Coronach ‘open for business’ with transition money announced Friday

First with the oil downturn starting in 2014 and now with federal regulations moving the country away from coal, southeast Saskatchewan’s economy is hurting.

But on Friday, the provincial government announced a chunk of money to help.

Estevan is being given $8 million and Coronach is being given $2 million and both are expected to share the money and opportunities it may bring with the surrounding areas.

At the announcement, Coronach Mayor Trevor Schnell said the money means the town can draw business and jobs.

“We’re open for business,” he said.

Schnell said there are 300 jobs in the town and area that are in the coal industry.

“We don’t have an oilfield. Our town is coal and power, that’s what we do, so it’s huge. Huge,” and Schnell said the moves away from coal that have happened and are planned in the future are having an effect.

“You try to stay positive. Morale’s coming down. There’s not much future. There’s over 50 houses for sale in our tiny town which is a significant number.”

Schnell said he has accepted that the town won’t be able to fill all 300 jobs in one shot.

“Let’s just start out small. Anything, anything, five, 10, 15 jobs. Start from there and keep going. But to think that we’re going to fill 300 jobs, it’s not going to happen,” said Schnell.

He said the town is open to anything that could bring work, though he doesn’t have much hope for carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology expanding and allowing the coal industry to continue. He said he just doesn’t see CCS happening.

$8 million for Estevan

Roy Ludwig is on the other side of the fence on CCS. The mayor of Estevan said carbon capture technology and pushing that forward is going to be Estevan’s focus as it moves forward.

The move away from coal will be big for the Estevan area. Ludwig said it has been part of the community since the turn of the century.

“It’s a huge impact to see, with the changes, with the carbon tax, with the changes of the regulations, the fact that our industry is under siege,” said Ludwig.

Ludwig said Estevan is also very willing to look at nuclear power as a job producer for the community.

Estevan is on the same page as Coronach when it comes to the pace of an economic recovery, though.

“We’re realizing at the end of the day there’s no great big corporation, probably, that’s going to land on our doorstep with hundreds of jobs. (The turnaround) will be incremental; it’ll probably be a few jobs at a time,” said Ludwig.

Adaptation needed, according to the premier

Premier Scott Moe and Government Relations Minister Lori Carr were in Estevan for the announcement on Friday.

Moe told the room fundamental change is coming soon and the province needs to adapt and prepare for the coming number of years.

“What we’re doing here today with the $10 million that we had put forward is more than the $10 million. This is a commitment to engage — a commitment to engage with the community so that we can work together to work through these next number of years, between in particular now and 2030,” said Moe.

The year 2030 is when the federal government has said it wants to phase out power generation through traditional coal.

Moe talked about carbon capture as a possibility to help the area in the future, though he admitted the decisions are still being mulled over on whether to fit other units at Boundary Dam or the Shand Power station with carbon capture technology.

Moe also talked about some sort of natural gas power generation or small modular nuclear reactors as options for the areas as well.

The money for the two areas will be distributed over three years, starting in 2020.