{"id":221677,"date":"2019-07-06T00:07:21","date_gmt":"2019-07-06T04:07:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=221677"},"modified":"2019-07-06T00:07:21","modified_gmt":"2019-07-06T04:07:21","slug":"n-l-premier-says-muskrat-falls-costs-are-too-great-for-optimism-about-benefits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/07\/06\/n-l-premier-says-muskrat-falls-costs-are-too-great-for-optimism-about-benefits\/","title":{"rendered":"N.L. premier says Muskrat Falls costs are too great for optimism about benefits"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Ball, who was re-elected on May 16, has been critical of the project since he was opposition leader around the time it was sanctioned by the former Tory government. (File Photo<\/a>: Dwight Ball, Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

ST. JOHN’S, N.L. \u2014 Newfoundland and Labrador’s premier says the Muskrat Falls hydro megaproject is currently too much of a massive financial burden for him to be optimistic about its long-term potential.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am probably one of the most optimistic people in this room,\u201d Liberal Premier Dwight Ball told the inquiry into the project’s runaway cost and scheduling issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe the future is optimistic for Newfoundland Labrador, of course I do. But I’m not going to sit here today and say we have an optimistic future because of the Muskrat Falls project.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ball, who was re-elected on May 16, has been critical of the project since he was opposition leader around the time it was sanctioned by the former Tory government.<\/p>\n

He said Friday that despite his criticism of the Labrador dam, which has seen costs essentially double to more than $12.7 billion, he didn’t set out to celebrate a failed project.<\/p>\n

He said he still wants to see Muskrat Falls succeed someday through power sales outside the province, but there are immediate challenges \u2014 including mitigating power-rate hikes once the dam starts providing full power.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were told the project would be $6.2 billion, we’re at $12.7 (billion). We were never told this project would be nearly 30 per cent of the net debt of this province just six, seven years later,\u201d the premier said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted this to be successful, and in the long term I still want it to be successful. But we have to deal with the next 10 years.\u201d<\/p>\n

The nearly complete dam will harness Labrador’s lower Churchill River to provide electricity to the province as well as Nova Scotia and potentially beyond through subsea cables.<\/p>\n

Ball’s testimony wraps up a crucial phase of hearings in the extensive public inquiry.<\/p>\n

The inquiry has heard from dozens of witnesses, with current and former politicians, bureaucrats, executives and consultants shedding long-demanded light on what went on behind closed doors that made the project go sideways.<\/p>\n

Some witnesses have suggested that estimates were intentionally suppressed, and many high-ranking officials, including former premiers, have denied seeing key information about risk.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Ball testified to his shock when he began to understand the true financial state of the project after he was elected premier in 2015.<\/p>\n

On Friday, Ball said he has more faith in future of the offshore oil and gas industry, for example, than a mismanaged project that has put immense pressure on residents already struggling to make ends meet.<\/p>\n

After his testimony, Ball said he takes some responsibility for a missed opportunity to mitigate methylmercury risks downstream from the dam through capping the reservoir, something he had committed to doing before it is fully flooded this summer.<\/p>\n

Still to come is a third phase of hearings on future best practices for issues like managing large-scale projects, two public feedback sessions and closing submissions from lawyers.<\/p>\n

The final report from the inquiry is due before Dec. 31.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ST. JOHN’S, N.L. \u2014 Newfoundland and Labrador’s premier says the Muskrat Falls hydro megaproject is currently too much of a …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":214781,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-221677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-holly-mckenzie-sutter","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=221677"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221677\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":221678,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/221677\/revisions\/221678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=221677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=221677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=221677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}