The Coal Injunction, Part 1: Do a 12 year old, a podcaster and someone who doesn’t even live here get to kill 1100 coal-related jobs?

Pipeline Online does one of its deepest dives yet into the injunction application meant to shut down Saskatchewan’s coal-fired generation fleet, just as this province begins its rebirth. At stake are 1100 jobs, billions of dollars, and keeping 44% of Saskatchewan’s lights on. And just who gets to govern around here, anyhow?

 

 

SASKATOON – A professional engineer-turned lawyer in recent years was eagerly awaiting an opportunity to take the Saskatchewan government to court over environmental policy regarding coal. When the Saskatchewan government told SaskPower workers on June 18 it would be rejuvenating its coal-fired power generation fleet, Glenn Wright saw his chance.

And now Wright, who has been a five-time unsuccessful political candidate, is representing three people and two environmental organizations in seeking an injunction before Court of King’s Bench to stop the coal plan in its tracks. The initial appearance in chambers before Justice Heather MacMillan-Brown took place on Tuesday, Aug. 12. The justice has reserved decision.

Pipeline Online has read through all of the court documentation filed by the applicants, spoken at-length with Wright and received a statement from Minister of Crown Investments Corporation (and SaskPower) Jeremy Harrison in response. Much of that documentation will be published in this and subsequent stories. There are five parts to this series which will be posted throughout the week.

Big stakes

What’s at stake? A recently re-elected government, whose Saskatchewan First Act was passed unanimously and set the stage for this coal decision, has made the most significant energy policy decision in a decade. That decision, if carried out, will save three power plants, two coal mines, three communities (Estevan, Bienfait and Coronach), and 1,100 direct jobs most of which pay over $100,000 per year. If the injunction successfully stops coal’s revival, not only could those towns, mines, coal plants and workers be out of luck, Saskatchewan could find itself short of up to 44 per cent of the power it uses on cold winter nights in four years, four months and 13 days.

Also at question is whether a very recently elected majority government can proceed on a policy path it had spent several years laying the groundwork for; or whether a 12 year old student, a 55 year old university student who hosts an environmental podcast, and a farmer activist who is neither an Saskatchewan resident nor a SaskPower customer, along with two environmental groups, can reverse a decision made by said democratically-elected government? And that decision is the most significant energy decision made by said government in a decade, with billions of dollars, over 1,100 jobs, and perhaps the fate of the planet at stake.

Additionally at question is whether governments can change course when they find the current path untenable, as the Saskatchewan government has? If it follows current federal coal regulations, we could be short up to 44 per cent of our power needs on the coldest nights in winter come January 1, 2030, as there is not nearly enough baseload power generation available to replace the 1,500 megawatts of coal by then. SaskPower would have to start construction, today, on four additional 370 megawatt combined cycle plants like the one under construction at Lanigan, at a cost of $1.7 billion each, to replace coal in that timeframe. And that natural gas plant is costing more than double the one commissioned in December, 2024.

When it comes to environmental lawfare, the stakes could hardly be higher. It really is a question of who gets to be in charge?

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And if don’t believe those are the stakes, look at what’s been happening in Ontario, where Sec. 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms – right to life, liberty and security of the person – is the new favourite among judges to push through ideological positions, from bike lanes to homeless encampments to climate policy. Duly elected governments are being pushed out of the way when it comes to implementation of their chosen policies.

(Former Saskatchewan Minister of Justice and Attorney General Bronwyn Eyre wrote about this extensively in the Epoch Times, and republished here. In her former position, she was a significant player leading up to the coal decision. Eyre is co-host of the Pipeline Online Podcast and a Pipeline Online columnist.)

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Setting the stage:

The “Coal Decision,” as it is referred to in the “Originating Application” for the injunction, is the three page letter Harrison wrote to SaskPower employees on June 18. Pipeline Online broke the story and published the letter verbatim here.

Here’s the key point of Harrison’s letter: “Work will begin this year to restore Boundary Dam 4 to service and be re-certified. Further investments will be made in long-lead items as a part of the life extension project. In the years to come, all coal units at Boundary Dam, Poplar River and Shand will receive the work necessary to extend the life of those units.”

And as published in that story, there was a long road to that decision:

 

The road to this decision has not been a short one, and has everything to do with harsh realities that cannot be frittered away for ideological purposes. The simple reality is that on any given day, wind power can and does go to zero output in Saskatchewan, the sun goes down every night, most of our natural gas comes from Alberta and it will likely be rising in price, and we have a lot of coal. Cheap coal. Hundreds of years of it.

