Recently SaskPower and the city of Moose Jaw teamed up to host an open house regarding the planning of our industrial park as well as the new power station that's set to be built there.

Many questions were asked and answered during the seven hours that representatives from both respective areas shared information about their area of expertise. Some of the inquiries surrounding the environmental impact of this new build and what SaskPower has done to accommodate the wildlife in the area, as well as the people living and working near the site. 

"We do environmental assessments of the area, we also do assessments to make sure there's not archaeological or cultural artefacts in the area because we don't want to disturb that either. We initially start with GIS kind of desktopping

which basically means looking at something like Google Earth or something similar to get an idea of the topography. We'll also have people go down and take a look specifically for things like cultural artefacts species at risk.," explained Joel Cherry, Spokesperson for SaskPower.

He noted that one of the specifications that made Moose Jaw's Industrial Park stand out was the fact that the area had already been disturbed which means there are usually much fewer plants and small animals living there. 

"In that area, it's mostly cropland right now and it's adjacent to a sewage lagoon, so that area is probably not going to have a lot of sensitive habitats, grasslands and that sort of thing. Most of it has already been altered and that makes it more preferable than going on a site that has more native grass or more environmentally sensitive aspects," said Cherry. 

One of the many displays during the open house was a computer that could show residents that numerous things they look for when they're collecting data with a fine tooth comb.  

"We have a pretty sophisticated desktop program, it has numerous layers overlayed and it has things like habitat for birds at risk, important wildlife areas... many, many different levels of environmental concerns that we're monitoring in the area because it's important that we're good stewards of our natural resources and wilderness."

Although it's been mentioned that the power station set to be built near Moose Jaw is almost a replica of the Chinook Power Station near the city of Swift Current, there are still plenty of things to separate the two buildings. Representatives from SaskPower explained to attendees the extremely fine details of how they put the building together, why it's set to face a certain direction so the smallest amount of noise coming from the building would face the closest neighbour. They even stated that the lights on the outside of the facility will point a certain direction so as not to disturb anything in the area. 

Cherry said they'll continue to host the open house styled events to keep communication with the public as well as giving SaskPower an opportunity to hear from people who use that land or an area nearby to live, work and play on that ultimately know it best and can help to provide insight.