LP working hard to reduce soot emissions from boiler.

In the last few months I have received several questions from resident about the level of soot emanating from LP. A few years ago LP invested a considerable sum to improve it's pollution control equipment which had made a noticeable difference to the quality of the air we all breathe in Golden. Lately an increased soot level has observed. As a result I asked Annette Lutterman from the Golden & District air quality committee to look into the situation. Below is the response I received.

Hello Keith,

I spoke with Dave Messier at LP to address your question about the increased soot observed. The situation is that last year there was a fire in one section of the dry electrostatic precipitator pollution control equipment for the boiler. This section was rebuilt in October 2012. There has since been some equipment malfunction

LP is:

• Working closely with the Ministry of Environment on this issue.
• Currently, under agreement with MoE, they are running the boiler at a reduced load (20% lower) to keep emissions at a minimum and still continue to operate. The annual source test indicated that LP had exceeded its permitted particulate limits. 
• LP has retained a third party engineering company to resolve the issue.This will result in some type of upgrade to the pollution controls to resolve the issue. The equipment may take 3-4 months to be manufactured. They must have it completed by the end of October due to freeze up. The upgrade may be completed earlier if the required equipment is manufactured sooner.

With regards to your question about the IPP, nothing has changed in the past 10 years in terms of how hard the boiler is run. Any power that is sold is essentially surplus capacity when the mill is operating at lower production rates, and on the weekend. Currently, under the reduced boiler load, LP is producing power for the IPP only on weekends, when the production plant is not running.

So you can pass on the message to residents that there have been some issues over the past 8 months, but LP is working hard to resolve them.

Cheers, Annette

A proposal to reduce the number of councillors from 6 to 4.

I filed a notice of motion today to repeal bylaw 977 thereby reducing the number of councillors for the town of Golden from 6 to 4 as of the next municipal election in 2014. The resolution will be debated in council on October 8th 2013. For more detail click the link below;

Read more.

Auditor General for Local Governments announces initial audit targets

In a press release dated 2013.05.29, Basia Ruta, BC's Auditor General for Local Governments (AGLG) announced the first performance audits involving a number of local governments.The first three planned performance audit topics will be reported on by March 31, 2014 relate to cost containment.

Revelstoke and Vernon are two of the initial six local governments to be audited under the topic; achieving value for money in operational procurement.

Cranbrook and Rossland are two of the initial six local governments planned to be included in the audit topic; Learning from local government capital procurement an asset management programs.

Golden was not named in the initial list of local governments to be scrutinized by the Office of the Auditor General for Local Government as it continues it's performance audit mandate.

For more details visit the AGLG website;
www.aglg.ca

The opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions and may not represent the opinions of other councillors nor the opinions of council.

Citizen Budget

The Trade Show at the FCM 2013 occupied all 3 exhibition halls in the Vancouver Conference Center. Given that council is looking for ways to engage the public in a level-of-service conversation, one exhibit caught my attention as being very topical and timely. 

Open North, online consultation experts were promoting “CitizenBudget” at a booth at the trade show. Citizen Budget is a cost effective way of engaging the public at large in the town’s budgeting process. Starting at $1750 for a municipality of less than 25,000 this would be a cost-effective tool to start the level of service conversation with the community.

You can try a demonstration at;

Demo.citizenbudget.com

The opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions and may not represent the opinions of other councillors nor the opinions of council.

 

FCM 2013 Conference and Trade Show

I attended the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) Conference and Trade show 2013 in Vancouver May 31-June 3. The central message from the conference was the success the FCM have enjoyed in negotiating the new Building Canada Plan directly with the federal government in Ottawa.

As part of the Building Canada Plan, The Gas Tax Fund ($21.8 billion) will become a permanent fixture for municipalities. The fund will be indexed and cover a broader range of infrastructure projects than before. There will be an incremental GST rebate for municipalities ($10.4billion).There will also be a new Building Canada Fund in 2014. Thank you Mr. Harper.

Discussion about the rising cost of local government was non-existent at the conference.  At the standing committee forum on social economic development a question “Who is going to have to pay for all these social programs” was quickly dismissed as inappropriate and the questioner was referred to the standing committee on Municipal Finance and Intergovernmental Municipal Arrangements (MF&IMA).

I also attended the MF&IMA forum where the main focus is on getting more money from senior levels of government, and not cutting back municipal expenses.

I attended a workshop on innovative infrastructure: Building Asset Management Capacity in Rural Communities and a forum on Rural Communities. Both provided useful information applicable to issues here in Golden.

Building Asset management capacity in rural communities was a workshop particularly pertinent to Golden. Don Barry, Associate Partner Asset Management Solutions for IBM Canada teaches an 8 day course in asset management at the University of Toronto and gave a cursory outline of his course. 

Darren Elder, CAO for the Rural Municipality of Wilton gave a presentation on his experience using the NAMS program, the same program Golden is using. I talked with Darren and Glen Dow, the Reeve of Wilton after the workshop about their experience with NAMS. They both endorsed the program but were emphatic that the best approach was to address one set of assets at a time. For example do complete analyses on water utilities. When we are confident with the complete picture on water utilities move onto the next asset group; sewer for example. They felt trying to process all assets at once was not the best approach.

Nicole Goodman, PhD from the Munk School of Global Affairs gave an insightful presentation on the current status of internet voting in Canada. Internet voting is already being used in many municipalities and it is certainly the way of the future. BC has yet to follow the other provinces and approve internet voting; however internet voting is currently being studied by a provincial panel in BC. We may have the ability to offer an internet option to the electorate as early as the 2014 municipal elections.

The opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions and may not represent the opinions of other councillors nor the opinions of council.