Liberals stress environmental benefits of power deal
Published Thursday November 26th, 2009
But Opposition says those benefits could come without selling off the assets
FREDERICTON - The Liberal government says selling NB Power assets to Hydro-Québec would reduce New Brunswick's annual greenhouse-gas emissions by 11 per cent.
But the Opposition says those results could be achieved without the proposed $4.75-billion deal.
Environment Minister Rick Miles tabled a report in the Legislature yesterday giving figures on what greenhouse gas reductions might be if the deal goes through.
Miles said the greenhouse gas reductions would put the province on track to meet or exceed environmental commitments already made.
"Our data also shows that, under this potential agreement, New Brunswick will exceed its 2012 greenhouse gas emissions reduction target by one million tonnes due to the decommissioning of NB Power's facilities at Grand Lake and Dalhousie," he said.
As part of the proposed deal's memorandum of understanding, NB Power would sell all its assets to Hydro-Québec except for its fossil-fuelled power plants (Grand Lake, Dalhousie, Coleson Cove, Courtney Bay, and Belledune).
Grand Lake and Dalhousie are scheduled to close next year and Courtney Bay hasn't run since 2002 so it's already considered closed.
Coleson Cove and Belledune don't have any closure dates set, but the province says they could close sooner than their planned economic life if the deal goes ahead.
While there are no plans at this point to close any facilities other than the Grand Lake and Dalhousie facilities, the report looked at the potential closure of all carbon-based facilities when presenting data about annual reductions.
If all six facilities were to close under the deal, the report says there would be annual greenhouse gas emission reductions of more than six megatonnes, more than 33,000 tonnes of sulphur dioxide, more than 13,000 tonnes of nitrogen oxides, 6.5 tonnes of volatile organic compounds, and 96 kilograms of mercury.
The Progressive Conservatives didn't dispute that there would be environmental benefits with the proposed deal, but said that selling NB Power wasn't the only way to achieve them.
"The same benefits could be acquired through a long-term power agreement with Quebec, other provinces or other businesses," said Tory leader David Alward, yesterday.
Energy Minister Jack Keir said a power purchase agreement with another province might lower emission rates.
However, he said such an agreement wouldn't do anything to address what he called the other benefits of the NB Power/Hydro-Québec deal: lowering industrial power rates stable, stabilizing homeowner rates for five-years, and reducing debt.
Disabled
Search Articles
More CE Network Sites & Partners:
Comments (1)
All comments are subject to the site Terms of Use. For a full commenting tutorial click here.
Our editorial team relies on filtering technology and our visitor community to identify inappropriate comments. In the event that a site user has submitted offensive content that has evaded our filter, please select the option to Flag As Inappropriate presented within the comment. Thank you for helping to keep this site clean.
Remember the "Carbon Credits" all go to the Quebec Hydro, not to PNB!! That is wrong simply because HQ may for a time run those plants but when the closures are initiated this province (PNB) will be on the hook financially to disassemble!!
Guess what, those costs associated to dismantling the fossil-fuel plants will more than likely become an expense on the Government books; currently any expenses of NBP are NOT on the Government books. That will likely mean our tax rates will increase as the debt will 'really now' a taxpayer problem!!
We are so screwed!!