Wednesday November 24th, 2021
The Atlin Whisper “Never doubt that a small group of committed citizens can change the world.” Margaret Mead
Please note that this article which was published on Wednesday was written and submitted by Judith Urquhart and not Christine Ziegler. Judy’s name was inadvertently left off and thus there has been some confusion as to who wrote the piece.
Atlin Whisper Article
Written and submitted by Judith Urquhart
We have an opportunity to comment until the end of December on the hydro project proposed by THELP (Tlingit Homeland Energy Limited Partnership). The project called AHEP (Atlin Hydroelectric Expansion Project) is still in the proposal stage. It has been created to sell energy exclusively to the Yukon to help reduce their need to burn diesel in the winter months. It would supply 8.5 MW of electricity for 6 or 7 months during the winter. The project will cost at today’s prices $200 million. We need to understand what this project entails before we can comment so this is a brief outline. Surprise Lake will be turned into a reservoir by artificially raising it 2 meters (6 feet) in the summer. This will flood grayling spawning areas and beaches and kill the vegetation but the company intends to create new spawning areas and cut down the dead trees. Then in the winter the level of the lake will drop 2 meters. From Surprise Lake the water will be carried by a series of power canals to feed 2 Francis turbines located in the vicinity of our town generator station. Spruce Creek will be diverted into this system to increase the flow of water. These turbines will produce a total of 5.7 MW. Because of the water diversion, Pine Creek Falls will have 50% less water than at its lowest water level. The company realizes this is will change the appearance but “THEL recognizes that this is subjective.” From the upper turbines a Right of Way (ROW) will be built to supply water to the lower turbine located on Warm Bay Road. This ROW will be 25 meters wide and 3.2 km long. The ROW will carry the buried pipes, transmission line and a service road. It will parallel Pine Creek and pass through the subdivisions on both sides of the creek. To minimize the impact to property owners the extensive bedrock in the area will be jack hammered instead of blasted where possible. Unfortunately, part of the Pine Creek Trail and the Pine Creek Campground will have to be eliminated. The flow in lower Pine Creek will be only 10% since 90% of the water will have been diverted. This will severely compromise the wetlands but the company assures us that the die off might give rise to new vegetation that could have even better browsing opportunities.