Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to make mention of several Yellowknife Centre constituents. I’ll start on the end with the NWT Status of Women. We have Annemieke Mulders, Lorraine Phaneuf and I believe Samantha Thomas also lives downtown. She’s shaking her head, but I’ll take her anyway. Sitting next to them is the lovely Ms. Katherine Robinson. She’s devoted many great years of service here at the Premier’s office and to help many Members here, and she’s done a wonderful job. So, thank you very much for each and every one. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to recognize two young Pages we have here with us this week: Mr. James Beaulieu and Austin Cayen, and also their chaperone, my own constituency assistant, Myrtle Graham. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. I’d like to welcome everybody here in the public gallery today. Thank you for taking an interest in our proceedings.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Today I rise to acknowledge and congratulate Weledeh constituent Zhalaani Drygeese-Yelle on her recognition as Top Young Trapper in the North Slave region under the Genuine Mackenzie Fur program.
---Applause
It’s excellent to see her here in the gallery. Apologies for not recognizing Zhalaani. Perhaps her family is here too.
Zhalaani, a resident of Detah and in Grade 12, will graduate this year, but she is also learning about the traditional skills of her culture from her parents. Zhalaani’s parents believe in teaching their children both traditional and modern skills. A member of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation, she went on her first caribou hunt when she was nine and is now being recognized for her excellence in trapping muskrat and beaver. Obviously, her proud parents, Bertha Drygeese and Gerry Yelle, were successful and have much to pass on.
Mr. Speaker, I invite you and all Members to congratulate Zhalaani on her achievement and wish her well as she pursues her two paths of excellence. Well done, Zhalaani!
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. The Member for Sahtu, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Can I go back to item 5, recognition of visitors in the gallery?
---Unanimous consent granted
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I just wish to acknowledge my constituency assistant, Josh Campbell. Lorraine Bezha, as you know, has gone to get her education and career in Fort Smith.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to congratulate our Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment on being named the president of the Pacific Northwest Economic Region and all the work that his department is doing with the geoscience office in undertaking of forming of the office of the regulator of the oil and gas operations in the Northwest Territories.
I want to ask the Minister of ITI to update the House briefly as to where his office is at in adopting and creating new policies and guidelines as the regulator.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. One of the decisions that the government made was to regulate the oil and gas industry ourselves here in the Northwest Territories and grow the capacity here in the NWT, and we’ve done that. We’ve got an office set up separate from the Department of ITI, the office of the oil and gas regulator. It’s got an executive director; we’ve got staff in place at that office, and we’re looking forward to regulating the industry. We don’t have a lot of activity taking place currently, but we’re looking to see some more activity in the future. Thank you.
Thank you. I want to say that we have a saying in the Sahtu: If you shoot a moose right the first time, you’ll have enough meat and hide and you’ll feed the family.
As the regulator, we’re setting up this office now in the Northwest Territories. Is the Minister in this fashion, are we learning the hard way or are we learning the amazing and fast way? Can the Minister guarantee that we’ll be engaged in shaping the new regulation body, which stems directly and philosophically from the 17th Assembly priorities of their positions and goals? Thank you.
What we have is an opportunity here, an opportunity to get things right, and it is our belief that we can regulate the industry ourselves. We have put the pieces in place that are going to allow us to regulate the industry here in the Northwest Territories, and we feel very competent that who best to regulate the industry than Northerners. We’re very proud of the decisions we’ve made to date and we’re proud of the opportunities that we have going forward and certainly look forward to working with Regular Members as we continue to strive to get the best regulatory system in place here in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Also, we have a saying in the Sahtu: fought over many years of our own sovereignty, institutions and culture.
Will the process of the regulations of oil and gas in the Northwest Territories respect the sovereignty of the Sahtu people, their settled land claims, the regulatory boards that we have? Will this process respect that there are land claims in place, there is sovereignty in place, there are processes of regulating oil and gas through the co-management boards that we have set up? Would that be respected?
The quick answer is yes, it will be respected. We have independent land and water boards across the Northwest Territories. It’s not our intention to do anything to fetter their decision-making authority. What we want to do is get out. We inherited the filing requirements from the National Energy Board. Our intention is to get out draft requirements and filing requirements to the public and other stakeholders early in the new year, and we are moving forward with that plan.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, Minister. Can the Minister go a little further? Can he give us more certainty than the honourable Premier did last week in the House? The regulatory office is at the heart of the next vital economy engine for the Northwest Territories.
In this country, shale gas is helping to shut down the dirty coal industry south of the border.
Does the Minister and Cabinet agree to share the draft regulations with all the Members of this House before Christmas and April 1, 2015? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It’s our intention, certainly once the draft requirements are ready, we will certainly look at sharing those with the Standing Committee on Priorities and Planning and the Regular Members. It is our intention to do so.
As for the date of the end of December, our time frame right now is early January, and we’re hoping to ensure that we hit that we target of early January. So, at the earliest opportunity, we will be ready to share those draft filing requirements and new regulations with the Regular Members. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’d like to follow up with my statement earlier today. Recently, Borealis GeoPower in partnership with Acho Dene Koe First Nations of Fort Liard and the federal government developed a geothermal power project, the feasibility of which was confirmed by a third-party review. The company met with every obligation for a Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board permit. The failure of NTPC to provide a power purchase agreement stopped the project.
Let me start with one specific. What was GNWT’s investment of taxpayer dollars and funds into this project? That is, including third-party review and other costs that we covered, how much did we contribute to the evaluation and development of this project proposal? Mahsi.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. Minister of Finance, Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The records indicate $190,000. Thank you.
