Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We've been at this Taltson thing for about two decades now and tens of millions of dollars in engineering studies, and I guess my first question is can the Minister tell me how much this Taltson Expansion is going to cost? Thank you.
Thank you, Member for Yellowknife North. Minister responsible for Infrastructure.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the I just before we I don't have the cost right in front of me but I do want to add that we have numerous discussions with industrial companies regarding the Taltson project. These companies have expressed interest in the project. They have stated that they that the investors want to invest in project that use green and clean power. At this point in time, we are examining the potential for ten candidate mine customers to be able to support this project, which will start in 2033. We will need at least two or three reasonable, foreseeable mine customers in place to proceed to construction in 2027.
I'd also like to add, Mr. Speaker, that linking these two grids will improve redundancy, power reliability. We would always realize significant savings when we are faced with low water levels and we have to rely heavily on diesel generation, which comes at a significant cost. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I didn't hear how much the project was going to cost, which seems like a pretty fundamental thing you would want to know, is how much is this project going to cost. We have an MOU to build it. We were asking the federal government to give us money. Certainly we must know how much we're asking for, Mr. Speaker. But apparently not.
Mr. Speaker, one of the reasons that this project has fallen through in the past is that we just can't quite get to a rate of power that is competitive with the price of diesel, and so mines do not want to enter into a longterm power purchasing agreement. I know some of the social governance and the desire to be on clean energy is changing that math for mines but, really, at the end of the day it's going to come down to what we think we can sell this power at. So does the Minister have a figure of what we can expect to sell Taltson power at? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Of course, Mr. Speaker, our goal is to sell all the power we will produce from this project. 60 megawatts is the current proposed expansion at the site, on top of what we're producing existing generation. The final install capacity of the facility and annual water levels in the Taltson system will ultimately dictate how much power we'll be able to sell. Mr. Speaker, we are currently estimating in the range of about 420 gigawatt hours of additional energy we'll be able to sell. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Yeah, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Selling 60 megawatts in this territory is no small feat. You know, we're definitely going to need quite a few mines and they're going to need to operate for multiple decade with longterm power purchasing agreements to sell 60 megawatts of power. And I didn't hear how much the project was going to cost, and I didn't hear how much we actually expect that power to cost. I'll note that a lot of these operations can look to Alberta that sell at about $0.12 a kilowatt hour power, which is a lot cheaper than what we could ever hope to get to.
Mr. Speaker, I'm hoping, perhaps I can get a bit more detail there. I heard the Minister say there's ten potential mines. I'm wracking my brain to even picture two mines that are on a potential route. Pine Point is an obvious one. But can the Minister tell me which potential mines these are that would actually be on the grid? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, let me take this opportunity to let the Member know the hydro price we will charge will need to be competitive with other power alternatives for remote mines such as an LNG and diesel at the time we proceed. You know, Mr. Speaker, I want to say that's probably not you appreciate it's not in our best business interest to be able to list a price today for power that will be sold to a project that won't come on line in the future. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Minister. Final supplementary. Member for Yellowknife North.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. You know, I don't actually know whether we should build Taltson, and I don't think I should even have an opinion on it. I think the power corp needs to have a business case, and it needs to be evidencebased, and we need to crunch the numbers to see who's going to buy our power, for how much, and if it makes sense then most certainly we should do that. And, really, it is an evidencebased decisionmaking, and we shouldn't be here on the floor of the House asking basic questions such as how much is this whole thing we've been talking about for decades actually going to cost. And all of that would be done in a business case, Mr. Speaker; a business case that we have been promised over and over.
And so my question for the Minister of Infrastructure is when are we going to see a public business case for the Taltson Hydro Expansion? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we are on track for the completion of a detailed business case for this project within the life of this government. This document will not be made public. As a general rule, Mr. Speaker, detailed business case information is not made public; you know, to preserve the financial that's in the context of a major project for which we are going to be seeking competitive bids for this construction. We will be working with our partners to provide compelling case for Canada and the GNWT to invest in significant dollars for this project.
Mr. Speaker, a key part of this work is to demonstrate specific benefits for the Northwest Territories in terms of growth, construction jobs, stabilized power, power rates, specific conditions, risk, that must be addressed prior to the GNWT investing in this construction dollars. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
