SaskWater report shows Crown's heavy reliance on potash industry

SaskWater's 2016-17 annual report, released Monday, highlights thesignificant role potash plays when it comes to the Crown corporation's distribution numbers.

"Certainly the potash sector is by far and away our largest customer in terms of volumes. They take about 75 per cent of all the water we deliver and most of that is untreated water," said Doug Matthies, CEO of SaskWater.

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SaskWater delivered 35.8 billion litres of non-potable waterin 2016-17. The potash industry accounted for 26.85 billion of those litres, which would fill 71,600 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

The report says "overall consumption volumes for non-potable customers decreased in 2016-17 largely in response to global potash market conditions."

MatthiessaidSaskWatermay look at raising the cost of water in the future if potash continues to drop; however, he said in his observation "the cycles are reasonably short" and don't affect the interest of investors.

Plus,SaskWaterhas a minimum charge built-in to some non-potable and potable water contracts, which can help in circumstances where earningsdecrease.

The report says new customers are an additional offset to lowered consumption numbers.

So, revenues were unaffected,sitting at $53 million. That'sabout $5 million more than the previous fiscal year.

A total of 42.9 billion litres of drinking water and non-potable water weredistributed across Saskatchewan this year.

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