04 November 2009

A good deal

Brian Lee Crowley and Tom Adams weigh in on the NB Power sale.

Among other things they not that the Lower Churchill is a dead horse owing to the current market situation:

The lesson for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians is inescapable. They should learn from the Mackenzie gas experience before supporting Premier Williams' ephemeral dream to press ahead with hydro-electric development on the Lower Churchill in a glutted market. Taxpayers should be relieved, not outraged, that Nalcor, Newfoundland's Crown energy company, is not out in the market trying to sell costly power right now.

In the long term, the economics of Lower Churchill development may well turn around, particularly if the market for its environmental characteristics becomes sufficiently rich to overcome the costs of remoteness. But that's for another day.

Perhaps one day soon local reporters will stop carrying the transmission line line as if it was anything vaguely close to reality.

-srbp-