Utilities commission approves transmission line route

Construction could begin as early as January on a new 350-kilometre electrical transmission line from Genesee to Langdon after the Alberta Utilities Commission approved a route Thursday.

That’s the last regulatory step for the $1.5-billion project, the third of four controversial upgrades identified as critical infrastructure by the Alberta government. The Heartland and Eastern lines have already been approved, and the commission is still expecting an application for a Fort McMurray line.

The Commission chose AltaLink’s preferred option with a few minor alterations. It has required the company to use less-obtrusive single-pole structures near the Gleniffer Reservoir near Innisfail, and shifted the route east for a 37-kilometre section near Crossfield.

Opponents have argued the line is really meant to facilitate export. The commission ruled on a constitutional challenge from a landowner who argued it was outside the commission’s jurisdiction.

The four major lines are intended to increase the reliability of Alberta’s electricity supply. As part of that, the upgrades will also allow the system to better tie in with British Columbia, said Jim Law, spokesman for the commission.

But the commission ruled it has jurisdiction because the line starts west of Edmonton and ends east of Calgary, and thus is entirely inside Alberta. It is not an “international undertaking,” said Law.

The four major new lines have been controversial. Opponents argue the lines will be muchmorethanAlbertaneeds and the companies involved will end up charging Albertans for infrastructure that will serve an export market.

“We should not be subsidizing industry for this,” said Joe Anglin, Wildrose MLA for Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre. “All the evidence says this is for export. The government has misrepresented this from the start.”

He said if the line was only for a provincial system, the company would be building with the lower-cost alternating-current technology.

The decision Thursday does little to address that, since the government already declared this type of line was needed, Anglin said. Everything in Thursday’s decision was expected. “We hold this hearing as if they could do something other than what was applied for.”

But Scott Thon, CEO of AltaLink, said the line is being built as a direct-current transmission line because it is easy to scale up as Alberta’s energy needs increase.

“It’s very expandable without having to go back and build more lines,” he said after the decision was issued Thursday afternoon. The new line will be built to handle 1,000 megawatts, he said, but can be increased to 4,000 megawatts without adding new lines and disturbing the landowners.

Thon said AltaLink will continue to talk with landowners as construction gets underway. The line is expected to be operational by the spring of 2015.