Brian Zinchuk is editor and owner of Pipeline Online
The room was packed on May 14 with businesspeople eager to get a piece of the action on the impending coal refurbishment project. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
ESTEVAN – The same day the legislative session wrapped up in Regina, with fiery rhetoric about how horrible it would be if Saskatchewan refurbished its coal-fired power plants, a seminar was held in Estevan for suppliers who were eager to work on that very project.
Approximately 120 people plus about 20 SaskPower staff packed the Southeast College auditorium on May 14.
The event was invitation-only for attendees, most of which have done work with SaskPower in the past. Community leaders from the city, municipality and Indigenous communities were also in attendance. They heard from Gregg Milbrandt, vice president of Asset Strategy and Planning, Rhea Brown, executive vice president, Customer Experience & Procurement, Scott Bannerman, director of Coal Life Extension, Tyler Danielson, manager of Coal Life Extension, Ken Wakelam, project manager for the Coal Life Extension (execution) and Dan Irvine, director of Procurement & Contracts Management.
Attendees heard about some of the details, like generator rewinds, substantial work on water treatment facilities, coal handling equipment and more. There’s a lot to be done.
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The long term goal is that coal-fired power act as a bridge to nuclear power. But it’s going to be many years before any nuclear reactors are up and running, let alone enough to replace the existing coal fleet and handle growth demands. The coal refurbishments are meant to get us there.
Gregg Milbrandt and Rhea Brown. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
Brown told Pipeline Online, “Today in Estevan, we’re pleased to be here to host our supply chain involved with our coal assets, because we are life extending all seven of our units, and we are highlighting the work that’s going to happen, the timing of that work and when the procurement packages will be out for bid.”
Attendees were told that SaskPower has designed multiple job packages with the intention to create scopes that align with local capacity. In most of those packages, SaskPower will look to find larger contractors to either ngineer or lead the construction of the work while also partnering with SaskPower to include local subcontractors and labour throughout. Brown explained, “We’re looking for companies that can act leads in engineering and procurement management and also for companies that be be the primary constructor”
Some of the scopes of work, including the related Engineering, Procurement & Construction Management (EPCM or General Constructor (GC) are expected to be in place for the whole project while other scopes are specific to individual plants or smaller scopes.
For those not in attendance, Brown said, “We’d be pleased to hear from any supplier that has a role to play in coal. We can’t do this alone, and we definitely rely on our suppliers to come through for us and deliver safe and quality work. We are very easy to reach. At SaskPower, we have a dedicated supplier development team, known as Supplier Relationship Management.” Suppliers can look for work packages on MERX and SaskTenders.
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As for Indigenous involvement in the project, Brown said, “I think that what we’re signaling here is the importance of meaningful Indigenous involvement in the project, and we are very happy to share information on what that looks like with our Indigenous capacity building initiative and how suppliers are evaluated based on the level of commitment to meaningful indigenous involvement.”
Brown said SaskPower hit a new record of “committed spend” this past fiscal year, with $1 billion committed to Saskatchewan suppliers.
Milbrandt outlines the sequencing for the next phases of the project. He said, “From a sequencing at a high level, we are focusing on the 300 megawatt units first, starting with BD6. We will be alternating on the 300 megawatts between our Estevan area as well as the Coronach area. So it’s going to go BD6, PR2, Shand, then PR1.. Following the three hundreds, we will then life-extend the 150 megawatt units, so we will progress to them … it goes BD3, BD5, BD4. Boundary Dam 3 ends up in that period where it’s that half-life extension. It was fully rebuilt in 2014.”
Asked when wrenches will be turning, Milbrandt said, “We’ve actually got some work starting this fall, on BD6, retubing the condenser. What we’re doing between now and the life extension work is ultimately ensuring reliable operation to those life extension windows? So we’ve got what we’re calling early phase life extension work. So there’ll be work between Boundary 6, Boundary 5, and then even some work at Poplar River on the common systems to ensure that we’ve got, again, the facilities and the equipment in a position so that it can reach those life extension windows.”
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Brought back to life
In April, Boundary Dam Unit 4, which had been retired, was brought back to life. Milbrandt said that BD4 was producing 120 megawatts that morning.
Brown said, “We’re really proud of that one. It’s online and running and contributing megawatts to the grid.”
“Five is up and running now, too. So we actually have all four units in operation at Boundary Dam today,” Milbrandt said.
That’s evident in the higher coal-fired power generation numbers reported daily on SaskPower’s Where Your Power Comes From webpage. On May 18 and 19, coal-fired power output exceeded an average of 1,000 megawatts per day each day.
Boundary Dam Unit 4 several years ago. Photo by Brian Zinchuk
That’s a significant development, as the reason a major multi-billion dollar Bell data centre is currently under construction southeast of Regina is precisely because SaskPower had the capacity to restore approximately 300 megawatts of dispatchable power to the grid. That data centre, whose total economic impact is anticipated to be $12 billion, will require 300 megawatts. (SaskPower and its officials often use round numbers in describing generating units capacities. The SaskPower website lists each BD4 and BD5 at 139 megawatts nameplate capacity, but they are often referred to as “150 megawatt” units.)
BD4 and BD5 had been retired due to federal coal regulations. Their working lives had been extended a few years as part of a coal equivalency agreement in 2018. BD4 had been totally disconnected from grid in late 2024, but BD5 was still available in cold standby if the need required. That happened several times with BD4 after its original retirement date.
Attending the conference was Sandon Weber of Sector 1, a local contracting firm with a group of companies in related fields. Weber wasn’t looking so much for work at the local power plants itself, but from all the spinoffs that would result. He said, “We want to be ready for there’s going to be added population growth in Estevan. So looking at building homes, building rental properties, hotel accommodations, stuff like that.”
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Jim Wilson of Wil-Tech Industries said, “What we’re hoping to be a part of is the complete life cycle this time. We’ve done maintenance, repair and overhaul on the plants for 35 years, and this time we’re maybe get involved in the building and the complete life cycle. So we’re really excited about this.
“With the potential of the coal rebuild, and if you threw a nuclear that’s 20 years of construction. And we’re pretty excited about that.
“This is a good deal for us, and it’s better than where we were headed with the other deal. So we see coal and power generation surviving for 20 more years in the community. So it’s a good story.”
As for specifics, he said, “We provide hydraulics, pneumatics, lubrication, filtration.”
The company also does extensive conveyor work in the potash industry. So for the coal refurbishments, he said, “We would be working with their existing systems, upgrading them, and then hopefully bring some innovation. The plants are built, you know, as they’re as old as me. So there’s probably some innovation that could be brought in there.”
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