Saskatchewan is rebuildings its coal fleet. Here’s a chance to hear from Crown Investments Corp and SaskPower Minister Jeremy Harrison explain how this came about. It’s the biggest energy decision in 10 years. If you work in the coal industry in take time this weekend to watch/listen.
BREAKING: Saskatchewan to rebuild its coal fleet, despite federal regulations calling for its demise. In other words, to hell with the feds, we’re keeping the lights on. At 10 on Friday, Minister Jeremy Harrison will be on the Pipeline Online Podcast
How a strong wind day led to coal exceeding natural gas power generation on June 8. This story ties in wind, coal, enhanced oil recovery, nuclear and natural gas and their relationships to each other.
Carney’s mandate letter to ministers is dramatically different than Trudeau’s, with climate change an afterthought. Trudeau mentioned climate 27 times in his letter to Steven Guilbeault, 20 times to Jonathan Wilkinson. Carney? Once, and almost in passing.
Another major nuclear announcement, this time in Tennessee, which will have impact on SaskPower’s nuclear ambitions.
Alberta wind output falls to 0.05 per cent of capacity days before energy election. And the Clean Electricity Regulations, brought into force the last day Parliament sat, do not appear to be up for change according to the Liberal election platform. Read for yourself.
How does the saying go? Gradually, then suddenly?
In case you missed it, posted last night
Moe declares “Saskatchewan is now a carbon tax free province”
BC is scrapping its consumer carbon tax
B.C. to bring in legislation to end its carbon tax on consumers starting April 1
If carried through, Saskatchewan rebuilding its coal fleet could be one of the most consequential policy choices in decades.
I’ve finally had the chance to get caught up on posting these podcasts, originally broadcast live. Originally broadcast in January, this is worth listening to. Pipeline Online Podcast Ep. 2: Jeremy Harrison on Coal
Brian Zinchuk: How much might building SMRs cost Saskatchewan Hint: it’s not cheap.
This is a major piece talking about the costs that could be incurred building small modular reactors. Those costs could be unobtainable, which is why coal is back on the table in a big way.
The numbers come from the Tennessee Valley Authority, who already operate three nuclear plants and is the largest utility in the US. They plan on building the same model of reactor.
Also:
Moe proclaims pipeline projects “pre-approved,” Smith joins in.
I’m not sure how a provincial government can pre-approve something it has no regulatory power over.
Bronwyn Eyre: The Great Federal Stand-Down: How Chaos Theory (aka Donald Trump) is Changing Everything
Wind goes from 90.5% output in Saskatchewan last week to 0.05% in Alberta on Monday
Saskatchewan is looking to rejuvenate coal, not abandon it: in-depth with Minister Jeremy Harrison.
If SaskPower carries through with rejuvenating coal, it will save three power plants, two mines, ~1000 jobs and two communities.
The significance of the shift on coal cannot be understated. When SaskPower’s then-CEO Mike Marsh came to Estevan in 2018 to say they would not be installing carbon capture technology on Boundary Dam Units 4 and 5, it wasn’t the obituary for the community, but it sure felt like the cancer diagnosis. And with no talk of carbon capture for Coronach’s Poplar River Power station, it seemed all but certain that town would whither away once the coal plant and related mine shut down by the federally mandated 2030 deadline. The January, 2025, announcement of SaskPower looking to rebuild both Boundary Dam and Poplar River, if carried out, would be a decades-long reprieve for both communities.
To extend the metaphor, effectively Estevan and Coronach just went into chemotherapy, and the results may be positive.
The implications of this change in direction, from the impending death of coal, to its possible rejuvenation, have local, provincial, national and international aspects, detailed in the story.
Watch for the Pipeline Online Podcast, Episode 2, to be broadcast on LinkedIn, Facebook and X at 1 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 24.. Crown Investments Corp Minister Jeremy Harrison is the guest, where we will delve even further into this new direction on coal-fired power generation.
X (works best): https://x.com/Pipeline_Online
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianzinchuk/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pipelineonlineca/
It will eventually be posted to YouTube, Apple Podcasts and Spotify
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Government of Saskatchewan says coal has a future. SaskPower is to look at running Poplar River and Boundary Dam Units 4,5 and 6 for decades to come, considering rebuilding them and ignoring federal coal mandate to shut down by 2030. Minister Jeremy Harrison was in Coronach and Estevan telling coal workers that coal has a future.
Here’s the op-ed he submitted exclusively to Pipeline Online, explaining what was going on. I just had a detailed interview with him which will be published Monday.
This is an enormous turnaround that cannot be understated. Saskatchewan is not giving up on coal. Estevan and especially Coronach get a huge reprieve.
And it’s a giant up yours to the feds. I’m sure Guilbeault will have a canary, and a cow. But he won’t eat the cow because my get is he’s a vegan.