On any given day in recent years, up to 88 per cent of power generation in Saskatchewan comes from natural gas and coal. And the federal government’s Clean Electricity Regulations mean to do away with all of that, unless carbon capture is applied. But the federal standards for that carbon capture are higher than what has ever been achieved to date at the Boundary Dam Unit 3 Integrated Carbon Capture and Storage Project. Impossible standards left the government of Saskatchewan with an impossible choice – follow federal regulations and shut down the coal fleet, and eventually natural gas fleet, letting our people quite literally freeze in the dark; or go its own path, effectively telling the federal government “To hell with your regulations, we’re keeping the lights on.”

The Saskatchewan First Act, introduced by then-Minister of Justice and Attorney General Bronwyn Eyre in the fall of 2022, was the first move in that direction. It reasserted provincial jurisdiction over electrical energy generation, as stipulated in Section 92A of the Constitution.

The next stage of that was using the Saskatchewan First Act’s Economic Impact Assessment Tribunal to examine the impact of the Clean Electricity Regulations, that were brought in under then Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault. The impact on the province, as found by that tribunal, would be nothing short of devastating. The tribunal released its findings in September, 2024, just prior to the fall provincial election.

Along the way, the federal carbon tax, introduced under the Justin Trudeau-led Liberal Government, climbed from an initial $20 per tonne CO2 equivalent (CO2e) to $50. And then it was revised to escalate another $15 per tonne CO2e per year, until it eventually hit $170. But federal ministers indicated it could go even higher. That carbon tax meant that SaskPower was burning more natural gas than coal not because it was cheaper, but because it incurred less carbon tax. Carbon tax bills via the “Output-Based Pricing System” totalled hundreds of millions of dollars per year.

The federal government pausing the carbon tax on home heating oil, largely to the benefit of Atlantic Canada (which overwhelmingly tends to vote Liberal). That gave Saskatchewan the justification to stop charging carbon tax on home heating that it could control, under SaskEnergy. And then in early 2025, Premier Scott Moe withdrew the carbon tax on industrial emitters, too. This was followed by newly-elected Prime Minister Mark Carney withdrawing the consumer, but not the industrial, carbon tax as his first act upon election.

 

Some of this history is referenced in the originating application, which listed the respondent as the “Government of Saskatchewan, is the Crown in Right of Saskatchewan as designated in The Proceedings Against the Crown Act, 2019.” And indeed, that application references a Pipeline Online Podcast done with Harrison on June 20 where he describes the government’s justification for the Coal Decision.

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Asked what was the purpose of this action, Wright told Pipeline Online, “The whole purpose of this whole challenge is to ensure that the government is making reasonable decisions that are lawful, so no government or administrative decision maker is beyond supervision by the courts. And so the applicants, and I agree with them, that they view that this decision was made hastily, and the letter that was released does not adequately justify the marked departure from long standing plans by the government of Saskatchewan and SaskPower to retire unabated CO by 2030.”

He continued, “In this case really a judicial review is really about the court just reviewing the decision and the record of the decision maker. And if the decision is unreasonable or unlawful, they would quash the decision and send it back to the government to be considered. So the government could very easily make the same decision. They would have to at least include in their reasons a justification that responds to all of the constraints that we’ve identified in our application. So that’s what we’re hoping will happen.”

 

Waiting for his chance

Wright said, “We filed an action against the government of Saskatchewan and SaskPower and the Crown Investment Corp. back in March of 2023 where we were opposing their plans to build new natural gas fired power plants. And so that action has been moving, not as fast as I would like, but it’s been in the courts for two and a half years. And this action now is a new action that we’ve started to challenge this Coal Decision that was recently released by the government of Saskatchewan.”

The action was filed on July 18 and served on the Government of Saskatchewan on July 22.

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Order sought:

According to the originating application, “The Applicants seek the following remedies and orders:

1. An order in the nature of certiorari setting aside or quashing the Coal Decision;
2. An order for an interim stay of the Coal Decision pending the determination of this application for judicial review;

3. Such further and other relief as ordered by this Court; and
4. An order for each party to bear its own costs.”

(certiorari is “a writ or order by which a higher court reviews a decision of a lower court.”)

