Local officials are saying Hydro-Québec’s recent announcement to begin work on the upper Pontiac’s power grid is a big win for the region and its development.
Hydro-Québec announced last week it will build a 120-25 kV substation near Fort Coulonge, as well as rebuild the Cadieux substation in Bryson and update 30 kilometres of supply lines between the two.
Hydro-Québec spokesperson Pascal Poinlane said these upgrades will shorten the distance the distribution lines have to cover to get power to people’s homes after leaving the substation, the place where power voltage is lessened before being distributed.
“Right now the situation is you have the distribution system in this area that was starting from Cadieux,” Poinlane said. “But if you have a new substation in the Coulonge area, then you have less of a distribution system. You are closer to your customers, and that’s why it’s going to be really more reliable.”
Pontiac MNA André Fortin said the investment into this work, estimated by Poinlane to be “a few hundred million dollars,” has been a long time coming for a region that has seen frequent power outages for over 20 years.
“It is a massive investment on the part of Hydro-Québec, but mainly it’s something that is more than overdue for the residents and businesses of the Upper Pontiac and part of Mansfield,” said Fortin, adding that frequent and sometimes lengthy outages have had a slew of negative impacts.
“We’ve heard stories of businesses not wanting to set up here. We’ve heard stories of residents and employers who are getting sick and tired of not being able to do telework. We’ve heard from local farmers whose equipment has failed [ . . . ] so to be able to address that today is a giant leap forward.”
Fortin said the work will help bring the upper Pontiac onto the main power grid, instead of the current system, in which power generated at the Waltham dam gets sent to the Ontario grid before returning once again to the upper Pontiac.
“It creates all sorts of havoc, all sorts of instability to their power supply,” he said, adding that they cannot be fed by the main hydro network because of the distance to the nearest substation at Cadieux.
“By having a local substation close by in and around Mansfield and Fort Coulonge, it allows them to be put on the main hydro network and to stop using the odd historic bypass system to and from Ontario.”
Allumette Island mayor Corey Spence said the news means the difference between a cowpath and a four-lane highway to help the electricity get from the nearest substation to residents of the upper Pontiac.
“We have a big need for electricity in our end, and to get that, there’s only a cowpath from Cadieux station to Allumette Island or to Sheenboro. It just doesn’t work,” he said. “We’re building a four-lane highway with electricity closer to us, which is great.”
He said the news is a big win for the region’s residents, adding that a more reliable power grid could mean more economic investment in the region.
“When a business looks to do anything, one of the first things they look for is the infrastructure in place,” he said. “Now with this being in Mansfield, there’s an area where industry can say, ‘Hey, we can pull power.’”
Spence said Upper Pontiac municipalities and their residents used all available channels to fight this issue, scheduling meetings with Hydro-Québec and encouraging residents of the upper Pontiac to submit tickets to the company when they had an outage.
“I like to call it judo that we used,” he said. “I mean, using their own strengths against them [ . . . ] Every time you get a power outage, you complain. Complain, complain, complain. By law, they have to respond, and these statistics started to pop up and the right people started to realize what was going on here.”
He said the victory is one the entire community should celebrate. “If it wasn’t for these local residents, we wouldn’t have been able to learn so much and see where the problems were.”
Fortin said he heard those voices loud and clear as well, and has been working with Hydro-Québec to come up with solutions for quite some time.
“This is only happening because local people have pushed and pushed and pushed for years. They’ve pushed myself, they’ve pushed Hydro-Québec, they’ve pushed their local officials, and everybody has contributed to getting Hydro-Québec to this decision.”
The project will go through several phases, including two years of technical and environmental studies as well as public consultations before finally doing the work, which is slated for 2028 and 2030. The company estimates the new substation will be ready for 2030 or 2031.
The current phase is for public consultations and planning. To that end, Hydro-Québec will host an open house on May 27 at the Knights of Columbus in Fort Coulonge from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Poinlane said the point of the open house is for residents to come with concerns about the project so the company can determine where exactly the substation and lines are going to be located.
“We need people to come to us and talk with us and we can give suggestions to identify the potential line routes, the substation options,” he said.
