't take that risk, so it was critical that the province step in and direct Hydro on what to do. This is what I am told, anyhow.

Plus, Resource Management Areas (RMAs) are a provincial responsibility. These are arrangements whereby affected parties are consulted about development. However, they have to be managed properly, otherwise "rather than reducing conflict, these arrangements can create tensions whereby the government states that the relationship is one of consultation but in effect grants a right of consent to each First Nation."(pg16) In other words, there is work involved on the part of the provincial government to stick-handle the talks with the First Nations correctly. This requires effort, diligence, and intelligence. If the provincial government is unwilling to undertake these negotiations than perhaps they are lacking in one of those three areas.

What's the conclusion? I have seriously spent too much time on this and have to get back to my regular schedule of downloading anime porn. Also, I am not buying the idea that NRDC or any other environmental group would or could block Hydro exports to the U.S. -- a prospect that the routing study call "highly speculative" -- and I certainly don't agree with paying a billion dollars to guard against it. I think the real issue here is the willingness or the ability of the province to deal with the First Nations in a fair but firm manner, and to take a stand if necessary (as it likely will be). As always with this government, if there is a choice between making a tough decision or spending money, the choice will always be to spend money.

***

by the way, Hydro, thanks for the second bag of light bulbs. Is this going to be a weekly delivery? I probably shouldn't tell you this, but I can afford to buy my own bulbs.

***

*as discussed by Hydro personnel at recent open houses in Western MB.

h/t Mike Waddell

Windmill math

Let's see ... I have 15 minutes to kill before I go to work ... What should I do? Relax with a coffee? Read the paper? Masturbate? Oh what the heck, let's do some math!

I see that Manitoba Hydro has finally signed on to a deal to build another wind farm. Is it a good deal? Hard to say because the details were not released. What we know is that Hydro is giving Pattern Energy a 20 year loan for $260m, and that Bob Brennan says that "Hydro stands to make a small profit" on the loan.

Small profit, eh? Ok. Let's suppose then that Hydro is lending them the money at a sweatheart deal of 5% interest -- slightly more than the rate they're paying on a Series 10: 5-Year Fixed Rate Manitoba Hydro bond. $260m amortized over 20 years would require Pattern to make payments back to hydro of about $20.9m each year.
Now: this wind farm is rated at 138 megawatts, but the capacity factor of a wind farm is between 20-40% (source) so we can count on this thing generating about 30% of 138 mW or 41.4 mW. At that rate, in order to cover the cost of the loan, they would have to be able to sell the electricity back to Hydro at at least $0.058 per kW.h. But .. they also have to cover their own $95m investment. If they were to finance that in a similar way, then the break-even price jumps to $0.079 per kW.h. More likely Hydro's buying the power at something like $0.10-0.12 per kW.h because their financing costs are probably higher and they need a profit margin.

I pay $0.0625 per kW.h on my hydro bill each month.