The reasons given for the request for the injunction, according to the originating application, are as follows:

“The Government of Saskatchewan’s Coal Decision is incorrect or unreasonable on several bases:

1. It unreasonably relies on irrelevant and inaccurate information, including an outdated economic analysis, which it fails to address through any independent costing or economic analysis of the Coal Decision;
2. It unreasonably fails to consider or grapple with Canada’s obligations under conventional and customary international law or the best available science that informs these legal obligations with respect to mitigation of climate change;
3. It incorrectly determines the federal government’s authority over the abatement of coal-powered electricity and unreasonably engages with the Government of Saskatchewan’s obligations to phase out unabated coal powered electricity by 2030 under federal law.
4. It incorrectly fails to identify the implications of the decision upon the rights of Saskatchewan residents and other Canadians under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms against the adverse impacts of human-caused climate change, and it unreasonably fails to proportionately weigh the impacts of the decision on Charter protections against the other factors it took into consideration; and
5. It unreasonably fails to justify why this decision has been reached in spite of it being a marked departure from past decisions and positions of the Government of Saskatchewan with respect to the phaseout of unabated coal powered electricity by 2030.

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The “Unreasonable Reliance on Irrelevant and Inaccurate Economic Analysis” the application refers to is the Economic Impact Assessment Tribunal into the Clean Electricity Regulations, convened by then-Minister of Justice and Attorney General Bronwyn Eyre. The Saskatchewan First Act established the basis for these tribunals. The Clean Electricity Regulations were the first matter considered of two tribunals to date.

Wright took issue with the tribunal’s report which considered the then-draft Clean Electricity Regulations. The final regulations were not released until the last day Parliament sat in December, 2024, which was after the Saskatchewan October election and also one of the last acts of the federal government before then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he would resign. To be of use, it was imperative for the tribunal to work with what it had before the end of the Saskatchewan government’s term in office, meaning it could not wait until December, 2024.

The application notes, “The Coal Decision refers to an economic analysis wherein:

“…the Saskatchewan First Act Tribunal estimated that compliance with the Clean Electricity Regulations would cost the province $7.1 billion in economic growth, lead to the direct loss of at least 4,200 jobs, and there would be an $8.1 billion negative effect on Saskatchewan’s exports.”

It goes on to say, “The Coal Decision is unreasonable because it relied upon an economic analysis of the Saskatchewan First Act tribunal that was irrelevant and inaccurate given that the tribunal’s report was based on draft federal regulations. The tribunal report was not updated to reflect the relevant legal framework that now applies to Saskatchewan (i.e. the final federal regulations as proclaimed in December 2024).

Even so, the updated Clean Electricity Regulations left no prospects for unabated coal-fired generation post Jan. 1, 2030, anyhow, as other coal regulations already prohibited such operation.

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The application says, “The Coal Decision is furthermore unreasonable as there was no independent analysis of costing completed—neither the cost to refurbish the coal plants, nor the cost to replace with 1,500 MW of new alternative electricity generation, such as renewables or nuclear, nor the cost of the anticipated, additional pollution from the coal-fired plants’ operation to 2050 or beyond.”

Asked if Premier Scott Moe’s Drawing the Line white paper and the Saskatchewan First Act had shown there was indeed several years of consideration before taking this new path on coal, Wright said, “I suppose the government may try and make that argument, but I mean, let’s take the economic impact assessment tribunals report, just as an example. That report was issued in May of 2024. It only considered the draft clean electricity regulations. It didn’t actually consider the regulations as they were proclaimed.

“Our perspective is that the report then is therefore irrelevant, because it’s not considering the most recent and the as proclaimed regulations. And so it’s really a meaningless value to be considered with respect to this decision to extend coal.”

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When Pipeline Online pointed out that the minister responsible for the Saskatchewan First Act made clear that act paved the path for the Coal Decision, Wright said, “That’s your opinion. That’s not the opinion of the applicants here.

“I mean, we don’t know what’s been going on with respect to the government’s political posturing, because it seems like they’re really following a path of unlawful behavior, is what I would say. I mean, we had the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act. I mean, that was an act that survived a court challenge at all our highest court in the land, the Supreme Court of Canada, and yet, the Government of Saskatchewan just decided we’re not going to collect pollution pricing in the province on natural gas, or our electricity, right? That’s unlawful behavior. And so now, when they’re saying they’re not going to recognize the Clean Electricity Regulations, again, this is under mining the rule of law in Canada.

