For more than a year, local residents have been wondering when the provincial government would step forward with coal transition assistance for Estevan.
After all, the federal government has announced support for Estevan (and other communities) after the feds decided to fast-track the phase-out of conventional coal power plants from 2042 to 2030.
It was imperative that the province step forward with funding of its own. After all, their decision to retire Units 4 and 5 at the Boundary Dam Power Station once their respective life spans expire in the 2020s has nothing to do with the 2030 phase-out of coal-fired power.
So after the speculation and the waiting, and after a request by the city for $5 million, the provincial government announced in the throne speech last week that it was stepping forward with $10 million in funding for Estevan and Coronach.
We’re not 100 per cent sure how that money is going to be distributed just yet, but early speculation is that it will be $5 million for each community for their adjustment to life after coal.
The Estevan Business Excellence Awards last week happened two days after the announcement, and the crowd was fairly upbeat. It was certainly a much friendlier and more positive scene for Estevan MLA Lori Carr than what we saw last month, when a chamber coffee talk turned into a fairly hostile reception for Carr, who was the guest speaker for that meeting.
Most people who attended the awards last week seemed to be pretty happy with the money.
The announced funding from the province is also another reminder of the need for local action. The city, the chamber and the economic development are showing early initiative.
But economic development activity can move at the speed of a tectonic plate at times. It can take a lot of slow-moving work that isn’t always rewarded.
We can’t afford to wait for Unit 4 to come offline in 2021 or Unit 5 to come offline in 2024 to move forward or take action or think of ideas or formulate plans. We need to do these things now, and we need to have the right people in place.
The kicker is that we’re not going to find that one project that is going to generate the same number of jobs as coal-fired power. A lot of smaller developments and initiatives will be needed.
We’re at a crossroads in the history of our community. Ten or 15 years from now we’re going to look back on this time as a point in which we banded together, regrouped and pursued other options, and came away a stronger and a more diverse community.
Or we’re going to look back at this time as the point in which we lost something that we never replaced.
It’s not the beginning of the end, but we don’t want to be a community of 5,000 or 6,000 people, either.
Yes, it sucks that the day is coming in which coal power won’t be as strong in Estevan as it is now. The people who have their jobs at the mines and at SaskPower are proud of the work they do, and rightfully so. But we have to accept our new normal is on the horizon.
And frankly, while it’s great the province has stepped forward with this funding, more is still needed. More from the feds. More from the province. We’re looking at major job losses over the next five years that will have an indirect impact on all of us.
Estevan should get more than Coronach. After all, we’re a much bigger centre than Coronach and our needs are greater.
Coronach absolutely needs help from the province to deal with the phase-out of coal-fired power, but also keep in mind that their needs aren’t as pressing as ours, since the two units at the Poplar River Power Station won’t come offline until 2030, while we have two units at Boundary Dam that will be shuttered in the next five years.
But at least $5 million in funding from the provincial government is a positive development that should be welcomed by everyone in the Estevan area.
