Touted CCS Technology Not Working As Boasted About

Posted on by John Klein

SNC-Lavalin-built carbon capture facility has ‘serious design issues’: SaskPower
Despite conflicts, SaskPower gives SNC another multi-million dollar contract

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Mind you, the fact there’s legal action in the cards hasn’t stopped SaskPower from awarding the firm a $4 million portion of the $45-million Island Falls Powerhouse Concrete Rehabilitation project.

Nor did a September 2014 SaskPower carbon capture briefing note, obtained by the NDP, which says SNC “is more concerned about getting paid for the 6.5 million than fixing the deficiencies of our plant.”

It goes on to note “very poor to no support from SNC Lavalin,” and “serious design deficiencies” in the project.

SaskPower CEO Mike Marsh says “because there’s a contract dispute (with SNC) on one job, doesn’t mean we don’t use them on another job.”

I happen to work at the same university, the one primarily responsible for research that made Boundary Dam CCS possible:

Associate professor of marketing at the University of Regina, Lisa Watson, says “of course people are going to be upset” over the issues at Boundary Dam.

The bigger question, she says, is whether they should be.

The consumer push for more environmentally sustainable options and clean energy is a “major change” for government, she says, and perhaps people shouldn’t be upset when projects involving groundbreaking technology don’t go as planned.

Carbon capture has “huge potential, and if it was working properly, we’d be shouting from the rooftops,” she says, and “to not do it at all, I don’t think that’s the right thing.”

https://twitter.com/mikemckinnon/status/659461602375155712-

Premier Brad Wall touts Sask. carbon sequestration project
Some premiers are sitting out today’s climate change summit in Quebec City, but Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall is there, talking up the province’s efforts to capture and store carbon dioxide.
[…]
Wall told an audience that the world needs to follow Saskatchewan’s example if there are to be serious reductions in greenhouse emissions.

I tried to find Brad Wall on a rooftop shouting to people about it, instead there is video of him on Sun News TV boasting about it to Brian Lilley, and more than a smattering of articles on the Web boasting about it.
“YouTube’s great, you can learn anything on YouTube.” – Premier Wall

Wall at Boundary Dam CCS

Boyd admits issues surrounding the plant have “a bit of a negative connotation,” adding “I think any time there’s losses, any time there’s problems, there’s certainly a degree of loss of confidence.”
On the other hand, he thinks taxpayers “would rather have SaskPower delivering power to them,” rather than the private power companies that operate in other jurisdictions.

Wow, neat way for Boyd to suggest the alternative to fixing SaskPower is only to ditch the Crown Corp and go with a rob-you-blind private power corporation instead. (The Saskatchewan Green Party is proposing converting SaskPower into a Crown Co-op instead.)

An aware commenter notes:

Myek O’Shea:

Holy spinning neckties Batman! Our loss of confidence is with Bill Boyd and those politicians that chose carbon sequestration over renewable energies. The Sask Party keeps green washing this sequestration turd as if we asked for it in the first place. Want to restore our confidence? Lets go 40% wind and solar by 2020. But on the other hand, maybe tax payers should waste their money on subsidizing the petroleum oligarchy. Oh and ‘groundbreaking’ here is a pun, nothing more.

There’s also the huge matter of SNC-Lavalin’s criminal charges. The Federal government stopped dealing with HP after a bribery conviction for that company.

More from Global News Regina.
“SaskPower says the project is now on target to be fully operational by the end of 2016.”

https://twitter.com/saskboy/status/659383280039399424

ADDED:
“Out of the more than 250 companies year to date on the World Bank’s running list of firms blacklisted from bidding on its global projects under its fraud and corruption policy, 117 are from Canada — with SNC-Lavalin and its affiliates representing 115 of those entries, the World Bank said. ”

ADDED: https://oursask.ca/2016/06/27/coal-vs-pixie-dust-saskatchewans-carbon-capture-and-storage-saga/

8 responses to “Touted CCS Technology Not Working As Boasted About”

  1. This carbon catch and release BS was a subsidy to the oil industry to push more oil out of an old oil field. Never about climate change action. The end result a
    fter the formerly non recoverable oil is burned is 2-3 times more C02 in the atmosphere. Fact- we must leave two thirds of PRESENT fossil deposits in the ground in order to prevent IRREVERSIBLE climate change- IEA. Sask. still has its sucker light flashing on its forehead. WTFU.

    Reply

  4. Pingback: It’s a Gas | Saskboy's Abandoned Stuff

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