Your morning Coffey, plus the Reading List

The Reading List for 10 February 2023

Someone has a boxed edition and took a picture on their kitchen counter.

Saltwire did something bizarre with it, but here’s the full text of Bern Coffey’s recent suggestion to the provincial government about how to deal with all the power that’s available from Churchill Falls and potentially from Gull Island.

Run an advertisement

No one can legitimately complain about someone seeking "the best possible arrangement(s) for the people of the Province and the shareholders of CF(L)Co." Being a shareholder of CF(L)Co, Hydro-Québec certainly cannot.

Therefore, why not run an advertisement analogous to one published back in 2005? Revised for the circumstances of 2023, it could read:

Request for Expressions of Interest for development of the Lower Churchill Hydro Resource and purchase of Churchill Falls power post-2041

The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador Government, Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro, and Churchill Falls (Labrador) Corporation Limited [CF(L)Co] jointly invite expressions of interest for participation in development of the Lower Churchill hydroelectric resource and the purchase of CF(L)Co's Churchill Falls power to start delivery 01 September 2041.

This public invitation provides all potential interested parties with the opportunity to present their development concepts, interest in purchasing power, and qualifications for consideration.

Proposals that best meet the objectives for developing and utilizing the resources and for maximizing the profitability of CF(L)Co will be considered for feasibility assessment. The Government of Newfoundland and Labador is committed to developing the Lower Churchill fully and to selling CF(L)Co’s Churchill Falls power post-2041 under the best possible arrangement(s) for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador and the shareholders of CF(L)Co.

Now I’ve made some minor editorial changes, in paragraphing and in referring to the Upper Churchill as Churchill Falls.

This is a pretty simple idea. It could also be an incredibly effective idea if you goal is to maximise the revenue from the Churchill river.

There are three assumptions behind this idea and you may see them already,

First, it proposes to sell the electricity to the highest bidder, in essence. No more discounts and freebies for anyone in either province, although both HQ and NALCOR-Hydro will get a de facto discount based on their respective share of profits.

Second, it puts both Hydro-Quebec *and* Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro in the position of being customers for their own power. That’s not a bad thing. It really ensures that the interests of the real shareholders, that is, the taxpayers and ratepayers of both provinces, are as protected as they can be against the collusion of the political and bureaucratic interests that control CF(L)Co.

There’s a third assumption that I’d toss in there. The two shareholders have to treat CF(L)Co not as a holding company, a shell, or some other marriage of convenience. They have to treat it as a fully-functional, jointly-owned corporation that has interests that are different from but not incompatible with those of the individual shareholders.

So when it comes to evaluating the bids, CF(L)Co would have to function like a completely independent company. We’d have to find a way to make sure that neither HQ nor NALCOR-Hydro would be able to put their thumbs on the scale. Not easy but not impossible either.

---

The reading list this week is about Churchill Falls. It’s not a long list by any means. And it may not be complete. I’ll update it from time to time as new things appear on my screen.

This is all the secondary stuff, that is analysis of some kind by third parties about the construction of the original power plant (not all the engineering stuff), the 1969 power contract, and the fall-out from it. It’s not government or company records, memoirs, diaries, and that sort of thing although there is some of that floating around.

Most are linked to a pdf version. That’s a bonus.

Enjoy!