Letter to the Editor

I think most people in Kimberley will remember back in 2009 when the city decided to proceed with the construction of the new Mark Creek Chlorination and Micro Hydro generation plant. The chlorination plant produces sodium hypochlorite from salt, water and electricity, a product required to treat our water supply. The Micro Hydro generation plant as we were told was designed to produce 200 MWh / 200,000 KWh of electricity. The chlorination process would consume 133 MWh of electricity annually, leaving 67 MWh /67,000 KWh of electricity available to BC Hydro at a suggested rate of $0.08 per KWh for the whole sum of $5,360.00 annually.

The city would also have a Net Metering agreement with BC Hydro to track the electricity consumed by the chlorination plant and the amount of electricity delivered to BC Hydro.

To make a long story short, over a year ago, I asked the Mayor and the CAO if they would perform a post review of this project to determine if it delivered on the goals and objectives outlined in the justification of the project and to provide me with the amount of electricity the Micro Hydro Plant produced, the energy consumed by the Chlorination Plant and the revenue generated on an annual basis since the date the plant went into service.

To this date, the only thing I’ve learned is the Director of Operations is working with BC Hydro to come up with the numbers with no indication as to when a final report would be completed. It’s obvious the mystery behind how much power is being produced and where it is being consumed will remain a mystery for some time to come.

However, while scanning a 2017 budget document I did discover the Director of Operations was purchasing a new spare $5,000 Programmable Logic Controller. The rational: If the current PLC fails the power generated by the turbine (which supplies power to the adjacent chlorination facility with any excess being delivered to the BC Hydro grid) will cease to be produced until a replacement is sourced. The second item on the list is a new $10,000 PLC display screen. Rational: The current PLC display screen has burnt out and the illumination in this unit is not replaceable. All chlorination control for the Mark Creek supply is through this unit. Both units will be funded out of the newfound wealth in the Water Operating Capital Reserve Fund.

With all the increases in our water and sewer fees supposedly required to replace our leaky and aging water lines, can we really afford to purchase a $5,000.00 PLC to sit on a shelf?

It was touted by the city this project would establish a benchmark for all other communities to follow. A post review report on this project would be informative and appreciated by most taxpayers and should have been completed one year after the plant was commissioned for production, not seven or eight years later. I’m confident taxpayers will anxiously wait for council and city management to produce this report.

Thank You.

Gregory McCormick,

Kimberley

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