The Upper Toba Valley project was one of 19 projects to be awarded an electricity purchase agreement. BC Hydro announced the 19 projects on Thursday, March 11.
Originally, the project included three hydroelectric facilities, on Upper Toba, Jimmie Creek and Dalgleish Creek. The Dalgleish facility will not be proceeding at this time.
Elisha McCallum, Plutonic's director of media and community relations, said that during negotiations with BC Hydro on Upper Toba, the company was given new information that indicated there were constraints on the transmission line from Saltery Bay to the Malaspina substation near Earls Cove.
"Going through that process, they determined that one of the projects had to be dropped and so Dalgleish was the one we looked at removing from that process," she said.
If the constraints on the transmission line are removed, McCallum added, Dalgleish could be developed in the future.
The day before BC Hydro announced the 19 projects, Plutonic and GE announced in a statement they were pulling the Bute Inlet hydroelectric project from the 2008 Clean Power Call.
"Negotiations with BC Hydro for an energy purchase agreement for the Bute Inlet project will not proceed at this time, in order to allow further data collection, studies and due diligence," stated the joint release from the companies issued on Wednesday, March 10.
Plutonic's 1,027-megawatt Bute Inlet project, estimated to be a $4-billion project, consists of 17 run-of-river hydroelectric facilities on three river systems in the Bute Inlet area, a substation near the mouth of Southgate River, 216 kilometres of a 230-kilovolt transmission line and 227 kilometres of a 500-kilovolt transmission line from the proposed substation to the Malaspina substation.
"We strongly believe that the Bute Inlet project is an exceptional opportunity that will be developed in due course, however we will not move ahead with pursuing an EPA [electricity purchase agreement] at this time," said Donald McInnes, Plutonic's vice-chair and CEO. "We have learned a great deal and proven our ability to bring all stakeholders together on our three other projects in BC and given the size of the Bute Inlet project and the level of interest expressed by first nations, regulators and the public, we now realize that further work is needed. During the next 12 to 18 months, we will advance our studies and permitting processes as well as build on our strong relationship with the local communities, stakeholders and our first nations partners."
The 19 projects in the first group announced by BC Hydro are located throughout B.C. and include 14 run-of-river and five wind projects.
Following execution of the contracts, BC Hydro will submit the electricity purchase agreements to the British Columbia Utilities Commission for its review. Further project details, including the range of electricity prices to be paid, will be available in BC Hydro's filing to the commission.
An additional 28 projects remain in the Clean Power Call and BC Hydro expects to select additional projects for the award of electricity purchase agreements later this month.
