{"id":869678,"date":"2026-08-24T12:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T12:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/869678\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T12:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T12:28:11","slug":"former-pub-chair-says-new-churchill-falls-deal-does-not-provide-additional-capacity-to-sell-power-to-u-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/869678\/","title":{"rendered":"Former PUB Chair Says New Churchill Falls Deal Does Not Provide Additional Capacity to Sell Power to U.S."},"content":{"rendered":"

The province is promoting Newfoundland and Labrador\u2019s ability \u2013 for the first time \u2013 to sell power directly to U.S. markets, but the former chair of the Public Utilities Board and a member of the 2041 group, David Vardy, says it\u2019s not that simple.<\/p>\n

Newfoundland and Labrador has had to sell power to Quebec and can\u2019t use Hydro Quebec\u2019s transmission lines to sell to third party customers. Vardy says the new deal \u201cdoesn\u2019t do anything to improve that situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt extends an existing arrangement, which we have, to sell power from Muskrat Falls, and some surplus power, recaptured power, from the \u201969 contract from Churchill Falls\u2026where we can sell power into the United States. That\u2019s an existing arrangement.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says the new deal announced last week doesn\u2019t give the province any additional capacity to be able to sell the energy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat it does do,\u201d says Vardy, \u201cis it gives us some access to contracts that Hydro Quebec already has with customers in New York and New England, and we can piggy-back on that and we can supply those markets based upon prices already established by Quebec.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

(via Nalcor)<\/p>\n

The Opposition says Newfoundland and Labrador has not secured the ability to transmit power from Churchill Falls and Gull Island through Quebec to the U.S. as government claims.<\/p>\n

The Liberals say as per the agreement, NL Hydro may elect to sell to Quebec a limited amount of power based on U.S. prices, with limitations.<\/p>\n

The Opposition says there is \u201czero\u201d ability for NL Hydro to negotiate a price directly with a U.S. market, and then use Quebec transmission to meet that obligation.<\/p>\n

They say Newfoundlanders and Labradorians \u201cdeserve straight answers\u201d about what the agreement delivers and not \u201cpolitical spin.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The province is promoting Newfoundland and Labrador\u2019s ability \u2013 for the first time \u2013 to sell power directly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":869679,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48,269876,185074,269873,269875,269877,269874,269870,269871,269872],"class_list":["post-869678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-listen-to-vocm","tag-news-radio","tag-news-radio-st-johns","tag-st-johns-fm-radio","tag-st-johns-local-radio","tag-st-johns-radio-station","tag-vocm","tag-vocm-590","tag-vocm-radio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869678","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=869678"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869678\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/869679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=869678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=869678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=869678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}