Ahhhhhhh that was fun. Anyhow, just back of the envelope calcs ... there are lots of variables.

~~~

related:
how the name "Pattern Energy" came about.
Pattern press release.

Manitoba Hydro: the golden beaver - updated

Trappers suing for $64M. Say Hydro, province took away livelihood

Will $64 million help? I know it would help me. It would help me to buy a new gullwing AMG Mercedes SLS, for example. But, the question is: will it help the trappers in Chemawawin? First, the history:

In 1968, Hydro builds a damn, and floods 500,000 acres of land -- "one of the best wildlife areas in North America" according to the lawyer that the band hired. Prior to building the damn, Hydro, attempting to do the right thing one would suppose, negotiates with the affected community and moves them to a new location, giving them roads, schools, running water and electricity for the first time. While you might think that this would lead to an improved standard of living, alcohol abuse took hold of the community "as it became clear the new site, built on bedrock, was no good for traditional trapping, hunting and agricultural practices." There is cause-and-effect implied in that statement that I am not convinced is true. Many other communities got plagued with alcohol abuse, without any drastic change in their trap lines to blame it on. But in any case, many years later in 1990 Hydro paid $13.7 mil to Chemawawin to compensate for the "outstanding effects of the damn."

End of story? Hell no ... Another 18 years later, a group of trappers from the community are going after Hydro for $64 million in lost income. This is for "as many as" 118 trappers or descedants, suffering a 50% drop in their standard of living (I guess running water and electricity don't count). That's over half a million dollars for each of the 118 people.

Sanity check time: $64 million works out to over $1.5 million per year since the damn opened. If this represents a 50% decrease in their revenues from trapping, then that implies that the total value of their trapping, had that revenue not been lost, would have been over $3 million per year -- more than the value of all wild fur produced in the province each year by over 7000 trappers, according to the Manitoba Trappers Association.

Now, I'm not saying the trappers in Chemawawin are not 428.5 times better at trapping than everybody else, or that their former land wasn't that much better. I just find it hard to believe, is all. The cynic in me is thinking that this is one last money grab before the trappers in question get too dead or forgetful to recall the glory days of catching 500 muskrats a week.

***

I wrote in the comments of a recent post by David Watson that, while in general racial tensions have largely decreased in Canada, they seem to be growing larger with respect to the First Nations. There is increasing frustration among many Native leaders and groups that they are not being properly compesated for past wrongs, and continue to be denied the resources that they deserve; and there is increasing frustration among non-Natives that the more the government gives, they more the First Nations demand. There is a sentiment that it is high time they take responsibility for their own state of affairs -- a sentiment that grows each time an unreasonable demand like this is made. As the demands get bigger, the divide grows larger.

*** update: in related news ***

oh geeze, this isn't gonna help with the whole racial tension thing ...

Last week the band council on the Kahnawake reserve, southwest of Montreal, delivered letters to 26 people identified as non-natives living with their Mohawk spouses or partners. The recipients were told they had 10 days to leave.

Ottawa, as all Canadian governments tend to do, is avoiding this like the plague:

"It is important for people to realize that whether I like the decisions or not, these are decisions made by First Nations people on their own land," Mr. Strahl told reporters in Ottawa.

Whatever.

Mr. Delaronde said all the eviction letters were delivered last week. He could not say whether anyone has heeded the notice yet. The band council plans to publish the names of anyone who has not left by next week, he said.

That must be the "or else..." part of the eviction notice.

Mostly Moose. Some other stuff

I went to the Saturday night Manitoba Moose game. It was an entertaining, but low scoring game, with the good guys winning in the OT shootout after a 1 - 1 tie.

Thumbs up goes to:
- the Moose defense, for keeping the Toronto Marlies to around 20 shots on net, and to goalie Cory Schneider for only letting in one of those (and only one in the shootout.)
- the game programs. The free handouts are four pages, with one page devoted to the lineups, and another filled with various stats and analysis.
- the scalper who sold me a 3rd row center ice ticket for $20.

Thumbs down goes to:
- the MTS Centre cleaning staff. The seats where really dirty. General grime, dried beer, feathers ... it was kind of gross actually. Time to pull out the Bissell for a quarter-season cleaning I think.
- Santa Claus, for causing all of the streets downtown to be closed off. Although parking was a snap once I decided to drive around the barriers.
- The Moose offense. That's not really a fair assessment though, because they worked hard all night, got over 30 shots on net and plenty of scoring chances. It just comes down to a lack of scoring ability. For example, at one point Marco Rosa had an open third of the net and hit the post ... from six inches away. That's what happens when everybody on the team who is capable of scoring more than 10 goals a year (and isn't over 40) gets pulled up to the parent club.

Other notes:
- best fan comment: "Hey Deveaux. How do you explain to your friends that you aren't even good enough to make the Maple Leafs?"
- former PC party leader Stu Murray was handing out St.Boniface Hospital lottery leaflets. Good to see him out doing the nitty gritty promo stuff.

Summary / Jets rant:
The Moose are a good fit for Winnipeg. It's affordable, the team is relatively successful, and the entertainment isn't bad most nights. I can't really complain. Could I have bought a $20 3rd-row ticket for a Jets game? Not a chance, but I probably could have bought a $50 ticket for the top of the cramped balcony, and the calibre of play would have been better. I feel like a traitor saying this, but I can live without the Jets. It would be cool to have an NHL team again, but Winnipeg is about 300,000 people and 5 or 6 big head offices too small to have the economic base for a successful team. Our arena is also very very marginal. Rexall Place in Edmonton holds 16,800 and the owners there are saying that's too small, and are pushing hard for a new downtown arena. Having said that, I do think the NHL will come back to Winnipeg. Where there's smoke there's fire, and there's more smoke all the time. As not-profitable as the New Jets will be, they will still be far more successful than some of the struggling US teams, like the Old Jets for example. I think it's going to happen.

~~~~~~~~

Hey, since I have my thumbs all warmed up, a big thumbs up to Mary A Welch for her article about wind farms (or lack thereof), and to the Free Press editors for sticking it on the front page of the weekend edition. This is something that deserves more attention. And thumbs down to Minister Wowchuk (I'm having an "I Married an Axe Murderer flashback right now. Woooooo-Chuck! Anyhow ... back to the program ....) for idiotic comments:

it's not fair to compare Manitoba to Ontario, since our province already relies almost exclusively on renewable energy but Ontario is powered largely by dirty coal.

