Brian Zinchuk is editor and owner of Pipeline Online
Minister of Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson at the Bekevar Yotin Wind Facility, near Kipling, on June 29, 2023. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
REGINA – You’d think the Government of Saskatchewan and SaskPower would be giddy about the federal government announcing $265 million for “Saskatchewan clean electricity projects.” That would be until you realize it was giving back our own money, and not even all of it.
Crown Investments Corp and SaskPower Minister Jeremy Harrison said in an emailed statement on Dec. 5, “Today’s announcement from the Future Electricity Fund is simply the return of carbon tax dollars collected from SaskPower customers by the Liberal/NDP federal government that is required under The Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act. The federal government has needlessly increased the cost of power for Saskatchewan people and we continue to call on the federal government to eliminate the carbon tax and return the $483 million of Saskatchewan carbon tax dollars they continue to hold in the Future Electricity Fund.”
Minister of Crown Investments Corporation and SaskPower Jeremy Harrison is now the next possible candidate for carbon tax jail. Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan
Late in the day on Dec. 5, federal Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson announced the very long list of projects that would be received money. The announcement came out at a very odd time, with the press release from the Government of Canada issued at 18:10 hrs (Ottawa time). CTV Regina was able to get a video interview with Wilkinson in time for the supper news here, however, which you can watch here.
Pipeline Online reproduced the entire federal press release here.
Notably, there was not a corresponding release 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.
Highlights include money for a number of solar projects, advancing SMR development, the intertie to the United States, grid-scale batteries, transmission, and a “forecast that there will be over 130,000 clean energy jobs added in Saskatchewan between 2025 and 2050.”