A power purchase agreement from the Power Corporation was a condition for the federal funding available. Despite a three-year window in which to provide the necessary power purchase agreement was not forthcoming from NTPC. The government has said that it provided the terms for an agreement, knowing full well that this falls short of the requirement for the PPA. This failure cost residents, businesses and government millions of dollars in the loss of local jobs. Borealis was willing to shoulder all financial risks.
Why did the government not direct this fully owned subsidiary to provide a power purchase agreement for this key energy initiative?
Work was done towards a power purchase agreement with Borealis. It was realized that a power purchase contract would be quite complex and timely to negotiate. In order to facilitate Borealis’s discussion with financing partners like Husky Energy and one other large energy player, we gave them a term sheet which provided a 25-year contract at the marginal cost of diesel, committing customers to 25 years of diesel rates that was indexed to inflation of diesel. Borealis took this term sheet but was unable to find a partner to complete this $16 million dollar project. Our due diligence, through a third-party consultant, had the project cost at about $21 million, despite the federal government pledging $7 million towards the project.
It’s a complex project, so we are not going to approve it and we are going to lose all these benefits.
Some say that NTPC is monopolistic. Perhaps this philosophy is based on some legitimate concerns that need to be addressed. For example, money that is tied up in the power diesel generation infrastructure, infrastructure that may be rendered obsolete when more economical and environmentally friendly power systems such as this are introduced to our communities.
What role does stranded infrastructure play in this and ongoing Power Corporation reluctance with this government’s endorsement to promote and support progressive third-party power generation projects, and how will the government deal with them? Mahsi.
Mr. Speaker, the Power Corporation is a Crown corporation, ostensibly arm’s length, but it has, in fact, evolved into a much closer working relationship, very similar to the working relationship that we have with the Housing Corporation. It is a vehicle of our social and economic policy and energy policy and sits at the table with other deputies. Comes to all the high level meetings with the chairman of the board and the president to look at how do we move on things like the expansion of hydro, how do we look at generation issues, handling things like the installation of the solar array in Simpson, the work in Colville Lake. It was referenced in my comments this morning, doing the wind mapping in places like Storm Hills between Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk. The Power Corporation is a very critical aspect of our energy policy in delivery in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bromley.
I might add, Mr. Speaker, the most expensive power in the world is what this Power Corporation is producing, and this Minister is letting this go, passing up what other opportunities we have missed like this.
The Minister will be happy to learn that despite government failure and the best efforts of NTPC to stand and watch this exciting opportunity evaporate, Borealis GeoPower is still prepared to move forward with this project without the federal subsidy.
My question is: Is this government now prepared to move forward and capitalize on this still available and valuable opportunity? Mahsi.
Of course, we are open to all alternative energy opportunities that are out there. I would point out that this project, two or three years ago, was projected to cost anywhere from $16 million to $20 million for 600 kilowatts, which is a very, very expensive price to pay. We had offered up a 25-year power purchase agreement. In addition to the cost to install, there were some very significant ongoing costs because of the high mineral content of the water. It would require ongoing scaling and potential drilling of additional holes and wells.
We would be more than willing to revisit this to see if there is any of the economics and dynamics that have changed. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Miltenberger. Member for Hay River North, Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I indicated in my Member’s statement, Hay River needs dredging. I know the Minister of Transportation had federal meetings, including the meeting with the federal Minister of Transportation. Was Hay River dredging on the agenda?
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Minister of Transportation, Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Hay River dredging was not on the agenda because it was the meeting of the Ministers of Transportation and I didn’t have an opportunity to speak with her. But in any event, we should be talking to the Minister responsible for Fisheries and Oceans or the Minister responsible for Supply and Services, which is the Minister responsible for the Coast Guard. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I don’t think we have here in this House any of those Ministers, so the only Minister I can ask this question to is the Minister of Transportation.
I guess the question is: What is this government going to do to dredge the Hay River?
We agree with the Member that dredging in the Hay River is essential to transportation of goods. We continue to urge the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. I haven’t engaged the Minister directly; however, the department has been doing some work with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, the federal department, and urging them to get the dredging done as we, too, see that as essential.
I know some responsibilities that have been federal only, let’s say building new highways, have now become the responsibility of the GNWT. We’ve committed money to creating some of those new highways.
Is there a way that we can commit dollars to it to maybe move this project forward?
The last time the federal government did spend money on the port was in 2012-13. We recognize that there appears to be an abandonment of that responsibility at this point. In order for me to include that item under the Department of Transportation business plan, again, I would have to go through the process here, the business planning process, and come to the Members to request that money be put into our business plan in order to dredge the port in Hay River.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Bouchard.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Will the Minister of Transportation commit to getting a meeting together of all the responsible federal Ministers to see that we can move this project forward in the future sooner than later?
I’m more than willing to meet with the federal Minister responsible, although I can’t set his or her schedule, but I will have the department make contact with the Minister responsible to check to see if it is a possibility that we could have that discussion Minister to Minister or department head to department head to see if something can be done with the dredging in the Hay River port.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. The Member for Inuvik Boot Lake, Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’m just going to follow up with some questions to the Minister of Transportation in regard to the ferry operations in Inuvik.
I would just like to, first of all, ask the Minister of Transportation how many days was the ferry shut down when it was supposed to be open, or how many days was it operational during that freeze-up and breakup period?
