Jason Unrau
Northern News Services
Wednesday, July 25, 2007

YELLOWKNIFE - When RTL-Robinson Enterprises' new 160 million litre tank farm opens for the 2007/2008 winter road season, it will expand Yellowknife's fuel storage capacity four-fold.

"We've been exploring solutions to the current re-supply issue for the mines for over a year now (because) the requirement for fuel is exceeding (Yellowknife's) capacity," said Cheryl Robinson, RTL-Robinson Enterprises Ltd. spokesperson.

With only 10 million litres of storage facilities in Hay River and 40 million for mine use in Yellowknife, trucks supplying the mines during the annual three-month winter road season often have to get their fuel direct from the train in Hay River.

Robinson said it would take some time to get the new facility's four 40-million-litre tanks to capacity, but once they are the ability to get fuel to the mines in a timely manner will be much improved.

"It allows fuel storage to commence earlier in the year, which will ensure that there's more fuel to go in storage when the winter road opens," added Robinson.

Deanna Twissell, spokesperson for BHP Billiton, which owns Ekati mine, said this will ease the burden of bringing fuel to Ekati.

"This is a breaking story for the Northwest Territories because there's nothing here that can accommodate this amount of fuel," she said.