NUNAVUT - Under the NWT and Nunavut Chamber of Mine's plan, the NWT and Nunavut would be connected to the national power grid through Manitoba - which is on the lookout for potential new customers - and Fort McMurray.

"You can build a power line down south, depending on what sort of private property and obstacles they have ... cheaper here because you don't have to cut trees and you don't have all the problems of crossing existing infrastructure," said Lou Covello, chamber of mines president.

Covello added that reducing the mines' dependencies on fuel would result in significant savings for both industry and the communities.

"They sell their power at five cents a kilowatt hour to their customers in Manitoba. Here in Yellowknife we pay 26 cents."

To provide backup service to the grid, 50-megwatt nuclear power plants would be built at four locations: Mary River, the site of an iron-ore deposit being developed by Baffinland Iron Mines 160 km south of Pond Inlet; Baker Lake, which is bracing for the 2010 opening of Agnico-Eagle's Meadowbank gold mine; the former Lupin gold mine site in the Contwoyto Lake area, which is currently under care and maintenance but is surrounded by several prospective mineral projects in the Slave Geological Province; and Selwyn Resource Ltd.'s zinc-lead deposit at Howard's Pass, which straddles the Yukon/NWT border.

"These four nuclear plants will be able to exploit the current generation of what are called micro-nukes becoming available," said Covello. "These are essentially off-the-assembly line nukes. You can fly them in on a Herc and lower them into a hole in the ground and turn them on and refuel them in 30 years."

David Ramsay, chair of the GNWT committee that heard the chamber's plan, said nuclear power would be hard for Northerners to swallow.

"I don't know about that. It would be a tough sell," he said.