SASKATOON — On the heels of the government announcing its Sask. First Energy Security and Supply Plan, the opposition New Democrats say they will be bringing forward plans of their own.
NDP critic for SaskPower, Jobs and Economy Aleana Young said the Saskatchewan NDP will release their plan for Saskatchewan’s energy future later this fall, titled the Grid and Growth Plan.
In speaking to SaskToday, Young said the plan is “going to present a different vision than the Sask Party’s.”
“We believe that we need to invest more in more electricity generations across the board. It's going to have more renewables, it will have more natural gas, we've talked a lot in the past about the need for a full cycle and clear strategies. … We're not going to be ideological about what this looks like. We need to be investing in Saskatchewan's electricity future. Most jurisdictions in Canada and around the world are looking at doubling or tripling their electricity production in the next decade or two.”
Young pointed to the importance of the power infrastructure to the province.
“Saskatchewan's electricity infrastructure is critical to our economy and we can't grow our economy, we can't retain and attract investment without having a strong grid here in Saskatchewan.”
As for the government’s proposals announced the previous day in the Saskatchewan First Energy Security and Supply Plan, Young was very concerned.
“The government of Saskatchewan, the Sask Party, they made some wild choices when it comes to power generation and what our future looks like,” said Young. “There are significant concerns about how they're politicizing and managing SaskPower, the Crown, and we think it's important that the people of Saskatchewan have the opportunity to work on our plans to have an alternative to what the Sask Party is putting in the window and we wanted to do this with experts from across Canada, and we wanted to do this well in advance of the election.”
According to the Saskatchewan First plan released Monday, the province is pledging it will “conduct a governance review to determine the optimal provincial structure and mandate for nuclear power ownership, operation and development within and beyond the provincial electrical grid.”
Young raised particular concerns about this language, suggesting this pointed to privatization.
She said when she opened the report, “there's no plan, there's no budget. But what it does have is privatization. … It talks about the need for review of governance and ownership of power generation, specifically related to nuclear and what that looks like.”
“To me, anytime the Sask Party talks about looking at the ownership of parts of our Crown corporations, I get nervous. You've seen this story before.”
Young also voiced concern about extending the coal fire plants.
“I actually want to get into this a little bit, because on one hand they're talking about … rebuilding 50-year assets. On the other hand, they're talking about only using it as a bridge to nuclear. Fundamentally, we don't think it's a good use of taxpayer money to spend potentially billions of dollars to operate 50-year assets for maybe five to 10 years if, if the Sask Party is still looking to move to nuclear. In the short term, it adds more chaos to communities like Estevan and Coronach, who want stability.
“They want to know what the plan is. They want to know what the future holds. And we just see announcements, from the government to get with no spending, with no plan, that are playing havoc with people's livelihoods.”
Premier Moe reacts to NDP
When asked Tuesday in Saskatoon about the NDP concerns on the governance review for nuclear power ownership, Premier Scott Moe said “that's always part of the conversation that we have moving forward.”
“It doesn't necessarily have to be SaskPower that's going to build a nuclear reactor. In the space of the large portion of our renewables, they are privately owned. In the case of some of our natural gas facilities, some of those are privately or municipally owned as well, most notably right here in Saskatoon."
Moe said if there is a more affordable and reliable way for the private partner, where they have “a power purchase agreement like we do in the renewables sector, we would look at that. We will also consider owning and operating them.” He adds those are decisions “that are yet to be made, but I think it would be premature and irresponsible to pick a direction on that type of a decision at this point in the policy.”
As for the NDP’s own energy plans, Premier Moe was less than impressed.
“Well, the NDP's plan would mean that we would have a much less reliable power grid, but we would pay more for it,” said Moe.
“So that isn't really a plan at all. In fact, their plan generally is to make a plan about how they might actually make a plan in the future. And that's just simply lost and reckless, like the NDP all too often is.”
Moe said what the government has come forward with is a “very concrete plan about how we are going to provide energy security and affordability in the near term. And how we are going to do a proper transition to nuclear, ensuring that we are going to have that reliability and the most affordable power that we can in this province. And by extension through partnerships in provinces and areas that are near to us.”
Moe also spoke of the importance of transitioning their workforce, whether it is located in Estevan or in the Elbow area.
“The fact is that we need more power. And we need it to be reliable, which the NDP's plan does nothing for. And we need to have it affordable, which the NDP's plan does nothing for as well. As I said, their plan would ensure that we'd have a less reliable power grid. You don't know (whether) the lights would go on when you hit the switch. But you'd get to pay more for it.”
