Ball pitches green N.L. power to American governors

Dwight Ballused his first meetings with American governors this week to pitch the province's green energy production though the premier says upcoming power from theMuskrat Falls megaprojectcould betoo expensive to compete in the American marketplace on its own.

Ball was in Boston on Sunday and Monday to take part in his first conference of New England Governors and Eastern Canadian Premiers. Ball says climate change and green energy "dominated" the discussion, and he took the opportunity to lay out what the province had to offer potential customers.

• Eastern premiers, New England governors meeting focuses on energy

"What we have to offer, both in hydro and in windpower, can be part of [a green energy] solution," Ball said Monday evening.

"They're keenly interested in all of this but there's one thing that also came out loud and clear, is that you could be part of the solution but the solution has to be affordable."

Cost coming in high

The premier says hydroelectric power from Muskrat Falls is currently forecast to be more expensive than the rate that U.S. customers arelooking to pay to import green energy.

"I've asked this question, [about] where prices would be in New England right now," Ball said. "The prices that you would see to the consumer...would not be where you would see the Muskrat Falls power today."

Nalcor has said that about 40 per cent of Muskrat's output would be put up for sale in other Canadian or American markets.

Ball says Muskrat's power could be made more attractive in a long contract, orexported in a package with other Newfoundland power sources like the future Gull Island project or wind energy as hydroelectric power generationis particularly stable.

However, he says the priorities right now are to complete Muskrat Falls on the newly-defined budget and schedule, and to simply make sure that potential customers know of Newfoundland and Labrador.

• Muskrat Falls a boondoggle, says Stan Marshall

"This is reallytoo early be havingthat kind of [cost] discussion yet," he said. "Eventually we can get there, but first of all we'vegot to position ourselves...so then what we have available to others, to potential customers is widely known."