by John Chilibeck, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter. Source: Telegraph-Journal
June 11, 2026

Brad Coady and Lori Clark answering questions at the legislature’s public accounts committee

NB Power’s CEO says her Crown corporation will build at least one more gas plant almost as soon as the controversial one in Tantramar is up and running. And she wants approvals to move quickly.

Lori Clark told reporters on Thursday that the public utility was still facing future electricity shortages. If billions of dollars more capacity isn’t added to the electrical grid, she warns that New Brunswick could be faced with brownouts and rolling blackouts.

“I do expect we will see more combustion turbines required in the future,” the executive said, adding that an additional 400 to 500 megawatts would likely be needed, the same amount as the Tantramar plant is going to produce.

“This is not unique to New Brunswick.”

Green opposition MLA Megan Mitton and other environmentalists are angry about the multibillion-dollar plants, warning they will spew out more greenhouse gases that threaten the world with climate change. They also worry they will pollute the air and water.

But Clark said New Brunswick’s neighbours, Quebec, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, are all considering building combustion gas plants to handle their growing electrical needs.

“There’s not a lot of options that can give us the reliable capacity that we need in the short term. So, gas is what we’re calling the transition fuel,” she said, a nod to NB Power’s commitment to have a net-zero electricity system by 2035, one that generates and supplies electricity with zero greenhouse gas emissions, unless they are cancelled out by certified carbon offsets.

Clark and another NB Power senior executive, Brad Coady, were grilled before the legislature’s public accounts committee for three hours Thursday.

Auditor General’s report

Politicians from all three parties demanded answers after receiving a report last week from the auditor general.

It found that NB Power executives had made critical choices without addressing the

significant financial and contractual risks of building a 500-megawatt plant in southeastern New Brunswick by 2028.

It’s a project that will cost NB Power’s 430,000 direct and indirect customers at least $2.8 billion, leading to future rate hikes for households and businesses.

The American firm PROENERGY will build, own and operate the so-called RIGS plant on behalf of NB Power, under a 25-year deal, subject to environmental approvals.

Auditor General Paul Martin testifying before the legislature’s public accounts committee earlier this month

Among his findings, auditor general Paul Martin said NB Power completed an analysis of alternatives to a gas plant only after the deal was signed.

No supplier quotes were obtained to justify NB Power’s assumption that it couldn’t build the project itself, even though Martin found the utility would pay up to $700 million more for the partnership it had chosen with the money-making firm.

Additionally, there was no backup plan if the provincial regulator had denied or delayed the project.

The report noted that the penalty would have been a US$55-million charge to NB Power, paid to PROENERGY, if the project had been scuttled, a huge risk to the utility’s customers.

In the end, the Energy and Utilities Board (EUB) approved the project last month.

Battery energy storage

Mitton, whose riding of Tantramar will be home to the new plant, is adamant it can still be cancelled and replaced with a huge battery project, which she insisted could be done more cheaply and just as quickly.

She warns that building another gas plant by 2030 – a date cited by NB Power officials – would add more fuel to the world’s climate crisis.

Tantramar MLA Megan Mitton questioning Auditor General on June 2

“I don’t think this is a done deal,” Mitton told reporters.

“Do I think that Premier Susan Holt wants this to happen? Unfortunately, I do. But there are a lot of New Brunswickers that don’t want this to happen, and that don’t want a gas plant built in Lorneville, either,” she said.

We need to change the way we’ve done things in New Brunswick and actually care about people’s health, actually care about our environment and our water.”

A proposed 390-megawatt data centre in Saint John includes construction of a 190-megawatt modular natural gas plant in Lorneville. The other needed 200 megawatts would be drawn from the NB Power electrical grid.

Risk of blackouts

During the committee session, Coady and Clark explained that they had no other choice but to bypass some of the utility’s normal procedures – such as its investment governance framework – to get the gas plant built quickly or risk rolling blackouts.

The plant will be NB Power’s first new major generator since the Belledune Generating Station went into service in 1993.

NB Power VP Brad Coady

Coady said there was no point in seeking quotes from manufacturers of dual combustion turbines because the “market is so hot” for them that they probably wouldn’t have even responded. Instead, NB Power relied on the expertise of a proven performer like PROENERGY that specializes in building and running such plants.

Clark, meanwhile, emphasized that the project had to be built speedily. The population boom following the pandemic – the province has grown by 11% since 2020 – meant that more people were drawing electricity, leading to all-time peaks for power usage in the province in 2022 and again in 2023 during a vicious cold snap in February.

If the power had failed, New Brunswickers would have been in deep trouble, as most people heat with electricity, she said.

Although NB Power bypassed some of its normal processes, Clark said it still made sure to run everything by the corporation’s board of directors and to seek approval from the EUB.

“When I look back at that moment, when the decisions were made to move forward with this energy security project, standing still was not the safest or best option for New Brunswickers,” she said.

“Doing nothing was a risk we were not willing to take on behalf of New Brunswickers. A safe, reliable, secure supply of electricity in New Brunswick, particularly in the coldest months of the year is non-negotiable.”

Pressed on why NB Power didn’t follow the investment framework, Clark told the politicians it would have added five years to the process.

Lack of public confidence

PC MLA Rob Weir

Rob Weir, a Progressive Conservative MLA on the committee, was willing to accept NB Power’s reasons for building the plant, but not the lack of documentation for proving its case.

He blasted Clark and Coady for hurting public confidence in the utility, already at a low because of rising electricity rates that have pushed residential bills up hundreds of dollars a year. In the last four years alone, prices have risen more than a quarter, well above the rate of inflation.

“So not only did they go around the process,” Weir told reporters afterward. “My problem was with they didn’t document why they did.

“I will accept them and their expertise that they needed to go around the process because of brownouts coming forward, and you’re screwed here. But my problem is, it would have been easy to document why, and that is their due diligence.”

Weir said he wasn’t satisfied based on the responses he heard.

“I’m not sure they did get the message, to tell you the truth, but they heard what I’ve said, and hopefully, it’ll sink in,” the politician from Riverview said. “When people are struggling to pay their bills, they’re going to get upset and I don’t blame them.”

Rules need to change

Given that NB Power has estimated it will need an extra 400 to 500 megawatts by 2030, even after the Tantramar plant is built, Clark said it was obvious the provincial government had to change the rules to allow the utility to spend huge sums for important projects more quickly.

“What got us here will not get us the right answers going forward,” she told Brunswick News.

“Things are happening much quicker than they have happened in the last 100 years. So, our processes need to be adapted, with the right level of oversight and governance included in those processes, but the processes need to be adapted to keep up with the changing environment that we’re working in today.”

Government house leader Marco LeBlanc

A Liberal member serving on the committee was willing to give NB Power the benefit of the doubt.

Marco LeBlanc, the government house leader, said he was glad the executives provided a better explanation as to why they bypassed normal rules on such a major project.

“Was it all the answers that I wanted to hear? Maybe not, but I believe they are going to continue to follow due process.

“I have confidence in NB Power.”

This story was written by Local Journalism Initiative Reporter John Chilibeck.