BC Hydro currently doesn’t have enough electricity supply in the region to power a redesigned Kitimat LNG facility should joint venture partners Chevron and Woodside decide to go ahead with the project.
BC Hydro senior media relations advisor Kevin Aquino said Kitimat LNG would “require additional capacity beyond that which is currently available in the region” should it begin operating.
“As such, we’re currently assessing what the potential impact would be in terms of capacity and transmission,” said Aquino, who up until April last year was BC Hydro’s construction communications advisor for the Site C project.
Aquino stopped short of indicating whether the amount of power needed by Kitimat LNG would come from Site C, currently under construction in northeastern B.C.
“It’s important to note that our electricity system is integrated and does not pinpoint a single generation resource, such as a dam, to a single customer, like an LNG project.”
The electricity required to power the operations of Kitimat LNG would be supplied through our own integrated system,” said Aquino, adding that he couldn’t provide details about how much power Kitimat LNG would need.
“Customer load information is confidential and commercially sensitive,” said Aquino.
Kitimat LNG announced earlier this month that it wants to use electricity from BC Hydro, instead of natural gas, as a way to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions while powering its equipment to compress and super-cool natural gas for export.
On Monday night at the District of Kitimat council meeting, mayor Phil Germuth said council had been informed by Kitimat LNG at a dinner meeting on April 3 that the joint venture partners’ had submitted an application on April 1 to the National Energy Board (NEB) to double the amount of liquefied natural gas it intends exporting to 18 million metric tonnes following a redesign of the facility commissioned in 2015 with the focus on improving Kitimat LNG’s cost-of-supply competitiveness relative to other global LNG projects.
Council was also informed that the partners want to extend the export licence from 20 years to 40 years.
“The most exciting part about the meeting was that they do now want to go all-electric. This would be the only major LNG facility on earth to be all-electric, powered by renewable power,” said Germuth.
But Kitimat LNG would first need BC Hydro to build a new transmission line to Kitimat – the current 287kv line which runs along the east side of the Kitimat River valley can only provide for BC Hydro’s existing requirements and the LNG Canada plant now under construction.
There’s no indication of when Kitimat LNG might announce that it is proceeding with its project.
B.C. Hydro’s preparations to provide power to LNG plants at Kitimat were first revealed in 2012 via a document examining long-range requirements around the province.
The crown corporation listed Kitimat LNG, LNG Canada (which is already under construction) and a project since abandoned called BC LNG as potential customers.
Then, as now, BC Hydro indicated the one existing 287kv line it has from the Skeena Substation just south of Terrace to the Minette Substation near Kitimat was incapable of handling all potential requirements.
In 2014 BC Hydro announced that the current line had reached the end of its life. The corporation surveyed a new route down the west side of the Kitimat Valley which, at 48km long, would have been shorter than the existing 59km line which currently runs down the east side of the valley.
https://www.northernsentinel.com/local-news/refurbishing-line-is-still-cheaper/
BC Hydro then spent $15 million on engineering and design for the new line, constructing a road network and other works in preparation for construction.
On January 8, 2018, the corporation announced it was putting the project on hold while it examined whether refurbishing the current line would suffice.
https://www.northernsentinel.com/local-news/bc-hydro-plans-to-scrap-new-transmission-line/
In an article published in the Northern Sentinel in October 2018, Aquino said BC Hydro had confirmed that refurbishing the existing 287-kilovolt transmission line would “safely meet current and future electricity demand at a lower cost than building a new line.”
He noted, however, that “in the event that future electricity demand in the area increases beyond the projected levels, a new line may still be required.”
The Skeena Substation is a regional distribution point for power coming into the area via a 500kv line from the Williston Substation near Prince George.
A variety of other lines then branch out from the substation to communities around the region.
“One option for meeting these future needs is a new 500kv line linking Williston Substation to Minette Substation for an approximate length of 500 km,” explained the 2012 BC Hydro document in commenting on how it could serve LNG customers.
The Williston Substation is a key BC Hydro facility, serving as a connecting point for power coming from BC Hydro’s existing facilities in the northeast and from Site C when it’s completed.
Chevron Canada communications team lead Leif Sollid said that Kitimat LNG is in discussions with BC Hydro but could not disclose any information on power requirements for the plant at this time.
