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DAM-L St. Paul Media on Manitoba Hydro (fwd)
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Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2000 09:52:18 -0500
Subject: St. Paul Media on Manitoba Hydro
Date: 10/12/2000 5:31:48 AM
Subj: St. Paul Media on Manitoba Hydro
Below are pro and con articles on importing Manitoba Hydro to Minnesota.
http://www.pioneerpress.com/opinion/ocl_docs/030288.htm
http://www.pioneerpress.com/opinion/ocl_docs/019700.htm
Pioneer Press, St. Paul MN October 12, 2000
JimAlders
Commentator
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pull the plug?
Critics, who maintain Manitoba Hydro destroys the environment and tramples
Native rights, want Xcel Energy to stop acquiring electricity from the
Canadian utility.
Canada must resolve dispute with Indians
Calls to cancel the agreement between Xcel Energy, which formerly was
Northern States Power Co., and Manitoba Hydro must be evaluated on whether
such an action would have its desired effect of resolving the dispute among
the various nations in Canada.
Additionally, as a provider of critical services to electricity customers in
this region, Xcel Energy is obligated to consider the effects any action
would have on our ability to provide low-cost, reliable electric service to
our customers.
No one disputes that Manitoba Hydro's developments of the Nelson and
Churchill rivers of northern Manitoba, constructed decades ago, changed the
land and affected local communities, including five First Nations.
Through the Northern Flood Agreement, Manitoba Hydro has worked with each of
the First Nations and reached settlements with four of the five. Discussions
with the fifth, the Cross Lake Cree, have not yet resulted in settlement.
Currently, the Canadian government, Manitoba Hydro and the Cross Lake Cree
are working to resolve the issue through the appropriate Canadian legal
channels.
We have met with Manitoba government officials and with members of various
First Nations. The Split Lake Cree and the Cree of Nelson House, two of the
bands that have reached agreement with Manitoba Hydro, hold a different view
from the Cross Lake Cree. In fact, the Split Lake Cree and Cree of Nelson
House are working in partnership with Manitoba Hydro on the possibility of
future hydroelectric development in the region.
While we have encouraged resolution of this dispute, ultimately it can be
settled only by Canada's national government, the Manitoba provincial
government and the First Nations.
Ending Xcel Energy's agreement with Manitoba Hydro will not move this
Canadian dispute to resolution, and it will negatively affect our customers.
We at Xcel Energy have worked to provide a diverse mix of reliable
electricity supply resources. Manitoba Hydro is one source of this
diversity, serving approximately 12 percent of the electricity needs of our
Upper Midwest customers. We not only purchase electricity from Manitoba
Hydro during our hot summers when our customers need it most, but we also
sell power to Manitoba Hydro at times in the winter when the citizens of
Manitoba most need it and we have available supply.
This relationship has allowed both companies to avoid building power plants
-- with their associated costs and environmental impacts -- that would
otherwise be needed to satisfy customer.
If we cancel our agreement with Manitoba Hydro, the Canadian utility will
have little difficulty selling its energy to other customers. Canceling our
agreement with Manitoba Hydro also will force us to replace 12 percent of
our yearly supply with new sources of electricity at the same time our
region struggles to find new sources to supply new demand. The same kind of
impacts may also be true for Manitoba.
The cost and associated environmental impacts of replacement power would be
significant. Consequently, ending our agreement would mean higher prices for
our customers without bringing this dispute any closer to resolution.
We will continue to meet with the stakeholders and encourage a settlement.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alders (e-mail: James.R.Alders@XcelEnergy.com) is manager of regulatory
administration at Xcel Energy.
DianeJ. Peterson
Commentator
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Costs of `cheap' hydroelectricity are too high
Manitoba Hydro sells artificially low-priced electricity to Xcel Energy,
formerly NSP. The price would be higher if Canada respected the
environmental, treaty and human rights of the Cree Indians whose lands and
waters in northern Manitoba are being destroyed to generate this ``cheap''
power.
Although Canada chooses to neglect its own law and the dictates of morality
and justice, that does not give Xcel the ethical right to retail that
electricity here, or anywhere. Xcel wants everyone to believe that
distributing Manitoba Hydro's low-cost electricity in no way implicates Xcel
as a collaborator in environmental and human-rights abuse.
Xcel is dealing in ill-gotten electricity. Because the victims are Cree
Indians whose land and livelihood suffer constant ravaging by the hydro
dams, the collaboration is a clear case of environmental racism.
Until very recently, Minnesota ratepayers didn't know their part in
promoting vast environmental damage in northern Manitoba, or their part in a
violation of the rights of Canadian Crees. Xcel didn't inform us.
However, a number of us ratepayers have recently become aware of our
unwitting complicity in this injustice, and we are using proper government
channels to extricate ourselves from this offense.
Since May 11, Minnesota Witness for Environmental Justice, a Twin Cities
grass-roots group, has staged a weekly rally of Witnesses outside the
Minnesota Public Utilities Commission and passed out leaflets to educate the
public about this shameful source of electricity. We've asked other ordinary
people to help us persuade Minnesota's public utilities commissioners to
deny Xcel further access to this immoral trade with Manitoba Hydro.
Most Minnesotans are not aware that 3 million acres of boreal forest in
Manitoba have been flooded (translate: destroyed) by the dams. That's equal
to three of our Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wildernesses. Some ecologists
view the boreal forest as an ecosystem in many ways more important to North
America than the Amazon is to South America. Manitoba Hydro has been
destroying it for more than 20 years by river diversions and flooding.
On the Cree reservations, the dams have destroyed recently intact hunting
and trapping economies. The result is a crisis of mass poverty,
hopelessness, despair and suicide among the Cree people.
There is no shortage of electricity suppliers. Cost is not the only factor
in purchase decisions, nor should it be. How sound is a purchase based on a
policy of seeing no evil in regards to massive environmental and social
damage in the northern wilderness?
Fortunately, Minnesotans are resourceful and Xcel has the know-how to be an
industry leader if it sets its talented work force to the task. With
determination, we can become more energy efficient to conserve all or part
of the power we're importing.
Investing now in development of genuinely sustainable energy technologies in
Minnesota will build up our own economy. Status quo reliance on presently
``cheap'' electricity from Manitoba Hydro can cost us in the long run by
luring us away from investing in energy production here.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Peterson (e-mail: birch7@goldengate.net) is founder of Minnesota Witness for
Environmental Justice.
Information distributed by:
________________________
Will Braun
Mennonite Central Committee
Energy Justice Coordinator
134 Plaza Dr.
Winnipeg MB R3T 5K9
Canada
wjb@mennonitecc.ca
ph (204) 261-6381
fx (204) 269-9875
For further information, or to be removed from this distribution list, please
contact the above.
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