And that makes a difference how? Maybe in a world where exporting electricity was impossible ...

And, she said, Manitoba is blessed with cheap power, meaning ratepayers would take a hit if the province threw open its doors to wind power

Oh, you mean those artificially cheap rates that contribute to us being among the biggest consumers of electricity in the world, and to Hydro's massive debt, which will be much more of a problem when interest rates rise again? Those cheap rates? That is why we're not building more power even though we've potentially over-committed on power exports and may face blackouts according to an independent auditor?

~~~~~~~~

Also a thumbs up to Gordon Sinclair for a good column about the Bomber's management woes. How about that, eh? I said something nice about Gordon! Although he still had ... let's see ... 1..2 .... 34 one sentence paragraphs. You still need to work on that, Gordo.

~~~~~~~~

Still with the Freep ... to borrow a gambit from Kate at SDA: Now is the time when we juxtapose!

Mia Rabson

Aboriginal inmates in Canada make up too high a percentage of Canada's prison population and tend to get harsher sentences and less programming, a report from the country's prison watchdog said Friday.

Colleen Simard

Waywayseecappo Chief Murray Clearsky went to court for another drunk driving charge. It ended up with Clearsky getting a light sentence with no jail time. ... The worst part is this wasn't the first time Clearsky had been convicted of a drunken driving charge. He's been charged three times since 1983, and also has a dangerous weapon conviction.

~~~~~~~~

Bob Brennan

News Roundup: Cabs, QBs, and megawatts

Duffy's, Unicity apply for new cab licences

The Manitoba Taxicab Board is nearing the end of extensive hearings that began nearly a year ago on applications for 800 more taxi licences. Today the board heard an application from Duffy’s and Unicity for any and all new licences the board may issue.

How much is this board costing us? Turn these hearings over to me and I'll save everybody money:

Duffy's/Unicity exec: "We would like to apply for 800 additional licenses for ..."
Me: "Go fuck yourself"

There. Done.

There's no reason for this board to even exist. With some basic standards and regulations in place the industry should be opened up to whoever wishes to participate, and customer demand will determine how many cabs are on the street. But, if we are going to regulate licenses, there's no way in hell any more should go to Duffy's or Unicity so that they can further entrench their duopoly. This is not a healthy way to run an industry.

Bombers trade for Esks' QB

I like that we're looking at moving Glenn and reworking the QB position, but why are we trading for another 3rd stringer? We have three of them already. We need a proven performer.

Of our current crop I like the look of Bryan Randall the most, but none of these guys have much experience.

Hydro eyeing historic buildings for new substation

I'm with rgalston on this one. Does this make any sense? Of all the parking lots and underutilized spaces in downtown Winnipeg, Hydro wants to put a substation here? That will certainly limit the revitalization potential of the area.

A couple quick things

I have been know to criticize the Free Press on occasion, but this weekend there were a couple of pieces that helped to improve my opinion of the paper as being something more than a forum for left-wing slaves pulling Bob Silver's plow through the tobacco fields of the Manitoba media. Okay, that analogy was pretty bloody bad, but I'm at a low point on my mental bio-rhythm right now and I don't think I can do any better.

First, there was this piece by Dan Lett, who I am becoming convinced is actually Policy Frog (he's at least a fan). Key paragraph:

We have the cheapest electricity in North America, but that is doing nothing to create wealth or opportunity in the province. What is has created is the highest per capita consumption of electricity in North America, a trend that will make it difficult for Hydro to charge the market rates it needs to be profitable.

Bingo.

Then there was this piece by Bartley Kives, including:

Allow me to repeat this: There is nobody in Winnipeg advocating anything other than the creation of a heritage park at 100 Main St. What the Friends and their supporters are quibbling over is the second parcel of land, at the corner of Fort Street and Assiniboine Avenue.

... The friends would rather sit back and watch Winnipeggers get spun into believing Upper Fort Garry is in danger, when in fact their all-or-nothing game is the only thing that truly imperils the park.

Which brings two questions to mind:

1) Now that Bartley has imparted some common sense to the Saturday paper on this issue, is that going to dampen Gord Sinclair's "ridiculous rhetoric" a little bit?

2) Is Bartley going to get a lashing from his boss and Friend of Fort Garry Bob Silver?

Hydro Math

Looks like Hydro has inked a Howard Stern-like $1billion contract to sell power to Minnesota. I guess Bob Brennan had better get on the horn and find somebody to build the Wuskwatim dam.

Just doing a little math here ... $1 billion over 15 years for 250 megawatts = $267k per megawatt-year or about $30 per MW-hr. That's a bargain, compared to the $40 cited here, but I guess you need to cut a deal if you want to secure your customer for the long-term. I hope that's indexed for inflation.

