Operator Of Port Of Churchill Hopes To Build Bulk Handling Facility By 2009

By: Larry Kusch

Updated: March 25 at 12:55 AM CDT 

THE company that owns and operates the Port of Churchill hopes to build a bulk handling facility there for products such as fertilizer and wood pellets in time for the 2009 shipping season.

Michael Ogborn, managing director of operations for Denver-based OmniTRAX, said Monday that preliminary work, including design, site preparation and obtaining any necessary environmental OKs, would be done this year, with construction occurring next year.

"The plan is to have the facility available for operation in '09," he said.

In October, Prime Minister Stephen Harper visited the port, announcing that the federal and provincial governments and OmniTRAX would spend $68 million on improvements to the northern port and the 1,300-kilometre rail line leading to it.

The three partners each agreed to spend $20 million on rail line upgrades over a 10-year period while the province and Ottawa each committed $4 million for port improvements. In exchange, OmniTRAX, which also owns the rail line from The Pas to Churchill, agreed to continue operating the port for another 10 years.

Ogborn said Monday it is too soon to say how much of the $8 million will be used for the new bulk handling facility, although he said there would be money left for other projects.

Last fall, a Russian ship docked in Churchill with the first incoming ocean freight at the port in seven years -- a load containing 18,000 500-kilogram bags of nitrogen fertilizer bound for Prairie farmers. But the absence of a bulk handling facility discourages substantial shipment of such products through the port.

Currently, the port's main business is exporting grain through its 140,000-tonne elevator. Last year, the Canadian Wheat Board shipped 640,000 tonnes of grain through the port -- a three-decade high.