Glen Korstrom
Northern News Services

INUVIK (Dec 18/98) - When the Ikhil natural gas pipeline starts servicing Inuvik homes in the summer of 1999, Inuvik's NWT Power Corporation plant will be its largest customer, consuming 35 to 40 per cent of the output, according to chair of the Inuvialuit Petroleum Corporation, Russell Newmark.

Newmark says the project would not be viable without Power Corporation support.

"That was the first piece of the puzzle," he says.

NWTPC signed an agreement in December 1997 to help ensure the natural gas project would be viable. Since then, it has set out to invest $3.7 million to convert its existing diesel plant to use natural gas as the prime energy supply for electrical generation.

"We are really excited about this gas project," says NWTPC director of western operations Pun Chu.

"We have negotiated and planned for this project for almost two years. It is not often we have a chance to do something like that."

The NWTPC's plan involves purchasing two new gas engines with a 2.7- megawatt and a 2.1-megawatt capacity respectively. Both are set to be installed by July 1999 at the Inuvik site.

Former landmark blue fuel tanks are scheduled to be dismantled sometime in the future.

"It is an economical advantage to have a local long- term source of fuel, and the increase in construction activities is good news to Inuvik," says Chu.

"It is also good news to our customers with stability in electrical rates and the potential for rate reductions in the future."

There is no planned change to the nine jobs directly involved with keeping the lights on in Inuvik though training programs are being arranged to prepare staff for gas operations.

Chu also hails the project for its capacity to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

The corporation will propose any rate changes for Inuvik and other communities across the NWT when it files a general rate application with the public utilities board late in 2000. If changes are approved, they will likely not go into effect until 2001.

But whether the change to natural gas will yield a profit for the corporation is yet to be seen, admits director of corporate development Bill Braden.

Still, despite the large investment, Braden is optimistic the lower fuel costs will make the corporation's business decision appear smart in the future.

Meanwhile, Braden says the NWTPC's one existing 4.3-megawatt diesel engine will be retired for future use in another community -- likely in Nunavut -- which will not be powered by natural gas but which the NWTPC will still service.

"The gas project here has the double advantage of making good business sense with the potential of stability of rates if not reduction of rates in the long run and to help clean up the environment."

Braden says the NWTPC is simultaneously working on other ways to decrease its burden on the environment while heating community buildings.

One of the biggest strategies here is called residual heat where the corporation taps heat off engines through a kind of water-jacket which it then circulates through surrounding heating pipes.