Cape Breton's Magazine

ing roads and rebuilding bridges built during the first investigations for a power project in the 1950s, drilling to select locations of tunnels and determine problems of mining, and digging pit sites in the search for proper dam-building materials as close as possible to the proposed dam sites. At the same time an investigation into the social and environmental impact of the project is to be carried out. This study will be the first of its kind in the province and thus being watched with great in? terest. A consulting firm, MacLaren Atlantic Ltd., has been hired by the Nova Scotia Power Corporation to prepare a report. This report will go the the federal Depart? ment of the Environment who also have their own people working in the project area. It is apparently the federal Department of Environment and Nova Scotia Power Corpo? ration who work out the guidelines under which this project will proceed. Ultimately the provincial Department of Environment will be responsible for the go-ahead, as it is the issuing authority for any watercourse alteration in the province. The infor? mation gathered by the consulting firm belongs to the power corporation and it will be up to the corporation to determine its public release. Under these circumstances, no one under contract to MacLaren Atlantic Ltd has been available for interview. We have talked to several people at the project site, especially Martin Rancourt, the Resident Engineer, Rock Poulin, the Resident Geologist,and Rege Sweeney, Department of Environment, Fisheries and Marine Resources. Power? house Rock Poulin and Martin Rancourt Martin Rancourt, Resident Engineer: Right now it's what they call a Peak Hydro-Elec? tric Project. That means they will get po? wer out of it only 15 percent of the time. 200 megawatts of power for 15 percent of 24 hours in a day. Gives you one and a half-two hours. That's enough for the Peak. There's enough water for that, with Che? ticamp Reservoirand MacMillan. There's e- nough for the Peak Period • it happens generally at lunchtime and just before suppertirae. That's all the kitchens and everybody cooking in the houses. (Here on Cape Breton?) No, no it's not for Cape Breton. It's for all of Nova Scotia. In? dustries, they keep producing. And to that you add all these women cooking, using a lot of hot water • and it's right there when you've got the Peak • and that is what this project is for. First of all you have 11 dams to build, all earth dams or rockfill dams, with an impervious material in the middle that you call your core dam with the filter material at both sides. Rockfill on each dam for the stability. You've got 11 like that. And in that you've got Surge Lake, Wreck Cove Lake, Gisbourne, Mac? Millan Lake and Cheticamp Lake. They will be a lot larger than they are. From Mac? Millan to Gisbourne you'll have a 16,000 foot long tunnel to interconnect these two Cape Breton's Magazine/3