“The Saskatchewan First Act is another example. I mean, this does not accord with if you talk to constitutional law scholars. I’m surprised that the Saskatchewan First Act and the Alberta Sovereignty Act haven’t faced a federal court challenge, because that legislation would seem to me to be ultra vires or not constitutional. We live in a federation, here in Canada, right? Cooperative behavior that has to happen to between both levels.”

When asked about responsible government, and the fact the Saskatchewan First Act was passed unanimously, Wright said, “You’re talking about the three different separate entities of our system of governance. Here you’ve got the executive branch, the legislative branch and the judicial branch, and so, oh, even though it’s a unanimous decision of the legislature, it still doesn’t prevent it from being reviewed in a supervisory capacity by the courts. So what we’re asking for is just that the court review that decision to determine, was it reasonable and is it lawful?”

He added, “The inaction that we’ve seen from this government in more than 10 years to address the need to replace coal, to me, seems to be quite an irresponsible action on the part of the government.”

Notably, Wright had just said he was leading a lawsuit against expansion of natural gas power generation in Saskatchewan, and at this point is leading a lawsuit against continued operation of coal. Together, the two produce up to 88 per cent of Saskatchewan’s power generation on the coldest nights in winter, when the sun is not shining and it is too cold for wind turbines to operate.

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As for those ten years, SaskPower has built or is building three large scale 370 megawatt natural gas plants of its own, and through independent power producers seen three large scale wind farms constructed and another announced and one more in the works. Two 100 megawatt solar farms are also in development, and major work has been done on licensing Saskatchewan first nuclear power generation, a process that will take more than 12 years from conception to initial operation in 2034.

Asked what they would replace coal with, Wright said, “Our job as the applicants is not to design the SaskPower’s generating system for them. What our what our request is that we make sure that the decision made to extend these coal-fired plants into 2050 is justified. So we want to see the rationale, as I outlined in this application here. There are five different ways that we think constraints or should have been considered were not, right?

“We know from seeing other jurisdictions all over the world making investments in their electrical generation equipment and their grid infrastructure, because the world is electrifying. The age of oil is coming to an end, right? And as the world focuses on electrification, it’s obvious there are many, many options that we could be considering, but there’s no evidence that there was any sort of comparison in terms of a life cycle, cost of electricity basis, comparing apples to apples.

“I’ve listened to some of your podcasts and the articles you’ve published, and you often talk about how the wind doesn’t always blow when the sun doesn’t always shine, and you talk about the winter. These are challenges that we have to overcome. I will grant you that. But nothing is impossible. And I think if we had a fair and transparent and honest assessment of the life cycle cost of electricity, from all of the options out there, then we would be making an informed choice to move forward and not just pinholing ourselves to only gas or coal.”

Asked about nuclear power as an option if natural gas and coal are out, Wright said, “This is a very complicated issue that requires a lot of nuance. So it’s not just about generation, but it’s also about demand side management, right? So there are probably some things that we’re going to have to do differently compared to our usual approach. We’ve become accustomed, if you will, to a centralized, large generation facilities, and eventually, I would imagine we’re going to move to more of a distributed grid, with a distributed grid control and generation and storage, and likely much more interconnection with other jurisdictions. Because the more we cooperate and the more we interconnect with other jurisdictions, the more resilient we are.”

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  0102 Lori Carr Coal Extended
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In that, Wright practices what he preaches. His biography on the Procido website says, “Glenn first installed renewable energy on the farm in 2008 and he and his family have been driving EVs since 2018. Glenn also completed a home insulation retrofit in 2018 and turned off his natural gas to the farm in 2008, electing to heat with geothermal energy since then. Glenn estimates that their family and farm emissions have been reduced by more than 50% compared to 2006.”

He said there are challenges with doing things like larger interties to neighbouring jurisdictions, “But they’re not insurmountable.”

“And the real problem here is we lack the consensus on the need to decarbonize. I see a lot of rhetoric coming from southeastern Saskatchewan, from Alberta, from all over the place, that seems to think that the age of oil will never end, right? And I hear a lot of people saying that there is no such thing as climate change, that it’s a hoax, and that is not true. These are facts, facts that have been proclaimed by our Supreme Court of Canada. If you look at paragraph 23 of the application that I filed here, climate change is a fact, right? It is caused by humans burning fossil fuels,” Wright said.

“It poses a grave threat to humanity’s future, and not only that, we’ve got court decisions from around the world now suggesting that liability can be ascribed to private companies and to governments for their emissions. So, if you’re a government like Saskatchewan that has a very, very high emissions profile for our small population, what do you think what might happen in the future if some of that liability was to come home to roost? It’s a huge risk.”