Hydro isn't saying what the surplus will be sold for, but even at $30/MW-hr, that works out to between $7.4 mil and $14.7 mil in annual line losses from the west-side Bipole III route. Think about it ... we could build a waterpark with a few years of that money.

Bipole Disorder : New Website

More on the Hydro Bipole3 east-side west-side debate... I wrote about it here and Policy Frog has had a number of good posts about the issue. If you're concerned about how your tax dollars are being spent, if you're concerned about the environment, you can't let this issue fade away.

Now there's a new web site out there dedicated to bringing attention to this matter: http://www.bipole3.ca/ . There are a number of links to news articles and such, as well as a blog and of course an and on-line petition. Check it out.


h/t: curtis

-- UPDATE -- 01/21

The first comment on the bipole3.ca blog is a beautie:

Stay away from the eastside. Hollow Water First Nation has blockaded once already and will do so again if necessary. The government has already shown a lack of consultation in regards to our traditional hunting,blueberry,wild rice and trapping grounds. Hollow Water will not be easily convinced.
Hydro along the eastside will be the beginning of unsustainable development from maximizing mining/logging corporations and encroaching cabin lot owners, which is encouraged by government so they can collect more tax money at the expense of our pristine environment and local residents.

by Danelle Bushie, who I can only assume is a relative of Chief Ian Bushie of Hollow Water blockade fame. I thought about replying, but I suspect there is not much point.

Don't Run The Hydro Lines Through The Grand Canyon

I have to get something off my chest. Even though I have commented on this issue elsewhere, I feel a need to rant about it here on my own humble blog.

That something is the government interference in the operations of Manitoba Hydro. You could dedicate an entire blog to that, but my focus today is on the decision to run the new DC Hydro lines down the west side of Lake Winnipeg, rather than the more obvious east-side choice.

A winnipegFIRST article has a few useful quotes:

The management of Manitoba Hydro believes that the east side is a better, more efficient route.

-- Bob Brennan, president and CEO of MB Hydro, confirming that government interference (my words) is the reason for the decision.

There’s already roads and infrastructure on the west side, so it’s more fitting than going through an untouched boreal forest on the east side that has the chance of being an UNESCO site

-- Colin Lemoine, press secretary for the provincial government, providing the flawed line of logic behind the decision.

Let's examine this:

First, is the government really concerned about the "untouched boreal forest" in that particular corner of the province? What about the San Gold and Rice Lake Gold mines east of the lake? What about the logging along the eastern edge of the province? What about the native communities, like Bloodvein First Nations? Does keeping the area "untouched" mean that we can never build roads to their communities?

Second, what the hell is this deal with the UNESCO heritage site anyhow? I grew up in the Boreal Forest in western Manitoba, and I could not explain to you how or why this area should be a UNESCO world heritage site. I even looked at their criteria. What is the "outstanding universal value" that can be found in this particular area, and not, say North Western Ontario? Sure, it's a beautiful area of the province, but it's not unique and endangered in the way that the Great Barrier Reef is.

Third, let's suppose we get our heritage status. Then what? What does that do for us? There will be some administrative costs associated with it, and very little economic benefit. That area will get the same hunters and fishers visiting that you see now. In fact, if we want the area to remain "untouched" (which it is not) then tourism would have to be limited or stopped completely. Maybe they're not interested in economic return ... maybe they're trying to protect the endangered white tailed deer.

Fourth, if government is at all concerned about the environment, then it should be concerned about the additional electricity transmission losses that will occur from using the western route -- 500 kms longer, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of lost electricity by some estimates. That is a lot of power that could be put to better use displacing dirty coal-fired power in other jurisdictions.

Fifth, we are waisting an opportunity to build summer roads to communities that are cut-off from the rest of us most of the year. All the more important with increasing unreliability of winter roads. Potential job creation for individuals in remote native communities has also been successfully avoided.

Sixth, we are losing an opportunity to build redundancy into our power supply from the north. With both DC corridors on the west side, we are much more vulnerable to natural (and unnatural) disasters.

Finally ... what about our valuable tax dollars????? $500m more to build, and who knows how much more in lost revenues from lost power (see point #4).

Now go back and read the quote from the provincial Press Secretary, and you can see just how lame their logic is.