Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions today are for the Minister responsible for the NWT Power Corporation, Premier Roland. Earlier today in my Member’s statement I highlighted the increased cost to replace the Bluefish dam. Can the Minister responsible for the NWT Power Corp please confirm this afternoon what the budget for this project is and how that budget has changed over the last several months? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. The honourable Premier, Mr. Roland.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The confirmed budget with contingency is targeted now at $37.4 million.
I thank the Minister for that. I’m curious how this increase will affect the power rates in Yellowknife, Mr. Speaker. Can the Minister tell me what the forecasted impact of this project is on power rates in Yellowknife? Thank you.
When this project was first proposed there was an estimate given to the PUB as this project had to be filed through them as well. The targeted impact was in the neighbourhood of up to between 1.5 to 2 cents per kilowatt hour. So that was budgeted prior to any changes in the budget. With this change we’re looking at 2.5 cents per kilowatt hour impact in this region. That does affect the rest of the communities because our Power Support Program, as we’ve changed it, is based on the Yellowknife rate. Thank you.
Thank you. I wonder, is there any specific cost mitigation measures that the Power Corp is using to try to lower the cost of this project. Are there numbers? We were talking about final numbers. Is the $33 million with the $4 million contingency, are they the final numbers or is there any possibility that the final cost of this project in the impact of power rates across the Northwest Territories and Yellowknife will be lower and how does the Power Corporation work towards trying to control these costs and keep them down, Mr. Speaker?
Thank you. The approach that the Power Corp has taken on this project on a number of areas was to minimize the costs. For example, after going out for our fee, the corporation chose a contractor to negotiate the price down, because the one portion, the construction portion was higher than anticipated, and they worked that number back down through an agreement in construction. There is also a portion of the contact that if there’s a savings on moving ahead on this project at lower than expected prices, that will reduce the overall impact, as well. So the corporation has taken a number of steps to try to minimize the project.
One of the areas we find as the reason for the increase was at the initial stages, it was deemed an emergency. The first program that was put together wasn’t as detailed as was needed, and through the environmental process there was a number of factors that adjusted the plan that was initially designed. So the design had changed, and requirements had changed and that impacted the numbers upward. We’re hoping, now that we have the numbers established and set, that there may be even some savings achieved as we go forward with construction. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. Your final, short supplementary, Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. This Assembly worked awfully hard to try to find ways to reduce the power rates in communities, and as a result, the rates stayed the same in Yellowknife, but overall we did a good job of trying to reduce the rates in the whole Territories. This rate obviously is a concern; this rate increase is obviously a concern. I’d like to ask the Minister, if power increases as a result of the Bluefish construction, if we can’t avoid increasing our territorial power rates as a result of this, are there any programs or is there anything that we can do as a Legislature and the Minister can do as the Minister responsible to residents to help with the impacts of this potential increase to our rates after we worked so hard to bring them down.
Thank you. The estimation of, for example, 2.5 cents per kilowatt hour will impact residents of about $17 a month. We know it is an increase. We’ve tried to minimize the overall construction costs. One of the things we’ve done with the contract is risk sharing, and that may be able to lower the actual amount that we’ve budgeted and reduce the contingency, for example. So right now the process as it would work out is the construction would have to be completed and the overall budget looked at and the impact then passed on. So it would be beyond the life of the 16th Assembly. Well, it will have to be after the final completion of the project that rates would be adjusted. So I can’t speak for the 17th Assembly on what they might do to try to mitigate something of this nature. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Roland. The honourable Member for Mackenzie Delta, Mr. Krutko.