• 0102 Lori Carr Coal Extended
  0102 Lori Carr Coal Extended
• 0093 Estevan OTS 2025
  0093 Estevan OTS 2025
• 0101 VP Energy Road to adventure
  0101 VP Energy Road to adventure
• 0100 Turnbull Project Manager
  0100 Turnbull Project Manager
• 0099 Mryglod Steel 1080p
  0099 Mryglod Steel 1080p
• 0097 Eagle Sky Ventures LTD
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• 0095 Fast Trucking nearly 70 years good at it
  0095 Fast Trucking nearly 70 years good at it
• 0053 Kingston Midstream Westspur Alameda Click Before You Dig
  0053 Kingston Midstream Westspur Alameda Click Before You Dig
• 0092 Turnbull projects big and small
  0092 Turnbull projects big and small
• 0046 City of Estevan This is Estevan Teaser
  0046 City of Estevan This is Estevan Teaser
• 0087 Lori Carr Coal Expansion
  0087 Lori Carr Coal Expansion
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  0077 Caprice Resources Stand Up For Free Speech
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Minister’s response

On Aug. 13, Pipeline Online received by email a response from Minister Harrison with regards to the injunction application.

Here it is, verbatim:

The Government of Saskatchewan will vigorously defend our decision to extend the life of Saskatchewan’s coal fired power plants against this lawsuit.

Our government is committed to delivering reliable, affordable power for Saskatchewan families, businesses, and communities. Extending the life of our existing coal power plants while we bridge to a nuclear future powered by Saskatchewan Uranium will provide fuel supply certainty.

We will continue to take an all-of-the-above approach to power generation including coal, natural gas, renewables, hydro, and nuclear reactors. Our approach is guided by the realities of Saskatchewan’s geography, economy, and existing infrastructure.

Our plan supports Saskatchewan workers, communities, and industries while maintaining an affordable and secure supply of power.

Erika Ritchie, the NDP critic for CIC, is a member of the Saskatchewan Environmental Society, which is one of the co-applicants in the case that is before the courts. The lost and reckless NDP owe an explanation to the people of Coronach and Estevan as to why they are fighting in court to force the closure of SaskPower’s coal power plants which would result in the loss of thousands of jobs in these communities.

With respect to these proceedings, we will not be offering further comment as these matters remain before the courts.

 

That sets the stage. In Part 2, we dig into the arguments and reasons offered by the 12-year-old child, the podcaster and the Manitoban as well as Saskatchewan Environmental Society and Citizens for Public Justice as to why the coal decision should be stopped in its tracks.

 

• 0102 Lori Carr Coal Extended
  0102 Lori Carr Coal Extended
• 0093 Estevan OTS 2025
  0093 Estevan OTS 2025
• 0101 VP Energy Road to adventure
  0101 VP Energy Road to adventure
• 0100 Turnbull Project Manager
  0100 Turnbull Project Manager
• 0099 Mryglod Steel 1080p
  0099 Mryglod Steel 1080p
• 0097 Eagle Sky Ventures LTD
  0097 Eagle Sky Ventures LTD
• 0095 Fast Trucking nearly 70 years good at it
  0095 Fast Trucking nearly 70 years good at it
• 0053 Kingston Midstream Westspur Alameda Click Before You Dig
  0053 Kingston Midstream Westspur Alameda Click Before You Dig
• 0092 Turnbull projects big and small
  0092 Turnbull projects big and small
• 0046 City of Estevan This is Estevan Teaser
  0046 City of Estevan This is Estevan Teaser
• 0087 Lori Carr Coal Expansion
  0087 Lori Carr Coal Expansion
• 0077 Caprice Resources Stand Up For Free Speech
  0077 Caprice Resources Stand Up For Free Speech
• 0076 Latus only
  0076 Latus only
• 0061 SIMSA 2024 For Sask Buy Sask
  0061 SIMSA 2024 For Sask Buy Sask
• 0055 Smart Power Be Smart with your Power office
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• 0051 JML Hiring Pumpjack assembly
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• 0049 Scotsburn Dental soft guitar
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• 0041 DEEP Since 2018 now we are going to build
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• 0032 IWS Summer hiring rock trailer music
• 0022 Grimes winter hiring
• 0021 OSY Rentals S8 Promo
• 0018 IWS Hiring Royal Summer
• 0013 Panther Drilling PO ad 03 top drive rigs
• 0006 JK Junior
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• 9001