Ontario Energy Board greenlights Watay Power project: Power line project passes major milestone to prepare for construction.

PositionFOCUS ON INDIGENOUS BUSINESS

A life-changing infrastructure project for northwestern Ontario has passed a regulatory hurdle.

The Ontario Energy Board has approved Wataynikaneyap Power LP (Watay Power)'s leave to construction application to proceed with the massive northwestern Ontario power line project.

The $1.6-billion project involves stringing 1,800 kilometres of power lines to connect 17 remote First Nation communities, north of Pickle Lake and Red Lake, to Ontario's power grid for the first time.

The First Nation-owned utility filed their application last June.

The application to the OEB lays out the project details, including timelines, design and costs.

An April 2 Watay news release said the next steps, before construction starts, involves finalizing the financing, obtaining environmental assessment approvals, selecting an engineering firm and the companies that will handle the procurement and construction.

The first community hooked up to the grid was Pikangikum First Nation, north of Red Lake, with the switch thrown just before Christmas.

Construction for that 117-kilometre stretch began in the fall of 2017 from Red Lake into the distribution system at Pikangikum.

"The OEB's approval authorizes Wataynikaneyap Power to construct and operate the Wataynikaneyap Power Transmission Project and deliver upon our commitment to bring reliable, sustainable and clean power to our First Nations communities in Northern Ontario," said Margaret Kenequanash, CEO of Wataynikaneyap Power in a statement.

We successfully connected Pikangikum to the provincial energy grid in December 2018 and are looking forward to connecting the rest of the First Nation communities who still rely on expensive, environmentally-unfriendly diesel generators for power.

Wataynikaneyap is a licensed transmission company owned by 22 First Nations communities. It's involved in a 51/49 per cent partnership with Fords Ontario, a subsidiary of Fords, a St...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT