Massive power line OK’d

Use of monopoles to up Heartland project price to estimated $610 million

By Michael Di Massa News Staff

The Heartland Transmission project will run past Sherwood Park and will not include an underground section. That decision was issued by the Alberta Utilities Commission (AUC) on Tuesday afternoon.

In its decision, the AUC selected the preferred route, making it an estimated $610-million project.

That route means the dual-circuit, 500-kV power line will branch off from the Ellerslie substation at the Anthony Henday and 91st Street in Edmonton. The line will follow the Henday north, where it turns into Highway 216. It will run north along the Sherwood Park side of the highway in a transportation utility corridor before crossing into Sturgeon County on its way to the Gibbons area.

Epcor hopes to begin construction on the line as early as December, with the goal of it being in operation by the fall of 2013, according to spokesperson Tim LeRiche.

"The commission concluded the preferred east route is both in the public interest and superior to the alternate west route based on land use, cost and environmental considerations. The preferred east route would utilize the public lands of the (transportation utility corridor), which were set aside to provide a location for this type of project," an AUC press release for the ruling stated.

The AUC also weighed in on the underground option included in the application due to stakeholder requests.

"The commission concluded an underground option would not be in the public interest as the evidence brought before the commission indicated it would not mitigate electric and magnetic fields (EMF) or materially mitigate the impact on property values, while substantially raising costs," the release explains.

The AUC ruled that the difference between underground and above-ground electric and magnetic fields stemming from the power line would be negligible. It adds the EMFs "will be much lower, and likely indistinguishable from background magnetic field levels at the nearest residences, schools, day cares, hospitals and businesses."

The AUC has also ordered EMF measuring at Colchester Elementary before and after construction of the line. The line will be within 213 metres of the school's buildings and 190 metres of the school yard.

Monopoles will carry the line for 9.5 km from Highway 14 to Baseline Road. The poles will be between 59 and 71 metres tall and 20 metres wide.

Although the cost of the line is expected to be in the area of $610 million, Epcor won't know the actual number until the project nears its completion, when a tariff application will be filed.

"The Alberta Electric System Operator estimates that every $1 billion in transmission build results in about $1 per month on the average residential bill. If that estimate were correct, then one could assume that a $610 million project would add 61 cents per month to the typical residential bill," LeRiche said.

The Heartland line is one of three power line projects deemed critical by the province when it approved Bill 50 in 2009, and is the only power line project in the bill that has not been suspended for review by the province.

The AUC's Tuesday decision followed a spring hearing that spanned more than one month, where proponents and opponents of the Heartland Transmission Project presented their cases about where the line should go, and if it should include a 20-km underground section.

Since the province had previously deemed the line necessary, the AUC was left to decide if the line would follow the preferred or alternative routes submitted by applicants Epcor and AltaLink.

The AUC also could have rejected both routes or returned the application for refinement.

The alternative west route would have taken the line north, just east of Spruce Grove, before heading east north of Bon Accord and Gibbons.

Many stakeholders, including Strathcona County and lobbyist group Responsible Electricity Transmission for Albertans (RETA), had been questioning the need for the power line, considering many of the once-planned upgrader projects in the Industrial Heartland have been scrapped.

Strathcona County and RETA had been lobbying for the section of the line that passes near Sherwood Park to go underground, but Epcor and AltaLink's Heartland Transmission Project team had estimated that doing so would push the project's budget to more than $1 billion.

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