Here’s how one of Sask’s largest power stations. was down for 73 days, and what it took to repair it

A group of SaskPower employees recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan’s largest power plants after it was offline for months following a severe flood last summer.

The area around Coronach, Sask. was host to a heavy downpour on the night of June 2, 2023.

The area received just under 65 millimeters of rain in four hours, according to data from Environment Canada.

The sudden rush of water caused a berm in the area to topple over, allowing water and debris to flow directly into the nearby Poplar River Power Station.

The flooding led to an estimated 4,900 hours of repairs and cleanup at the coal-fired power plant – with the incident ultimately costing the province $4.9 million.

Worst off was the station’s pump house.

“It was overwhelming. When you went into the pump house, the amount of straw and mud that had washed in was something,” station director Dalton Giblett told CTV News. “It was incredible.”

After the water was pumped out, the equivalent of 40 round bales were cleared from the ground floor of the pump house. The facility’s 45-foot-deep well, which provides cooling water for the plant, was completely filled with debris.

The cause of the flooding was due to heavy rainfall, which caused a nearby embankment to topple over. The water flowed towards the station’s pump house and the main facility itself, leaving a large amount of debris on board. (Courtesy of SaskPower)

Because the only access point was a three-foot-by-three-foot hatch, Giblett said his team had to return to base to clean up the mess.

“We started removing that after we pumped out the water, one barrel at a time,” he explained. “A total of about 128 round bales came out of that stable.”

The summer weather and cramped conditions presented problems for the workers as they descended the pit with their buckets in hand.

“(It was) early June, so it’s hot, it’s humid…the straw and mud started releasing gases, it started liking yeast. So this all had to be done under breathing air,” Giblett explained. “The rescue procedure required you to wear a harness and tie it off.”

The aftermath of the June 2 storm that caused mud and straw debris to flow into the Poplar River Power Station near Coronach, Sask. (Courtesy of SaskPower)

However, the pump house was just the beginning of the challenges crews faced.

According to Giblett, after the pump house flooded, crews were forced to pump some of the contaminated water into the plant to cool it and take it offline properly.

This meant a major overhaul of most of the plant’s systems to get the station operational again.

“Cleaning things out, heat exchangers, coolers and things like this to make sure that when we turn the units back on or get the pump house going again, we’re not pumping more debris through the system,” Giblett explains.

At the time of the flooding, only one of the station’s two generators was running. After the required cleaning and overhaul work, the two units were returned to service in mid-August, with a total of 73 and 79 days offline respectively.

According to SaskPower, the flooding was a first for the provincial Crown. An improved berm was constructed – in the hope of preventing a similar flood in the future.

“We produce 630 megawatts of power from this power plant, both units were offline at a time when our system load was quite high,” Giblett explains. “It’s something SaskPower as a company has never experienced.”

Official thanks

The efforts of Poplar River staff to get the station back up and running received official recognition at the Legislature on April 22.

Ministers and MLAs from both sides of the assembly came together to express their gratitude for the efforts of the workers involved.

“On behalf of the Government of Saskatchewan, I would like to express our deepest appreciation to these individuals for the work they did over several months last summer and the work they do every day on behalf of the people of this province. Crown Minister Dustin Duncan said as he addressed the meeting.

“I can’t imagine the cleaning, the dedication and the commitment you had to put in to get this station back up and running after the events of last summer,” NDP critic for SaskPower Aleana Young added.

The display was well received by Giblett and his team.

“When people started hearing the story, they started to appreciate the work that was really happening here and wanted to show some recognition, and that was greatly appreciated,” he said. “I wish we could have taken the whole factory – all our employees – because they deserve to be up there.”

He went on to say that nothing can beat the feeling of the day the factory restarted.

“I saw our employees coming in from my window and they looked at the pile and could see there was some steam flowing around,” he recalls.

“There was a smile. It was a sign of victory for us. So that was heartwarming.”