Hopefully my 100+ stories talking about the unreliability of wind and solar, and imploring we shouldn’t throw away what works for what we know absolutely doesn’t work had some impact on this.
I’ll have more to write about this in the coming days. There are lots of implications. For instance, since we own the coal, we charge ourselves basically nothing for it. We do pay for the mining, however. But for natural gas, since our domestic production has dropped like a stone, most of our gas comes from Alberta. So every dollar we spend on their gas is a dollar leaving the province, never to come back (sound like Trump?) And here’s the kicker – when LNG Canada goes online, what do you think is going to happen to gas prices? Does anyone think it’ll stay around $2/gigajoule another 10 years? Or will it go up – maybe to $4, or even $6? All of a sudden, gas won’t be so cheap anymore, nor will the electrical power derived from it. But our nearly free coal will be. And once the carbon tax is gone – smooth sailing!
Also, this just happened (gradually, then suddenly…)
BREAKING: With “second carbon tax” in jeopardy, FCL and AGT pause renewable diesel and crush plant projects. The carbon pendulum is swinging, hard.
Trudeau’s Done! And the oilpatch rejoices! For everyone who put a “F— Trudeau” sticker on their truck or hardhat, Monday was a day of celebration.
In Pipeline Online’s continuing mission to ensure we all know exactly what the federal government is telling us on climate change initiatives, this is the verbatim press release from the Government of Canada issued at 18:10 hrs on Dec. 5. Notably, it was not sent out via provincial media releases nor SaskPower’s media releases. And apparently according to the feds, Jansen is a company, not the place the largest mining company in the world, BHP, is building the world’s largest potash mind. Check that out in the opening paragraph.
(You’d think the natural resources minister, and ministry, might be aware of the largest potash mine in the world being built in their country)
The announcement was made by Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson. He and Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault are the federal Liberal government’s lead ministers on their numerous and various climate change initiatives. For good measure, we’ve interspersed a healthy dosage of oil and gas ads, that industry that this government’s Bill C-59 is trying to muzzle.
Highlights include money for a number of solar projects, advancing SMR development, the intertie to the United States, grid-scale batteries, and a “forecast that there will be over 130,000 clean energy jobs added in Saskatchewan between 2025 and 2050.”
Oh, and I am willing to bet a Christmas cheesecake the $265 million number was set so they could say it was more than Harper gave carbon capture in 2008 ($240 million). Never mind 9 years of inflation meaning my kid cries after buying groceries.
And on the topic of Guilbeault, Pipeline Online columnist Jim Warren, knocks another one out of the park talking about his involvement with the green slush fund.
“They pushed us to the limit,” Danielle Smith says in fighting oil and gas emissions cap. Saskatchewan has already started on this path.
Expect similar action from Saskatchewan in the next 10 days. If you remember back in September, Saskatchewan issued its Economic Impact Assessment Tribunal take on this emissions cap, calling it a production cap.
Sask NDP gas tax motion runs out of gas
Brian Zinchuk on Evan Bray: Elections, pipelines, million barrels, emissions cap and more. Part of the discussion stems from this:
Also: Energy experts think Donald Trump will make tariff exemptions for Canadian oil
Apparently there’s still money to be made in the oilpatch: Suncor to return all excess cash to shareholders after hitting debt target early
What’s a drilling rig doing southeast of Moose Jaw? Drilling a CO2 sequestration well, naturally
And what are going to use that CO2 for, pray tell? Producing more oil, baby! (Well, not the stuff that’s going into this well, but all the CO2 that’s going to go in the pipeline past it. You’ll have to read the story to understand.)
Canada steadfast on climate plan despite Trump re-election: Guilbeault
Good thing oil companies can make money in spike of Guilbeault.
Suncor Energy earnings rise to $2.02 billion in third quarter
Running out the clock on the federal oil and gas emissions cap: Saskatchewan energy minister
Brian Zinchuk: Trump won. Let’s build that pipeline, quick!
A remarkable alignment between Trump, the US House and Senate, Danielle Smith, Scott Moe and maybe Pierre Poilievre could make it happen
Also:
Verbatim backgrounder on oil and gas emissions cap
Emissions cap puts methane in spotlight; industry says low-hanging fruit already gone
I was on the road all Monday, so I wasn’t able to dig into this as much as I’d like. Hopefully I’ll be able to do more in the coming days.
Guilbeault’s oil and gas emissions cap press release, verbatim
Reaction to Guilbeault’s emissions cap on oil and gas industry, Part 1
Reaction to Guilbeault’s emissions cap on oil and gas industry, Part 2
Canadian Press
Oil, gas companies told to cut emissions by one-third under planned cap
Oh, and here’s a bonus: the federal government wants to now subsidize radio news as well. Why do I hear the Emperor from the Return of the Jedi cackling in my head?
Federal government’s control of media to grow, now seeking to subsidize radio news