(File photo/paNOW Staff)

By Nigel Maxwell

Water improvement

Study says cost of new water treatment plant $7 million more than initial estimate

Apr 23, 2021 | 5:00 PM

Plans for a new water treatment plant west of Prince Albert are at a crossroads according to the chair of the project’s steering committee.

The initial estimated cost of the facility was $45 million dollars, however, a new conceptual design study done by a Saskatoon consulting firm has come back with a figure of $52 million. Brent Miller, first line project chair and Shellbrook councillor, told paNOW a decision on whether to move forward would happen likely in the next month.

“It is the time where everybody has to make decisions,” he said. “We’ve got all the information and now we have to start thinking about what we want to do.”

The proposed project represents a joint venture between the Town of Shellbrook, Rural Municipality (RM) of Shellbrook and Prince Albert Rural Water Utility, and would involve a number of water lines running in different directions. Miller explained the next phase of the project will be reaching out to all the potential property owners affected by the project. Contact numbers and information will be included with the upcoming assessment notices being mailed out in the RM’s of Prince Albert, Shellbrook, Buckland, and Duck Lake.

“It’s not absolutely vital but we will use the information we get. People that express interest will help us justify our project and help us understand what kind of uptake we’d get if we built it and how much more sales we’d get”, he said. “A lot of our economics depends on how many subscriptions we’ll get.”

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Miller explained the $52 million figure is not a final number, adding if the committee decides to continue moving forward, they would look at a more in-depth engineering study.

“We’ve only done point five to two per cent of the engineering so far, but if you do a little more you get to what’s called a class 3 estimate and your level of uncertainty goes down,” he said.

Ken Danger, General Manager of the Prince Albert Rural Water Utility, expressed to paNOW he was not concerned about the higher number.

“I think a $52 million dollar project is a huge project but as long as our numbers are in order, I guess we can probably make it work,” he said.

Danger noted a special meeting would likely occur in the next two to three weeks. He also added there is still some federal/ provincial money floating around.

“At the moment, it appears that it’s feasible without any grant funding,” he said.

While the exact location of the proposed facility has not been finalized—beyond somewhere between Prince Albert and Shellbrook—Brent Millier has previously mentioned an area where the Shell River meets the North Saskatchewan River.

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nigel.maxwell@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @nigelmaxwell