Outages frustrate town
Derek Neary
Northern News Services
Fort Liard (Mar 16/01) - Fort Liard mayor Joanne Deneron said her community has been plagued by power outages over the past few months and she wants compensation.
There have been close to a dozen power outages over the past two months. The most recent was March 4 and lasted about 40 minutes.
Deneron said that Power Corp. officials have been very apologetic, but she maintains that compensation is in order.
"I said, 'If you're really sorry maybe you should give us a rebate'," she said.
Peter Watt, communications officer for the Power Corp., acknowledged that the new $400,000 generator, installed last summer, has had problems, but said that's not unusual for new generators.
The last power outage in Fort Liard was nearly two weeks ago, and the Power Corp. is confident the problems have been rectified, he said.
Watt said he was not aware that Deneron requested a rebate and declined to comment on how the company may respond.
Shane Parrish, chief executive officer for the Acho Dene Koe Group of Companies, said his organization purchased battery packs to back-up computers because of the unreliable power.
"We were just having too frequent hits," he said. "Of course, the information is far too valuable not to have back-up.
"In terms of refrigeration units and stuff like that, we're still exposed there."
Parrish said the ADK is interested converting Fort Liard to natural gas by this fall. The town doesn't have a franchise agreement with the Power Corp.
"We're proposing to supply power to the Power Corp. through some gas generators," he said.
A discussion regarding the use of natural gas was held with the Power Corp. in January, according to Watt.
The Power Corp. is conducting a cost analysis on the feasibility of converting to natural gas. "We hope to be getting back together sometime soon," Watt said.
